Glass Hand

     A failed man standing with a glass hand. A glass hand that breaks whenever it touches another, causing pain for both. 

    I stand up and walk over to you with consideration. I think kindly, though I feel conflict, but through the barriers I feel love, love, love. I love you. I think this. I say this. "I love you." "I'm sorry, I don't love you," she says. Understandably, given the circumstances. I look into your eyes with sorrow and pain, but I still hold my love, I just wish you felt the same. "It's okay, I still love you." "I don't know what to say," she says. I tell her "Speak your truth, damn the circumstances." I pause and take a step back. "Nevermind, sorry, this isn't a love story. This isn't Romeo and Juliet, this is real life. So why do I feel this way?" She looks at me as if to look into my heart, and she doesn't like what she finds. "Look into your soul and you'll understand," she explains. I feel as though she's right, but I feel conflict. "How do I look into myself to find an answer to a question I would prefer to avoid?" She pauses for a moment, only to make sure her response doesn't come off as inconsiderate. "You must prefer to answer the question, for our sake. Look into your soul and you will understand." This confuses me. I understand but, at the same time, I fail to see how I can answer it alone. After thinking for a few seconds, I respond "I don't know how." Once again, she hesitates. She has no true understanding of how to explain it, but she knows how she feels. She knows what I feel. Neither of us knows how to communicate it. "At the most base level, choose love over hate," she advises. I'm frustrated again. "That's what I did and, yet again, it was met with rejection." She looks down as if to break the flow of conversation, perhaps with some regret. Regret and pity. "Rejection is a step closer to acceptance," she speaks calmly, eyes still on the floor. Again, I take a step deeper into frustration. It's a sentence that rings true in a literal sense but it's meaning is slightly lost on me. I know it should make me feel hopeful, yet I find myself less so. "Acceptance is a choice, I can't rely on someone else's decision about me. People are hardly reliable, anyway, so what if they're making the wrong choice? What if I can prove it?" I take a step back. Still looking away, she replies, "So what if you can? A decision is a decision nonetheless. Rationality falters to emotion." I feel anger approaching. Why isn't she looking at me? "Why aren't you looking at me?" She seemed slightly surprised by the question. "Why are you distancing yourself?" 

   We both know the answer. We are now set on different paths. Two individuals with a different type of love for each other, now separated by the love that held them together. Something so similar creates such a difference because each wants to pursue their own version separately and together. A romantic love that cannot be strengthened now must begin its search yet again. A platonic love, more rational and grounded, feeling slightly guilty but understanding of herself for not being able to reciprocate. A mess and failed tryst, so close and missing the mark by a mile. The love beneath anger and frustration pushes one back. The love beneath pity and guilt causes shame and distrust.