(French, n.)

It happens slowly, insidiously; it happens like a cliché in a book you haven't read. She makes you smile, validates you, talks to you in a way you can't talk to anyone else. She's beautiful and imperfect and every imperfection draws you in. They make you feel as though you know her just a little better, having seen the things she doesn't show anyone else, the things she doesn't even notice about herself. People are inherently flawed, and you find comfort in each crack. You find beauty in the fractures, in how you care about each other despite the flaws, how you can stand some and not others, how they define relationships the way nothing else can. You see her imperfections and they wrench you in, unwilling.

You didn't know what love felt like, didn't understand. You know you still don't, but now you sometimes feel that you do. There's a moment, a realization. It's earthshattering in its plurality, one moment stretched through time, driving a dawning conclusion that should have been obvious but wasn't. You’ve read books about people in love. Hundreds of books. The pages ran together, the characters were forgotten, but there were always things you put in false boxes, things that couldn't be true, things that didn't fit your conception of love. You didn't think someone could ever be in love and not know it; it just didn't make sense. How could someone be so lacking in self awareness? How could someone not notice that particular ache? But you were, and you didn’t, and there was a catalyst that doesn't really matter now. In retrospect, you think maybe you were protecting yourself.

She leans in and whispers. She draws you in with her dark eyes and her sparkling words and you feel tension build up in you. You can hear your heart beating, feel it bruising the cavity in your chest, feel every molecule in your body burning, spreading until you can't find the origin. She makes you feel wanted, excited in a way you've never felt before. Every interaction is filled with potential. At least, that's how it feels. She doesn't know how you feel; you can't tell her even though you want her to know. You're stuck between wanting and fear. You don't think you’ll be able to handle rejection. It will break you.

She leans in and whispers and you lie to yourself. This thing between you is more than she says it is. You wait for her to have this realization too. You wait for her to fall in love because love follows lust, doesn't it? That's how it works. You wait for her because it's easier to want the unattainable than it is to accept reality, easier than ever overcoming your insecurities. You don’t tell her, but you wait for her and you hate yourself.

You are filled with fury, anger glowing brighter and brighter as it consumes you. You can't blame her for not feeling how you feel, but you can hate her for using you. They say the opposite of love isn't hate, because if you hate someone it means you still care, but it feels like a step in the right direction. You don’t tell her, but it seems impossible that she doesn’t know. And if she knows and still uses you, your hate is justified. You have a choice between sorrow and fury, and the fury is more useful. You wield it, use it as a tool, because you can't be in love and angry at the same time, right? Now instead of imagined confessions of love, you picture confrontations. You envision the anger burning through you and devouring everything. Somehow, fury hurts more than sorrow.

You write about her—to her—in letters she will never read. You write as though making the thoughts tangible will remove them from your head. You read your words over and over. You want to remind yourself of the ache. You ask her about her girlfriend, ask her to tell you how happy she is. You spend time with them; they glow with intimacy. You want it to hurt. The more it hurts, the easier it will be to let go of the parts of you that are inextricably linked to your idea of her. You start to catalogue the things you don't like about her, to build a wall around yourself in those little details, like they'll protect you, separate you from her and your conception of her. Every twinge is mortar that holds the wall together.

You hope for a future in which you see her and feel nothing.

La douleur exquise: the heartbreaking pain of wanting someone you can’t have.

Words…

Everywhere all I see are words,

Telling stories,

Expressing thoughts,

Written in poems,

Unraveling emotions...

All I did was to read them,

Acquaint with them,

Cherish them;

But then, ’tis are not enough-

My hunger unfilled,

My thirst unquenched.

The time has come,

I’ve learned how to free them-

I will begin to write.

Words…

My world is filled with them.

Now I will write

From fiction, poem, haikus or prose-

Satisfying my hunger;

Relieving my thirst.

The time has come,

There is no stopping from here;

I will begin to write.