Victim

I told him I love him.

Looking back, I don’t know why.

It was stupid, it was impulsive, but God I wanted to say it and to have him say it back. I wanted him to love me more than anything. I wanted to be needed. I needed him to want me and to one day to hold me. He couldn’t hold me than though. Not really. You can’t hold someone online after all. It’s not possible. We just want to think that it is.

His name was Robert, but I called him Pup.

It was a stupid nickname, but not nearly as bad as the one that he gave me: Lolli.

Just like a lollipop.

I never met him in real life. Not once. We barely knew each other. I wish I could say that I knew that, but looking back, I didn’t. To me, it was real in every way.

I met him while he was the admin of a site. It started off innocently. He asked for my messenger, which I had one and so I let him add me. We were just supposed to talk about plotting. And at first we did, but that didn’t last long. What happened next wasn’t innocent even if I was.

We did things via messenger I can never be proud of, especially for someone like myself who claims to be a Christian. I knew better. I just didn’t care. I won’t make excuses for it. I knew exactly what I was doing. And maybe that was why I wanted him to be my boyfriend in the first place. I wanted to justify it all even though I knew for a fact that some things can never be justified.

Ah the wishes of an eighteen year old.

I forced the relationship. I knew that even then. It was a nagging thought at the back of my mind that I crushed and justified. After all, I had my friend convince him to ask me. Albeit I was looking over her shoulder, but that was beside the point. I wanted it so bad. I wanted to be loved. And I wanted him to be the one to love me.

Maybe it was because I had never seen what he had looked like or heard his voice.

In the end though, it was him who did the asking. I don’t know if that is an excuse or what, but it is what happened. He asked and I was happy to accept. And I was happy for a few moments longer until he told me something that made me break down in tears. He was sick he said. He had to have surgery in several months and if it came down to it…he would break it off to save me the pain. I didn’t want him to though. I wanted to keep him and have him close. I told him I didn’t want him to break it off with me ever.

I didn’t have a cell phone back then. I had my laptop (which was all glorious and new) and the use of FRIEND’S cell phones. And I used those. Over thanksgiving break, I don’t think there wasn’t a day that we didn’t talk. And I liked it that way. I liked the sound of his voice and I like just having the chance to have someone who I thought cared about me.

* * *

The problem with trust is that eventually someone is going to let you down. I have been let down a lot in my life. Sometimes it’s my own fault. When it came down to Robert…I’m not sure who to blame. I can blame Fate. I could blame love. I could blame myself. I could blame him. I could blame any number of circumstances. It all ends the same way however. We broke up. That hurt, but I was okay because I knew that there was still a chance. I could still hope and dream. But there was something wrong with the whole situation and it began to nag at my mind and my heart and my conscience (yes there were tattered fragments of it still left).

There was someone else involved. Someone I thought I could trust, but there was one big problem with all this. I only knew her online too. Sure I had talked to her on the phone once or twice, but it was just like with Robert, I only wanted to think I could know and trust someone that I barely knew or knew how to trust. She started to tell me that she, despite being engaged romantically in other quarters, had also been with Robert…while he was supposed to have been mine. I didn’t want to believe her. That means I should have ignored her and never asked him.

I guess I didn’t trust him that much because I asked.

He told me that they had at one time been with each other, but that had been before me. I should have trusted him if I really cared about him shouldn’t I? But I didn’t. It ate at me. I couldn’t let it out of my mind. It began to effect everything around me until…I knew what I had to do. And finally…finally one day I had the courage to do the first smart thing I had done in the months since I had “met” Robert.

I told him I was cutting us off. We were only supposed to be friends now, but I didn’t even want that anymore. I tried to explain to him how it was hurting me, but he only seemed to be in a rage and so I blocked him. It was kind of a bad way to end the conversation, but I had to because I knew what he would say if I let him talk to me more.

“I thought you were sweet, but really you’re a lying, manipulative bitch.”

I was never going to let him say that to me again. It had hurt more than anything. And I didn’t want to feel that again. And so I did what I had to to protect myself. I blocked him everywhere I could. I deleted files where he w as associated. And inside, something happened…I felt good. This boy I had been in love with and who I had cared for was gone from my life forever.

And I was finally happy again.