Love of My Life

A winter evening: The sun set early that day. although I didn’t want it to end. But fate had a different tune. The rooftop where Anshuma and I regularly hungout seemed gloomy that day. Maybe it sensed what was happening. Maybe it realized that two of its most favorite people in the whole world wouldn’t be back ever again. Maybe it might be their last time together and the only way to comfort them was to sob along.

We were there, sitting on the edge with our feet dangling in the air hoping the time would stop. I never felt her grip around my arm so tight; maybe she didn’t want to let go. I felt her wiping a tear against my shoulder and I hated myself for not being able to comfort her. I was taking shallow breaths trying to hold back the tears, but looking at her like that, I couldn’t. Suddenly, everything became a blur. Heights always gave me the urge to jump, but that day, it felt like I was falling into the abyss.

I had my heart broken before. But this was different. I don’t know if I could ever come back from this. Anshu and I love each other so much, but we couldn’t be together forever. Like all the good things in this world, our relationship reached its conclusion.

A faint growl in my stomach made us laugh bringing us back to reality. She placed her hand in mine and I didn’t want to let it go ever. She might have read my mind because she said, “Shai, it’s time.” For the first time in my life, I was out of words. She understood what I was thinking and said, “You don’t have to say anything. This is harder as it is. You asking me to stay would make it more difficult for the both of us.”

“Why should it be this way?” I asked, wiping away the tears.

“I know,” she sobbed, “I know. But this is what we have to do.” She caressed my beard, looked at me with those most beautiful hazelnut eyes that could make me fall in love with her again and again, and said, “Can you do me a favor?” I nodded. “Could you kiss me one last time?”

To think that would be the last time I would see her, have her in my arms, and give her a warm kiss broke my heart irretrievably. I do not know how long our last kiss lasted because I didn’t want to know what would happen at the end of it. She said she wanted me to remember this kiss as her last memory and asked me not to open my eyes till she counted to five. A few seconds later, she wasn’t there. I went numb and stood there, not knowing what to do or how to feel because the love of my life was no longer with me.