Love Is for the Sane

I heard some shuffling behind me. It was early in the morning; the sun still had yet to come up. Everyone else should have been asleep at the time, and if anyone was up, why would they have specifically come to my room?

Turning around, I saw him.

He wasn’t looking at me, though. He was looking at the sky. At the stars.

His eyes flicked down to me and a soft smile played on his lips.

“Isn’t this ironic?”

I was surprised he had spoken to me, let alone smile at me, “What?”

“It’s ironic, isn’t it? When I told you I loved you it was on the balcony…and the sky looked just like this.”

He amazed me. He could nonchalantly mention our past endeavors while I would flinch if I so much as thought about it.

“Yeah…I guess so.”

“I always thought that no matter how bright or how many stars there were, they could never match you. After you accepted my feeling, it sort of became this…thing for me. I associated stars with you. And when we broke up, it was hard to look at the sky at all, even on star-less nights.”

Frank looked so sad, but he spoke so casually of this. He had accepted it, and that hurt me. He had already given up on me, because I wasn’t good enough.

He looked up, suddenly inquisitive, “How is she? How is…Jessica?”

He sounded desperate, and it was strange. Someone was so concerned over the person who had ruined their relationship. Why was he so altruistic? Why did he have to give me up? I wouldn’t have done it, if he had said ‘no.’ One single fucking word, and we would still be together.

“Why did you have to be so fucking selfless?!”

He jumped from the surprising volume of my voice. He looked confused, but apologetic.

“Why didn’t you tell me to stay with you?! I would have! I wanted to stay with you, but you didn’t even fucking look sad! You were fine with it!”

“You think I was fine with it? I fucking cried all night. Do not tell me that I wasn’t sad, because I was. I was sick, and tired, and so messed up. But you know why I did it? Because she fucking needed you! Right then, she needed you more than I did!”

“BUT I LOVED YOU! And I thought you felt the same way! If you did, then you would have asked me to stay with you.”

My voice was sore from screaming, and tears were blurring my vision. I could tell that Frank had still managed to keep his disposition throughout the entire conversation.

“Loving someone and needing someone are different. I love you, and I want to be with you, but she was sick. Couldn’t you tell? If she didn’t have you for at least a little while, she would have died, or gone insane, or something. I thought I could handle living without you for a while.”

I could only make out his form because my eyes were too blurry. Tears started cascading to their death on the floor where they splattered into tiny puddles, remnants of what they had once been.

“Do you blame me? Do you put me at fault for what happened? Why no one can seem to look each other in the eye anymore?”

He firmly shook his head, “How could I? You wanted to help her, so I allowed you to do that. It would have been wrong for me to say you had to stay with me.”

“Don’t you get it? I didn’t want to help her. I wanted to be with you. I was the selfish one.”

Frank had always been the caring and compassionate one. He was the person who was strong. He noticed that Jessica needed help, which she could only get from me. He knew he had to sacrifice our relationship to help save her.

And I was the selfish one. I was the one who was weak, who needed this. Frank may have cried all night, but he had chosen to let me go. I was obligated to, because he expected it out of me. And I hated him for that, for making me leave him, and making me go through this.

The person who needed the most help wasn’t Jessica after all. It was me.