Backhanded

Thwak! Thwak! CT's words hit me like a backhanded slap to the mouth. Even though it wasn't a physical blow, it felt as if my lip should be bleeding.

He leaned against the wall of our bedroom and said, "I've met someone..."

Eleven days before this, he and I had decided to break up after seven years together. I felt my heart sink and I stammered, "You - you met someone? Wh-when?"

"The day after we broke up," came his monotone reply.

Sometimes, to spare our feelings, those we love will tell us that they don't want to be together anymore because they need to be alone. They don't want a relationship. They just want to be single. Even though it isn't true, they don't say this to be mean. It is a well-intentioned lie. A sweet lie, meant to smoothe over the painful truth that, contrary to their claims, they don't want to be alone. They just don't want to be with you.

Sometimes knowing that someone else has won the heart of the one you adored hurts worse than the initial break up. Would it be better not to know the truth? Or is honesty a kinder gesture?

Last night at the bar I felt a familiar blow. Thwak! Thwak! And I cried, and the bartender brought me coffee, and it felt like my lip was bleeding, but it was just my heart.

He said we didn't work together. Oil and water. "You're just too intense for me."

Someday, when The Love of Hot Toddy's Life appears, I'm going to love him with all the gratitude and intensity of my heart. Love is supposed to be intense, isn't it? I can't tone it down. Sometimes I wish I could. Then maybe, just maybe, I wouldn't have to hear that tender lie, "I just want to be alone..."