I LOVE YOU; I LOVE YOU NOT

I got tired of seeing him as the only one available. I had to see him as my only one, my special one, my love; I have to love him from my heart; my innermost heart.
I’ve got to admit, he is really special. He smells like rose. Being the first person to see every morning, I could imagine waking up in a field of roses of different colourful fragrances. Oh, how I loved to smell him every morning. I thought it was just sentimental to think such things about him earlier on. He was a human being just like me and “He does have the right to smell good, doesn’t he?” I said to myself.
Well, this is 2019, and there is no disputing of the fact that he smells nice and right too. I also respect a whole lot about him, from his gestures, to his manly responses, to his sweet way of envisaging and solving problems well before they arrive. He is the man every right woman would dream of and judging by his sense of judgement, his apercu was always on point. It was like his every verdict was nonnegotiable and there just had to be a way wherever he says there could be one. To sum all this vocabulary up, he was nearly impeccable. You just have to believe every word he says and whatever he does is “shazam”! Working out perfectly well!
I didn’t want to admit it, but I was falling in love. I hated to admit it, I was too proud to, but I could hardly spend a day feeling alright without hearing his thick baritone voice saying his favourite words, “IT IS WELL”. Mike had a heart of stone, he never believed in the lost hope of a broken heart, but he was also nice and tender, and I knew this quite well. He felt hurt every time I responded like I hated him for putting us in such a mess, by agreeing to marry me! I wanted to kick, punch and break him all at once, I didn’t just know how to. I used to imagine his face every time I wanted to grind something on the stone, I must confess. It is over three months now and I have to let the past go. T this point, there is a need to embrace reality. I was married to Mike Showo, he was my husband; my beloved husband, I was supposed to love him with all the love there is in the world.
My uncle would always say, “It is better to understand at your own time”. Then, I would ask, what if your time was late. But this time, I’m so sure it’s not too late to acknowledge that mike is a good man, perhaps the best time. I just needed more time to think of enough reasons why I did love him, it is so clear now that I love him, but I have this thing called ego and with NO CONVINCING, there is NO LOVING! How long would I continue to deceive myself? This was a man I had spent a part of my life with, perhaps the most significant part; first three months of marriage. Do I not have enough reasons to convince myself? I have had Mike revel in the lie that I hated him, and wanted nothing to do with him, but now that it is so obvious that I will be spending the rest of my life with him, I find to find my happiness. Mike on the other hand was never giving up. His annoying response to every of my whims and caprices was always,” I am here to serve you, just call the shots and I m ready to go for it”. It was so annoying, I am usually dumbfounded and wouldn’t know what else to say, but I know that he is just never giving up!
The right choice at this point was telling him that I love him. That it was all a mistake: everything I had said before. All I needed was humility and the courage to face him. I hardly looked into his eyes, except when I wanted him to feel what I thought I felt for him-hatred. But when I looked in them, all I could see was love; I never really understood that part though. Was it that the hatred didn’t get to him? Or his big muscular frame could withstand every punch of hatred I was giving him. He did always punch back though, but with love.
Well, “It was time”, I thought to myself. I’m tired of just thinking about it, I have to tell Mike Showo, that I love him. I could get tongue-tied saying it, but I just needed to confess those words. The right time finally came.
He came back from work with two full bags of groceries as was his custom every Thursday. He knew I wouldn’t want to tell him if the groceries had finished. So, he did that just in case it was finished and I didn’t talk. I didn’t know how to start, where to start from. All I knew was that we needed to start afresh, Mike and me (enough of living in delusion). I had starved him of a lot of things in this union. And I wasn’t opening up. It was really bad, and I felt so wicked to have done that. Mike entered as usual, “Hello there”, he said. I responded, “I...I...um...”. “What is the matter?” He said. “I want to make some toast, so I was wondering if you will like to have some?”, “Oh no! Not right! Not right!” I muttered to myself. “Of course, I would love to” Mike responded smiling suspiciously. “Did this man standing over here just read my mind?” I asked myself. Or why else was he smiling? So off I went to the kitchen, and came back in the next 7 minutes with a dish full of toast for Mike and me.
Sincerely, why I did that, I do not know till this day. I wasn’t known for sharing my food with someone else, let alone Mike, but I did anyway. I served Mike who had already freshened up. Then, I decided that we ate together. I could see the expression on his face. He was like THE most surprised creature in the world! We then sat at the table. I still couldn’t wait to express my feelings for Mike. He hadn’t taken a bite, when I said these words, “Mike, I'm so sorry about the way I had been treating you, you never deserved it. It took me this long to realize, but now I DO. I LOVE YOU MIKE and I can’t imagine some girl out there treating our son like I had treated you these past months”.
There was silence; I guess he was probably digesting all I just said at that moment, maybe, trying to digest the fact that we were having a son soon. Or that we will soon have one since we were going to be close. I could tell that he was in shock! I had probably broken his heart, but in a good way. Was I supposed to say something or was he supposed to save us this silence with the next line? Then I continued” Mike, it took me these past months and few days to realize that I have fallen in love with you. Please say something!” I was beginning to cry”.... because you do not know how much humility and courage it is taking me to say this to you”. And that was the first time I saw Mike Showo shed tears. It was the start of a new beginning.
He stood up and what came out of his mouth was, “Come here baby”. I was glad that the burden had finally lifted; I was free to appreciate Mike as my husband, love him as his wife and be free to be close to him to have our kids! It was like a brand new day and we both knew it!
It was then that it all became clear to me: It takes two to tango, but you do not need the other person to love you back, to love them. If the love is genuine, it will surely find a mate.