Love vs. Logic

Love: I really like her.

Logic: Why?

Love: Well, many reasons.  She's cute, for one.

Logic: What else?

Love: She.....she's so.....bubbly.  Perky.  She possesses this sort of.....glow.  I can't explain it.

Logic: Try.

Love: She's changed.  I've always liked her, since we first started talking at Lincoln.  But.....now, it's like.....it's like she stripped off that mask she wore everywhere, that veil she had to avoid letting people in.  She's so much happier than I remember her being before.  She's.....beautiful.  In more ways than one.

Logic: You can't tell her without thinking it through..

Love: Why not?

Logic: For one, how can you be sure this is love, and not just you sick of being alone?

Love: Well, I'm not actually sure whether or not it's love.  All I know so far is that I've liked her for a long time, and these feelings have increased since the last time we hung out.

Logic: This could be a repeat of Heaven.

Love: This is different.  This isn't an immature eighteen-year-old boy wanting to be in a relationship because he subconsciously wants to heighten his self-esteem, and he has this need to be loved.  This is a rationally-thinking nineteen-year-old man who is wants to be in a relationship, but wants it to go somewhere.  I want to give her what every woman deserves from a man: respect, love, companionship, faithfulness.  Courage.  Support.

Logic: What about Heaven?

Love: I never thought I'd move on from her for a long time.  But, I really started thinking, and realized: why mope?  She was wrong for me from the very beginning, and I knew it, but was too immature to realize it.  Yes, I loved her.  Yes, I wanted to be with her.  Yes, I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.  But she's not the one for me, and it's so painfully obvious.  I miss us, when we were friends, so close.  But that'll never happen again.

Logic: Maybe you're doing this to move on.

Love: Doing what?  I haven't even told her yet.  I don't even know if I'm going to.  However, I have moved on.  The thought of Heaven being with someone else doesn't bother me.  I never realized how manipulative, mean, and selfish she can be.  As well as immature.  She's not the one for me at all.

Logic: You never said what it is exactly that attracts you to Stephanie.

Love: Because it's hard to explain.  She has this air about her, this.....aura.  Like I said, she's so bubbly.  It's the only word I can think of.  But it drives me wild.  She's like.....she's just so cute, and I'm not talking about just her looks.  That first night we hung out--yesterday--I was like, wow.  Something just sort of fell into place.  I just.....it's so hard to explain, because words really can't explain it.

Logic: Fair enough.  Why don't you tell her?  Are you scared of rejection?

Love: It's not exactly a fear of rejection, per se.  It's a fear of history repeating itself.  I don't want this to be another Heaven.

Logic: Heaven didn't freak out when you told her you loved her.  She ended it when you hit her.

Love: Which was an accident.  I wasn't on my meds, and she provoked me.  Seriously provoked me, and everyone agrees with me.  I'm still beating myself up over that, so let it go.

Logic: The point is, after you told Heaven your feelings, what happened?

Love: We eventually got together.  After she broke my heart by telling me she had this infatuation with a guy she barely knows--a guy with a fuckin English accent, for Christ sake--and that I needed to move on.  She continually broke my heart between the time I confessed my feelings for her and when we got together four months later.

Logic: But you two eventually got together.

Love: And look what happened!

Logic: There's someone out there for everyone.

Love: For crying out loud, I don't even know if I should tell Stephanie!

Logic: This is your problem, Nicholas: when it comes to females, you never take the risk.  What do you think will happen, the right girl will eventually fall into your lap?

Love: Of course not.

Logic: Then what's the harm in telling her?

Love: Well, I'm kind of going to be living with her for a few days.  It would be awkward if I told her before I left.

Logic: So it isn't awkward living with someone you really like, who pushes every one of your buttons, who drives you crazy insane with passion, but they have no clue?

Love: You have a point.

Logic: What do you have to lose?

Love: A good friendship.

Logic: But what do you have to possibly gain?

Love: That's the key word, "possibly."  There's no guarantee.

Logic: But there's no guarantee that you'll be shot down.  There are no guarantees when it comes to love, Nicholas.  Love is about taking risks, not waiting for them to make the move.  Be a man.

Love: I just don't want to lose another friend.  Think about it, why would Stephanie want to have anything to do with me as anything more than a friend?

Logic: She did tell you at one point that she loved you.

Love: Yeah, but love me how?  Who's to say she didn't mean love me as a friend?

Logic: You're too pessimistic about females.

Love: She told me about what's happened to her.  The abuse, the trauma.

Logic: How do you feel about it?

Love: It enrages me.  I'm still angry.  I just.....words cannot describe.  The injustice of it all.  The thought of another man--or anyone, for that matter--laying their hands on her fills me with such a black hatred that I've never felt before.  How anyone could ever hurt her baffles me.  How could you hurt her?  She.....she's such a sweetheart.  Why would you ever want to lay your hands on her with intent to harm her?  It makes me want to lash out at the bastards who did it to her, make them suffer, make them pay for what they've done to her.

Logic: How did you react to what she told you?

Love: I was steamed.  I wanted to lash out at everything around me.  Yet at the same time, I just wanted to take her in my arms and tell her that everything will be all right from now on, I promise.  I know for sure now: this isn't puppy love.  This isn't a crush.  I really think I'm in love with her.  I've thought about it so much, so deeply, and I'm very certain of it.  I don't want to rush into it.  I want.....I want to be sure.

Logic: And are you?

Love: I think I am.  I really do.  Everything about her is.....radiant.  When I see her smile, it brings a smile to my face.  The sound of her laughter fills me with this undescribable feeling of bliss, like everything is all right again.  Whenever I'm around her, my thoughts run wild, and I can't help but think "What if?"  Tonight, when we just walked around and talked, I just absorbed every word she said, as if tomorrow I would go deaf and this was my last day of hearing.  I was spellbound by her voice.  When it was just her and I, I never wanted it to end.  If it's like this just listening to her talk, how would it be holding her hand, or putting my arms around her waist?

Logic: You sound really sure of this.

Love: I am.  Even now, as I'm typing, I'm wondering what she's doing in the bedroom.  Not in a perverted sense, but I just can't stop thinking about her.  And this isn't like Heaven, where thinking about her depresses me because I dread I'll never get her.  When I think about Stephanie, nothing can ruin my good mood.  Nothing.  She's all I thought about at work today, and it kept me in a good mood throughout.

Logic: You really should tell her.

Love: I know I should, but.....should I cause an awkwardness between an otherwise good friendship?

Logic: Who's to say there'll be an awkwardness?  Only you think that.

Love: But I don't want to risk it.  I enjoy what we already have: a good friendship.  I don't want to jeopardize that.

Logic: Spoken like a man who truly is in love.

Love: I am so sure of this.  Positive of it.

Logic: Tell her, Nicholas.  Do it.  Just do it.  Be a man.

Love: Should I?


written 16 September 2007