How do you tell someone that you love, that you love someone else more? Do you? Do you admit that the feelings you experience with this person are less intense than the feelings you experience with the other? Do you tell this person that they seem to be passive in their expressions of love, and the other breaks down walls to wrap you in the fortress of their arms? No. You do not. You look at their back as it is turned to you and you deal with the hot flush of shame and guilt in the act of admitting you did them wrong.
You watch them curl up into a ball as they endure the pain that they've felt before from previous relationships. You watch as they crumble with the idea that they are just doomed to failure with love. When they ask you if you are going to stay, ask you if you are going to be there, you say that you will because its a way to stop the gnawing ache in the middle of your chest that reminds you of all the times you were a horrible person to those you love.
When the ache doesn't vanish, and you hesitate on your words, and your lover turns to you desperate for answers, you admit perhaps life would be better without you in it. It would. But then you feel the sting of such selfish words, and you watch the other person clinging with hope that you didn't mean what you meant. You remember that isn't an option.
You watch the passive one relinquish the gentler side, pull you in to an embrace and wrap you warmly in a cloak of loving desperation. You listen to the words as they tell you where you belong, how you will honor those promises made, how you must ensure that no more lines are crossed. How that other person that made you breathless must be at the end of your fighting words. How you will never be alone with that person again.
You relent. You've made promises. You have people depending on you. Here you are safe. Here you are wanted and loved. Here you will stay or drive loved ones to despair. You look at your passive lover. You say yes. You kiss. You cuddle. You fall asleep and watch the dreams covered in sin march before your mind with living colors, and when you wake, you do your best to forget them.
