Love has a funny way of showing itself.
Brad fell in love with Sarah because, when he met her, she couldn’t remember her name. Her brown hair fell into her green eyes and she danced to the music like they always tell you to, like she didn’t care if anyone was watching, like she was trying to make people see this is what life was about. Without knowing him, she wrapped her arms around him and swayed around the room with him to some utterly insignificant song, her eyes closed, her body free and fluid.
“What’s your name?” he shouted, needing to know her, needing to assign meaning to this moment.
And she threw her head back, laughed like a child being tickled, laughed at the absurdity of such a question. “Hell, I can’t even remember what century I’m in, much less who I am!”
When the music died down, the lights came back on, and everyone left, she remembered her name was Sarah. He told her his name was Brad. “Well, Brad, I’m in the mood for a big warm cinnamon roll. I know the perfect place. You coming?”
He did. He had known her two hours, but he knew then he would follow her anywhere because she had a spark he lacked, an understanding of life he admired. They went to a tiny hole in the wall café that sold one pound cinnamon rolls. He bought two, one for them to share, one for her to tuck snugly into her colorful purse covered in tiny pins about love, dancing, and music. They stayed at the café talking and eating until dawn.
She dragged him to the park so that they could watch the sun rising over the river. He let her sit on his coat, even though it was 30 degrees outside and he only had on a sweater, because being with her was warmth itself. She reached into her bag and unwrapped the extra cinnamon roll, tearing off a piece and placing it in her mouth, moaning in delight. She licked her fingers and commented, “You know, love is like a cinnamon roll. It’s sweet and delicious and tastes better warm.”
He kissed her because she was right, and because he was already falling in love with her, and because it just good to forget himself for a while. When he pulled back, she smiled, her eyes sparkling more than any star, and said, “I’ve been waiting all night for that. You don’t disappoint.”
He loved her because she sometimes pronounced her Ls as Ws and was the first person who ever made him dance in the rain and her smile reminded him of the warmth in hot chocolate. He loved her because she said no the first time he slid his hand up her shirt and made him wait four months for sex. He loved her because she cried at his sweetness the first time he insisted he walk her home.
She told him she loved him because his blue eyes are old. Because he didn’t like Beethoven, preferred Spiderman to Batman, and poetry to prose. Because he secretly loved the smell of roses, smelled of pine trees, and when he held her she felt so big and small at the same time. She wouldn’t tell him what that meant.
He began to hate her when she told him the truth behind her scars. She cried and told him she really didn’t have it figured out, and she liked dancing in the rain because it made her forget her pain, and her eyes were always so sparkly just because she was one step away from crying, and he made her cry when he walked her home because she had forgotten anyone cared. She really wasn’t afraid of sex, she was afraid of his eyes when he saw her scars. She cried for hours when she saw his quiet, silent gaze stare at her legs in nonchalant fascination.
She began to hate him when she realized why he was always so quiet. He told her his mom died young, his dad bought a gun, and no one ever believed the bruises they could not see. He didn’t like Beethoven because his dad played it while drinking; Spiderman soared from rooftops, Batman hid in shadows; poetry hinted at pain, prose explained too well; roses reminded him of his mom, pine trees of the first full day he went without thinking of how she died; he held her because he feared she would run away.
He never hated her more than the day he walked into her apartment to find her crying in the bathroom, blood streaming from the cuts on her legs, mascara streaming down in rivers from her eyes, crying I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
She never hated him more than the day he angrily punched the wall, his old blue eyes ablaze, hair wild like weeds and light like snow, muscles tensing and clenching as he whispered I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, Damn You I Love You.
He hated her because she hated herself. She hated him because he wouldn’t hate her. They loved each other because they fit like a hand in a glove.
And despite all the pain, they stayed together because life anywhere else wasn’t worth living.
Dominique Zuniga 