Page 53 of Not Your Valentine
No shit. They’re nothing alike, but I can’t stand to go on another date with Taylor when I’m such a lovesick fool. The card that arrived with my bouquet, the one that says, Can’t wait for tomorrow! xo Taylor—I put it in my purse so it goes with me whenever I leave the apartment.
But he doesn’t care for me the way I care for him. It was foolish of me to ever consider, even briefly, that he might want this relationship to be real. He was sweet and kind because he’s like that with everyone. He did a good job pretending to be my boyfriend because he’s my friend and he was helping me out.
Sure, we slept together, but it doesn’t mean anything.
“Please,” I beg. “Please stop trying to do the right thing. I just want to move past this.”
There’s silence on the other end of the phone, and then he finally says, “Okay.”
And that’s that. After ending the call, I turn the stove back on and finish cooking my fried rice, but I’m not fully present in my body.
You see? It’s good that I never said anything to him about my feelings because there was no hint of feelings on his side. If I’d said something, it would have been embarrassing.
True, countless people on the internet wouldn’t have witnessed the conversation and posted inane comments and think pieces on it. It wouldn’t have been as bad as my break-up with Charlie, and Taylor would have been nice about it. He wouldn’t have made me feel broken.
But that might have hurt even more, showing me why I’d fallen in love with him in the first place, and how could we hang out like friends after that?
I dump my dinner into a bowl and sink to the tile floor with it. The thought of walking those few feet to my table—the table where we ate our Valentine’s dinner—is just too much. I shove food into my mouth, not really tasting it, as tears fall into my bowl.
I can’t remember the last time I cried, but here I am, sobbing and snotty. Ugly crying.
I didn’t want a relationship. I’d asked for something pretend, something that should have been safe, but the joke’s on me. I fell in love anyway.
Stupid Taylor. Why did he have to be so goddamn adorable? Why did he have to send me a goddamn chocolate bar in the mail?
Speaking of that chocolate bar, I still have several squares left. I haven’t finished dinner yet, but I grab the chocolate from the cupboard, sit back down on the floor, and shove a square into my mouth. It doesn’t taste as good as I remember—in fact, I feel like I’m eating cardboard—but I don’t fucking care. I need to get rid of this, and it’s not like I’m going to throw perfectly good chocolate into the trash.
I begin the second square, and in my rush to finish it, I start choking. I bend over on the cold tile floor and keep hacking until the blockage clears, and then I toss the chocolate in the garbage because I just can’t do this anymore.
It’s not me, it’s you.
The state I’m currently in feels like proof of that.
There’s something wrong with me. More than anything, I couldn’t bear to tell Taylor how I felt because I suspected his answer would confirm my worst fears.
I’m just not a very lovable person.
Before, I told myself that I didn’t want romantic love. I claimed to have sworn it off, but secretly, somewhere in the jagged cracks inside me, I yearned for it. Sure, I might think that a heart-shaped cake with sprinkles is a travesty, but I still want what it represents.
And now, I feel more than ever like I can’t have it. Like I’m just not the sort of person who’s made for love.
My parents have been married for thirty-five years. My sister is happily engaged. But me, I’m different. I couldn’t do it. I didn’t deserve to have that video go viral, but Charlie wasn’t wrong, was he?
I start to get up, but my foot knocks over my bowl, spilling fried rice all over the floor.
Great. Just fucking great.
With more force than necessary, I sweep up the rice and toss it down the garbage chute.
When I return to my unit, my phone buzzes. I immediately grab it, just in case it’s Taylor, saying he’s realized he loves me.
I know, I know, I’m pathetic.
Of course, the text isn’t from Taylor. It’s Esther, asking how I am because she hasn’t heard from me in a while.
Rather than responding, I pour myself the last of the wine.
Chapter 18
