The Love That Lives On

She swore to God that she'd never fall in love. It was silly, she always said. Silly to give your everything to someone else. Silly to trust. Silly to let your walls down, because then it was so much easier to get hurt.

He swore to her that he'd never break her heart. It was silly, he told her, to believe that everyone was out to get her. Silly to never open up to someone. Silly to never feel like someone cared about her. Silly to never let her walls down, because then nobody could ever prove to her how much they cared.

She smiled the first night he kissed her, alone in the car. They walked up to her room together, hands held tight between them, and when they lay together on the bed, she swore that she'd open up and let him in. He kissed her softly, didn't try anything else. Maybe, she thought, I was wrong about love.

He smiled when he passed her at the party the next night, his eyes locked on another girl. She watched as the other girl kissed him on the lips, as they held each other, as he whispered softly into the other girl's ear. A few hours later, he called her. He swore that he didn't mean it, begged her to come back. I'm sorry, he whispered, I'm so sorry.

She cried for the next week, locked up in her room, throwing everything off of the bed that he had touched. She didn't want to know him, to think about him, to feel him in her heart. But no matter what she did, he was there in her thoughts. She called him on the phone but he didn't answer. I think I love you, she said quietly to the answering machine.

He cried when he realized that he missed her call, cried when he listened to her voicemail. Everything was going wrong when just a few days before it had been so right. He meant to call her back that night but he fell asleep. The next day, the phone call was just a memory.

And then she left.

He searched the entire city for her, day in and day out, but she was nowhere to be found. At nights he sat alone in his small apartment, staring out the window at the moon, wondering if she was looking at it too. Some nights he smiled, remembering the time they had shared. Some nights he cried. Most nights he wondered just why he had broken his promise to her. He wanted to call her, but he knew that he had messed up, and his pride kept him from dialing her number. He deleted all the pictures they had taken together, erased the kiss of her lips from his memory.

A month passed and then two, and suddenly she was back. All of the emotions, the memories, the thoughts that he had tried to erase suddenly came swarming back. She wouldn't hug him, wouldn't even talk to him. One night he cornered her outside of a party. I think I love you, he told her. Then he started crying and added, Actually, I know I love you. I love you more than the moon and the stars. I love you more than cheesecake or chocolate, more than surfing, more than riding my motorcycle. I love you more than alcohol, and that's saying a lot, and I love you more than I've ever loved someone in my entire life. I know I messed up. It was my fault, entirely mine. But since you left, you've been my first thought, my last thought, and every thought in between. You've been every sound, every smell, and every taste, and to imagine my life without you is to imagine death. I probably sound cliche right now but that's how much I love you.

For a moment, she didn't speak. Then she swore to him, once and for all, that she'd never fall in love again. With a sad smile on her face, she turned on her heel and disappeared into the darkness.