She was so flighty that I didn't think she would ever settle down with anyone, but when she met Aaron it soon turned into a serious relationship. He was over most nights and I had to hear them make love and then she started screaming. He was the only one, and I hated it. I tried to be a good friend and like him but I hated him and there was always tension between us, even though I would never tell her why I felt like that. The relationship lasted over a year. I had to watch them cook together, do jigsaw puzzles together, play board games together, watch movies together, do all the things that we should have been doing together.
I focused on my career and spent as much time as the office as possible, trying to avoid that which caused me pain. While I worked there, I started chatting to one of the interns, a redheaded girl named Denise. We hit it off instantly and the more time I spent there the more time I felt like I could have a proper life, a proper relationship. We laughed and I started to notice Denise's laugh. We went to a pancake restaurant for our first proper date and I noticed the way she would chew so that her mouth didn't open, and after she finished she dabbed both corners of her mouth with her napkin, then smiled at me, satisfied. I reached across the table and took her hand. She didn't know the magnitude of the gesture but for the first time I was able to enjoy a date without Bea getting in the way. I didn't compare the two of them. I appreciated Denise for her, and for what she could offer me.
But always I had to return to the apartment where the two of them were and they looked so happy, so in tune that my own relationship felt inadequate. And I noticed that Bea began to change as well. She took more interest in the news and current affairs. She started to grow her hair out as well. When I asked her why she told me that she wanted to try something new for Aaron. Then new things started appearing in our fridge. Gone was the continual parade of Chinese takeout, replaced by colorful vegetables and batches of homemade soup. Bea was becoming domesticated and I didn't understand it. She had never changed for anyone before and I didn't understand why she was starting now. Aaron was changing her, and I didn't like it. Most of all I didn't like the fact that I wasn't the one who changed her.
My relationship with Denise suffered after that. I started to question my feelings for Bea. Was it really fair to call it love when it was unrequited? Didn't that just mean it was a waste of time and energy, and that it didn't amount to anything? It was a hard thing to figure out because to me it was everything. It had been a part of me and was lodged in my soul. I felt like I could never let go of my love for her because I'd be saying goodbye to a piece of myself, and without it I would be empty...yet at the same time I knew that I would never be fulfilled until I found out a way to reconcile the love I felt for her with the situation at hand. As much as I didn't want to accept it, Aaron didn't seem to be going anywhere.
It was actually when I was back home for a trip that I came to a new understanding of things. I had popped round to see Bea's parents and I was telling them about Aaron, for he was such a big part of Bea's life that I couldn't very well leave him out. When I spoke about him I realized that I was listing all his good qualities, and the truth was that there were many, and he had managed to temper Bea's tempestuous spirit, something that nobody else had. I realized then that he was actually good for her, and that the love I had for Bea was a selfish love because it was only focused inwardly rather than out to her. A wave of serenity washed over me and I felt cleansed, like all the turbulent emotions had been wiped clean from my body and I was free again, for the first time my mind was clear and I could think clearly. My life didn't have to revolve around Bea. I was my own person, and just because we had always been tethered to each other and had been the opposites of each other it didn't mean that when she was happy I had to be sad, or vice versa.
I left home that day with the intention of committing myself to Denise and making our relationship a serious one, to tell her my innermost thoughts and trust her with the secrets I had been carrying around with me. That was my intention. But when I arrived home I found Bea in tears.
Chapter 4
I dropped my bag and rushed over to her and asked her what happened. Her words were intelligible and all I could do was hold her, cradle her to my bosom until the weeping subsided. When she finally gathered her breath she told me that Aaron had left, that he'd sat down and told her that things weren't working out and she just wasn't what he was looking for. How dare he? How dare that man say that Bea wasn't good enough for him when she was a goddess.
As I stroked her head I noticed how strange it still was to feel the long, thick tresses of hair roll down her shoulders. Her eyes were raw and red but they still retained that almost mystical beauty, as though the entire universe was sparkling within them. I made soothing noises and heard her tell the whole story through heaving breaths, how he hadn't been happy for a while, and that he felt she was holding him back. I tried to tell her that he was a fool and he was the one holding her back, and that he was the one who was making the mistake, but she just couldn't believe it. She wouldn't believe it. The tears seemed like they were never going to stop and I wanted to do anything to stem the flow, I searched my mind for an old joke to take her back to a time when we didn't have to worry about boys or anything else, but nothing seemed adequate, and for the first time I didn't know how to make her laugh. Her laugh had been stolen from me and my hatred for Aaron burned brighter than the heat from a thousand raging suns.