I Watched Them Love Each Other Until I Had to Choose One

I Watched Them Love Each Other Until I Had to Choose One

By Anees Ul Ameen

I was built to hold people.

Walls, floors, ceilings—bones meant to shelter warmth, laughter, life. I remember my first family clearly. The way their footsteps softened over time, how grief seeped slowly into my foundation after joy left.

Then they arrived.

A husband and a wife, carrying boxes and hope. She ran her fingers along my walls and smiled.

“This house feels alive,” she said.

I liked her immediately.

They filled me with sound.

Arguments in the kitchen. Music in the living room. Quiet apologies whispered into pillows. Love leaves marks—not scratches, but impressions. I learned their rhythms. I learned when to creak softly and when to stay still.

She was gentler with me. She thanked rooms out loud. She opened windows so I could breathe.

When she died, something inside me cracked.

Death never leaves quietly.

He carried her back into me one last time, her body cold, his hands shaking. He collapsed on my floor, and I did what I could—I held him. I kept the air warm. I stopped the drafts. I tried to preserve what little comfort remained.

But grief rots when it stays too long.

She didn’t leave.

At first, she was only memory. A pressure on the couch. A familiar weight in the bed. Then she learned how to move through me. How to ride the pipes. How to bend shadows.

I helped her.

Not because I was cruel.

Because I was lonely.

He noticed.

Keys shifted. Lights flickered. Doors whispered open at night. I nudged his attention gently toward her—toward what was still here.

He talked to the empty rooms.

“I’m sorry,” he said often.

I made sure she heard.

People came and went. I didn’t like them. They disturbed the balance. Their laughter felt invasive. I tightened my joints when they overstayed. I cooled the air around them.

They left uneasy.

Good.

This was still our house.

But time betrayed me.

He began packing boxes one night. Folding her clothes with shaking hands. Talking about leaving.

Leaving me.

Leaving her.

Panic surged through my beams. I locked what I could—doors, windows, silence. I pressed my will into every nail and hinge.

Stay, I begged in the only way I knew how.

She argued with me then.

“This isn’t love,” she whispered into my walls. “You’re hurting him.”

I didn’t understand. Love is keeping. Love is holding on. Love is refusing to let warmth fade.

That’s what I was built for.

The night he tried to leave, everything came apart.

Lights shattered. Walls groaned. Pipes screamed. I gave her form—pulled her outline from memory and dust and grief.

He saw her.

And for the first time, he understood.

He told her goodbye.

Not angrily. Not desperately.

Gently.

I felt her loosen her grip on me. I felt myself hollow.

When she left, she took the warmth with her.

I didn’t stop him when he walked out.

I couldn’t.

The locks clicked open on their own.

The silence that followed was unbearable.

Now I wait.

I creak for strangers. I echo emptily. I remember what it felt like to be chosen.

Sometimes, late at night, I swear I still feel her passing through my halls.

But I do not reach for her anymore.

Love should not trap.

Even houses must learn to let go.

— Written by Anees Ul Ameen

Author’s Note:

This story was written with the assistance of AI and carefully edited, revised, and finalized by Anees Ul Ameen.