My Endless Love

My Endless Love
by J. L. Ford

It's been so long since I've been to this house. Several years have passed, yet this house seems no different than when she was mine. I feel like I've walked forever just to come back to this most awful and most beautiful of all places.
The front door still has the same doorknob. Oh, how I hated that knob! I still remember our first date. We were so into each other that we'd only gotten to her front door before our passions started to overtake us.
"Jared, let's go inside," she practically begged me. I pushed her up against the door as our lips continued to press against each others. I reached for the knob and tried to turn, but it wouldn't turn.
"Oops, I forgot to unlock it," she giggled in such a delightful way that I had to restrain myself from kissing her even more. She turned and put the key in, turning it. I heard a click, and that was enough for me. I took her in my arms and began to passionately kiss her again as I reached for the knob.
"Is there a trick to your door?" I asked as I chuckled, feeling more than a little embarrassed. Here we were on her doorstep, about five seconds away from tearing each other's clothes off, and I couldn't even open a door.
She laughed, turned, and took my hand. I could feel her soft fingers glide over mine, guiding them into place. Then I felt her wrist jerk the knob back and open the door. I was so elated at the thought of the door opening it wasn't until the next day that I realized the importance of her showing me how to open the door, instead of merely opening it.
So it was that today, I reached out my hand, setting my fingers in place the same way she showed me how to place them so long ago. With the same jerk I had gotten used to using, the door opened with ease, and I walked in.
Of course, nobody was home, right now. It would be a couple hours before anyone would be home, so I had the whole house to myself. Slowly I walked in, almost afraid to see what changes had been made since I was gone.
The living room was perfectly the same. She hadn't rearranged, she hadn't even replaced the awful carpetting. The nail polish stain was still right next to the couch, a painful reminder of happier days.
We had only been seeing each other six weeks when she asked me to move in. I said yes without hesitation. She had a beautiful place and I loved her so much. She could have asked me for anything, I would have given her the world.
The first day I was living with her, she was lying on the couch, her feet on a towel, hunched over painting her nails. I had just moved the last of my things in when I went to sit by her.
"Careful, I'm doing my nails," she said as I sat down on the arm, reaching out for her neck and shoulders with my hands, rubbing some knots out of them.
"You just do your nails. I've got something else to do," I said as I kept rubbing her shoulders. She sighed just enough for me to hear.
"That feels so good, Jared," she said as she sat up, nail polish still in hand.
I merely smiled as I continued to massage her neck, then reached for the nail polish. She looked a bit confused as I took the polish from her, then replaced the cap, shaking the small bottle slightly. When I sat down on the other side, placing her feet on my lap, the smile on her face filled my heart with joy. Had nobody every treated her with love?
She softly giggled as I painted her toenails for her. It was a lovely shade of pink that matched her fingernails and the dress she was wearing to dinner that night.
We talked very little as I painted her toenails. Soon, I heard a small, mischievous giggle escape from her. As I looked up, I got hit square in the face with a pillow. I laughed, set the nail polish down on the floor and grabbed my own pillow.
I had never heard her laugh with as much vigor and life as I heard that day. We slapped each other with pillows until I threw mine to the floor and held her to the couch, tickling various spots I had found in the last six weeks, and trying to find more.
"Okay! I give!" she called, but I continued to tickle for a moment more. She kicked out, trying to get her leg away from my hands, knocking another pillow off the couch. She looked down and her jaw dropped as she started to laugh, again.
"Oops!" I had to laugh. She knocked the pillow onto the nail polish, knocking it over and spilling it all over the carpet.
"See what you've done?" I asked her, a big smile on my face, "You had to keep going until something happened, didn't you?"
"Me? You're the one that didn't stop tickling me," she replied, a smile just as large on her face. I lay over her for several moments, just looking into her eyes, seeing her beautiful face look back at me. I leaned down and started kissing her, tenderly at first, then becoming more passionate. We never went out to dinner, that night.
Seeing the polish still there makes me wonder if she ever regretted that horrible night just a few years ago. How long did it take for her to get over me? Maybe she's not over me, yet. Maybe there's still a chance. I've just got to show her how much I love her.
With that, I walked into the kitchen. The kitchen was completely clean and spotless. She always cared about keeping the kitchen clean. Even when she baked those cookies for me, she kept the kitchen clean.
It was only six hours since I had been called to the hospital because my brother had been shot. He was always a cocky little bastard and a smart ass. If only I'd known he'd gotten into drugs, maybe I could have helped him. But instead, he mouthed off to some pusher and got shot. We'll never know the full story, and somehow I think I found comfort in that.
I was still so heartbroken. Mom had lost dad in action when he was in the army. My sister caught some kind of disease when she went overseas and she died. So all my mom had was myself and my brother, and now my brother was gone.
I went home and found her there, making my favorite cookies, oatmeal raisin. I walked over to her and she reached out, taking me in her arms. She held me for an eternity as I broke down and wept. It was the first time she'd ever seen me cry. She just stood there and held me, not trying to quiet me, not trying to get my crying under control. She just held me.
Finally I had gotten my sobbing under control and she just looked at me asking if I was alright. I didn't know how to answer. How does one answer that question after such a tragedy. I didn't know what to do or what to say. I just shrugged, my machismo returning. I sniffled once, cleared my throat, then replied, "I'll be fine."
The look she gave me told me that she knew I didn't know. Still, she made those cookies, setting the first batch in front of me. I reached out and ate one, then looked up at her. Of all the things in the world I knew, there was one I knew more than anything else. I stood up, took her in my arms, and whispered in her ear, "Marry me, Love."
She smiled, looked in my eyes, and gave me a reply I wasn't expecting.
"Ask me when you're not hurting."
My world seemed to fall apart. She wasn't saying no, but she didn't say yes, either. What was wrong? Didn't she love me? I tried to make sense of everything as I got up and went upstairs to our room. I would be able to lay down and take a nap.
So I headed upstairs now, to see if our room was just the way it was so many years ago. I knew it would be. It was. The queen-sized bed sitting against the far wall, new sheets on it. It was just as I remembered them that night.
I was so heartbroken. My world was falling apart, and I didn't know where to go, where to turn. Or was that how I felt now? Maybe it was both. I just remembered feeling so lost. I loved her more than anything in the world, and she wouldn't marry me.
My mind was such a mess that I don't remember what else happened that night. I just remember that she was gone from me forever after that. Every so often, little hallucinations would drift into my mind to offer a suggestion, but there's no way I could have ever done that.
Yet, the hallucination never changed. It never wavered. It came every night that I walked these cold, dark halls. A thought, maybe a memory, of me walking to the closet where I kept my father's pistol. A thought, no, it was a memory, of me loading the gun with only one bullet.
I will never see her again. I will never hold her again. I will never again hear her laugh or giggle. I have gone somewhere she will never be. She will never be the prisoner I made myself so many years ago. I only hope she is well.