When Love Hurts

He was a friend I cherished, an adorable, cute, nice guy but not someone I would typically fall for. What I knew was that I liked having him around and missed him when he's nowhere in sight. I was a prankster who made his life miserable by poking jokes at him all the time. He reciprocated and we would end up laughing. He was the sweetest, most thoughtful guy I ever knew. He was there for me when I was struggling against cancer. He made me feel special. He was fascinating. Suddenly, I was entertaining the thought that there was something more than friendship in his mind. He occasionally made a pass on me but I didn't mind them because for me, he was just being a nice friend who was trying to boost my ego. Then I had dreams about him all the time. I woke up one day not knowing what hit me. I told my friend Ai that I think I was starting to like someone but wasn't exactly sure about my feelings. It was complicated. Our age difference, our status at work and most importantly, the rule at the hospital that prohibits a special friendship between our kind. I was trying to fight off my feelings.

One day we were hanging out together when he told me he had a crush on me all along and that he was falling for me. I almost put the car to a screeching brake upon hearing his revelation. I was driving when he made this confession. I didn't know how to react. I was certain that I liked him, but I wasn't sure if that was out of friendship or if it was something more. I tried escaping the moment by making a joke out of it but he persisted and asked what he was to me. Finally, I blurted out, "of course you stand a chance with me". He was overjoyed and couldn't believe I actually said that. I was trying to figure out my feelings for him. He had flaws and I was beginning to find them cute instead of apalling. That was when I knew I had fallen for him. A week after his revelation, we discussed the issues that were possible obstacles to our path. He said he has long accepted me for what I was, even despite my illness. I was swept away. That night, I listened to my heart. He became the prince I had been waiting for all my life. We officially became a couple. He said he could never believe someone as beautiful as me could go for someone like him. I countered him, "you know, I'm the luckier one because you're such a rare gem and you're mine now." Life has been a bed of roses since then. A miracle unfolded right before my eyes. For the first time I knew how it was to be loved back by someone I adored. He made me feel like a princess. I thanked the heavens for giving him to me.

It hasn't been easy. We kept it secret and decided to let it out in the open once he graduates. We were living like fugitives. He admitted he may not be good in handling the relationship. I was his first. I assured him I was willing to help him out with that, to be beside him and grow with him. I wanted to learn from him as much as I wanted him to learn from me. He did things that made me upset. He was too busy with everything that I had to remind him I still existed I was thinking about him all the time. From little things like delayed text replies to the issues on the girl he used to fancy and his friends preferring her over me for him, we had conflicts that we tried to resolve. I admired him even more for listening to my concerns, for accepting his faults and being willing to learn from it.

He would visit while I was on duty and sang for me over the phone when he got home because he knew how lonely it was to go on solo duty in Radiology. I loved him even more for that. There was always his nice smile plastered on his face that tells how in love he was with me. We were so happy together. For some reason, he was always in a hurry to go some place else. He gave me that cute apologetic look that he had to go. He sensed that as much as possible, I wanted to have him around longer but I had no choice but to let him go. It pained him to see that expression on my face everytime he's about to leave. Somehow he always had his hands full of responsiblities, he was always in a rush and he was always too tired. That bothered me. When I'm in love with someone, however tired I may be, when the love of my life wants my presence, I never seem to feel the stress. I am energized by his mere thought. I didn't see that in him.

Days went by, he disclosed that he might be busy as hell in the following days. As much as I wanted to spend time with him, talk to him about how my day went, I stretched my understanding and let things be. But i missed him too much that I couldn't stand it. We were in the same building all the time and I hardly saw him. I was aching to catch even just a glimpse of him. I was practically begging for his time. Just a little time was all I asked. Apparently, it brought out the monster in me. I was texting things that hurted him so much and I was hinting that I wanted a break. Of course I didn't mean it. The reaction I was hoping to get from him was that he'd fight for his love and win me all the more. But this did not happen.

Yesterday, I was excited to see him. I was ready to apologize for being such a bitch. I prepared food for us to share. I was on duty. Then he dropped the bomb. I must have acted possessive and insecure that he couldn't take it any longer. He wanted his way out. He wanted to think things over. He said things happened too fast that he was afraid of hurting me all the more if things went on. He assured me that he still loved me but we needed this break. Our love story was just in its introductory pages and he was already ending it. I asked if he could see me in his future, he replied "probably". I wanted to die. The man who I thought was crazy about me wasn't sure if he still wanted me. I hated myself. I must have been that bad to make him change his mind in a week. He put me up a pedestal. I fell off it, it hurt so bad that I was starting to feel some fractured appendages. From a princess, I have been turned into the lowest form of creature, lower than a fungus.

You'll never know what you got until you lose it. Perhaps I had been a total bitch. Perhaps I'm not someone worth loving. Perhaps he wasn't mature enough to handle a relationship. Perhaps he didn't love me enough to forgive me and give me a second chance. He was firm about wanting a break. I honestly don't understand what went wrong.

I thought he was the one. I thought I finally found someone who would stand by me through all my joys and pains who was willing to accept me for what I am despite my flaws. I thought he was my answered prayer. In the end, He was given to me not to love me but to test by strength even more.

Someday, when the boy I've learned to love finally grows up, I hope he realizes the pain he has caused and doesn't do it to somebody else. No woman deserves such cruelty from a guy who was too nice to be hated yet too selfish to take his love back from a girl who has helplessly fallen for him. An angel just broke my heart. If he only knew how much I've loved him. I'm beginning to miss him too much that it stings.

Maybe I just wasn't meant to be loved. Not in this lifetime.

When will all my sufferings end?