Love

There are better ways to describe love than using the word love. It's embrace, empathy, passion, right? Still wrong. Love is inexplicable. It's not a feeling, its a being. Love breathes strong, clear breaths. They say when you know you know but I disagree. Don't be fooled, love is strong and clear but it is confusing, suffocating, and bitter at times. So there is no way to truly know if someone is right for you. It is a mix of all things beautifully and toxically consuming.

I met him nearly 4 years ago now. He is my person. A sentence that seems to almost always be followed with "for now" or "until college" from anyone I talk to. People who don't understand our minds, young and eager with a short attention span. Our impressionable, fourteen-year old minds grew together. We are each other. We learned how to live from each other. To some, this may be seen as a disadvantage. Like we can't be ourselves without each other. Like we have no true self without each other. What if who I am is who he has helped me become? Maybe I'm wrong. I would survive without him and vice versa. But why if we don't have to?

There are many people who look up to us, other teenagers of course. The way we walk hand in hand everywhere we go, the way we look at each other before we kiss goodbye, the way you open the door for me no matter where we are, the way I slip little letters in your pockets when I hug you. So many people want what we have. So why do I doubt us? Why do I worry that we aren't made for each other? I am hopelessly in love but I'm not naïve. I know most high school couples don't make it through college. But what if? What if not? I know we will survive one way or the other but I so desperately want it to be you. I want it to be our late night calls and our last minute ice cream dates and our lazy movie days and our tears after a fight. I want the good and the bad as long as its our good and bad.

The way that I see it, there is no such thing as soulmates. If you want something bad enough you make it work. People who 'fall out of love' never experienced true, authentic love in the first place. Maybe you disagree. That's fine. I just know that there's a difference between no longer loving something and finding something you enjoy more. I will never fall out of love with him. He is my first love. I know it is true because I find myself looking for ways to better us everyday. I drive by a candy store, I should get him his favorite snacks so he knows I am thinking of him. I find a random piece of paper, I should write him a letter and put it on his car to let him know I love him. I accomplish a personal goal, I should go over to his house and thank him for being my motivation and support to do better. No matter what it is, he is the first and last person to cross my mind always.

This love is all things grand but it is also not. You've made me love you and I hate you for that. You've made me rely on you and I hate you for that. You've made look to you for reassurance, embrace, and nurture and I hate you for that. You've made moving across the country not so difficult and I hate you for that. All because my soul is ties to you. Leaving is no longer an option. Every lie, every manipulation, every fight. They will be worked out because I refuse to lose you. We will work on it because all things worth while take time and effort.

Love is complex and in it's eyes we are ordinary and nothing short of generic. But to me, we're perfect. You're who I want to be. You're who I want my kids to be. So while I may not end up with you, but I will never love another like you.