Unrequited College Love

I was fresh out of high school, not too fresh I guess because I was headed off to college. I had said my goodbyes to my parents tears filling my eyes. I knew I had to go but I wasn’t ready to leave my whole childhood. Thankfully I had my best friend with me, we were both heading to college in New York. I was a 5’2 light skinned with brown eyes and long curly hair, and my best friend was about 5'3 dark skinned with brown eyes and curly short light brown hair. As we stepped off the plane I could feel the wind brushing against my skin and through my hair. Going to college the only thing I had in mind was focusing on school of course, working, and partying with my best friend. I was young I was ready to have the time of my life with Chasity and boys were far from my mind. That is until I see him. I was walking with Chasity going to pick up coffee and that’s when I saw him.

 He was a 6’1 dark skin with brown eyes and short black hair. I went to the counter and he said “Hi may I take your order” and he smiled at me but I’m sure he does that to everyone but it was the feeling I felt when he smiled at me. He kept making eye contact with me not once looking at Chasity. She cleared her throat to get his attention and he turned and said he was sorry and proceed to ask for her order but she just looked at us and laughed. She gave him her order and mines as well because for some reason I couldn’t think correctly. As we were walking out he stopped us and asked for my number. I obliged after blushing and turning red for what felt like forever. We left but Chasity kept looking at me smiling you know that face your best friend gives you that you hate and love at the same time when you meet someone that could potentially be your forever.

 A texts shoots on my phone and says “Hey it’s Liam from the coffee shop”. A few days go by and Liam and I have been talking non stop, but we haven’t been able to meet up because the college life has me way busier than expected on the first few days. Saturday night comes and I just finished all night cramming for my test when I get a text from Liam asking if I wanted to go out. I mean I had nothing else to do so I respond with a yes. I meet him at the movies he offers to pick me up but I object. As we were watching the movie I noticed Liam kept glancing over at me, but I decided not to say anything. After we finish the movie we go out to eat. At this point I think I’m about to go back home when he asks “Wanna go for a walk on the beach”? As I look into his eyes about to say “Yes” I just think who the heck is the guy, a movie, diner, and a walk on the beach.

 I tell him yes and we walk down the beach in the night. It’s so beautiful it’s dark and the stars are twinkling in the pitch black sky, the water is so cold pressing against my feet, and the water is moving fast wave after wave. I think it can get no better until Liam reaches for my hand. We continue walking and we just talk about everything, my life, his life everything possible.

Liam walks me back to my dorm and tells me he had an amazing time, I tell him I did also. He kisses me on the forehead and say “Goodnight”. I walk into my room and Chasity is sitting on the bed smiling from ear to ear as I walk in and she yells “ TELL ME EVERYTHING”. I laugh and tell her everything not leaving out a single detail.

She tells me he could be the one. I brush off the statement remembering why I came here. I study for the rest of the night. Liam and I hang out every night for a month straight. Most of the time we do something simple but after a month he finally asks me out. I say yes because it felt right and I love how he didn’t ask right off the bat. Liam was amazing he treated me so well, very respectful, nice, kind, honest, loving, he was pretty much everything you could possibly want in a man.

 4 and a half passes. Everything has been great with Liam, he’s met my family they really like him, I’ve met his, plus my best friend likes him. I thought Liam was the best thing in my life, he made me the happiest I have ever been, showed me a love I never seen, he made me feel a love I didn’t know was even possible for me to feel for another human being. He made this emptiness I felt in my heart disappear. Like I said I thought he was the best thing in my life, turns out I was completely wrong about him, never saw this coming.

One night Liam invited me to a party but this time I said no. It was almost 11 and I had this huge test the next day I still needed to study for. As I thought, he understood. I loved that about him never pressured or made me feel bad for anything.

 I was studying so hard for this test but Chasity kept making it harder and harder, I mean this girl had me over here dying laughing. It’s 1:23, Chasity is finally sleep but I’m still up studying. I was about to go to sleep but I had this uneasy feeling in my stomach. I tried to sleep it had been almost 15 minutes since I laid down but my stomach was not having it. I decide to text Liam and see if he was still up.

“Hey babe you up”? He sent me a response a few minutes later saying “Yeah babe I’m up”. I asked him what he was doing he told me he was still at the party. I tell him I will talk to him later “Goodnight babe see you tomorrow”, “Goodnight beautiful I love you”, “I love you too, have fun”.

 As I’m still trying to sleep a voice in my head tells me to go to the party but not tell Liam that I’m coming. I get up and get dressed as quiet as possible because I didn’t want to wake Chas. I felt extremely guilty, I was practically about to spy on Liam and I had no idea why, I trust him with my whole life. I didn’t understand why I started to feel this way that is until I see him at the party, he was in a circle of friends girls and boys that I knew of course. I started to feel a little better, as I am about to walk up  to him I see a girl kiss him and he doesn’t stop it. Then I hear him tell her he loved her. 

I felt the brim of my eyes began to water. It felt like my heart had just been ran over by a huge truck, the music from the party started to echo then it started fainting and I couldn’t hear it, all I could hear was him saying he loved her over and over like a twisted jack in the box. I’m just staring not realizing what a creep I look like just watching him all up on this female. I didn’t even know I was crying until I felt the hot tears running down my heated cheeks, my heart was barely pumping yet I felt my blood boiling. I had never in my life felt this kind of pain, I didn't know what is was. Heartbreak? Liam looks up and sees me, his eyes get really big and his lips began to form my name “Shiy”? 

He starts walking towards me and I don’t even think about it because I find my shoes turning away from him picking my feet up one by one. Am I running from him? I am actually running from him. I run all the way back to my dorm forgetting all about my car. I get in the dorm slam the door and Chasity instantly wakes up. “Shiy you okay”?

 I hear but barely, I drop to the floor right in front of the door crying so hard I give myself a headache, I’m trying to stop but the tears just keep falling one after one. Every moment we ever shared flashing through my brain, I thought that this kind of stuff only happens in the movies but here I am thinking of all the moments we shared. By this time Chasity is sitting right beside me comforting me. God I’m so glad I got her. I thought to myself. 

She’s just holding me, hugging me telling me everything is going to be okay. Finally, she asked the question I was dreading her asking “What happened”? I tried to form the words Liam has been cheating on me but I couldn’t, a lump formed in my throat and my mouth became very dry all of a sudden. After hours of crying I finally can form the words to tell my best friend what happened. She goes crazy, crazier than I thought she would. After a few minutes of silence well except for me sniffing, I hear a knock on the door. I open the door and he asks if we can talk. Chasity yells “NO” but I need to talk to him, I HAVE to know why he did this to me after everything.

 Chasity leaves to give us some privacy. He sat on the bed next to me and tries to hold my hand and without even realizing it I moved. He looked up at me when I moved but I couldn’t look at him. He started to talk but I couldn’t even hear him I was lost in my own thoughts. I am quickly snapped back to real life when I hear him say “Shiy I love you”.

I didn’t mean to or maybe I did I’m honestly not sure but I laughed, like I really laughed. I could tell he was confused and he asked why I was laughing. I said “ You don’t love me, you can’t love me. If you loved me you wouldn’t have been cheating, and you definitely wouldn’t be loving another female”. He proceeded to tell me how sorry he was he must have said it like 1,000 times.

I don’t know why but I felt the need to ask him three simple questions before forgiving him. I wasn’t going to get back with him but I could still forgive him, right? Anyways, right now I’m still crying but I fight back my tears to ask him three simple questions. I look him dead in his eyes knowing he couldn’t lie to me this way. “How long, is this the first time, did you ever love me”? 

I could tell he was thinking about the right way to answer the questions like he was trying not to get them wrong or something. He broke eye contact for a second and then return and said “I’m going to be honest with you because I’m tired of seeing you like this”.

My heart started pumping and I started rubbing my arm becoming scared at the response he’s about to give me. He started talking “Shiy, let me start off by saying I am so sorry, I never meant to do this. The girl you saw me with tonight I have been with her for about 5 months”. My eyes became glossy quicker than I thought but I needed him to finish so once again I fought back my tears and managed to get the word “Continue” out.

He looked away and continue talking “ No, she isn’t the first one I’ve done this before a couple of times. When we first met I had a girlfriend. And I thought I really thought I loved you, but I just really care about you. I do care about you but love, no. I’m sorry. I was just going to be friends after the first night we went out, but” he stopped. “ But what”? I asked. “After you met my friends we made a bet that I could get you to fall in love with me”. He gets up and walks over to me but I’m frozen did he really just say that. I push out  the words “You need to leave” but barely it comes out as a whisper.

He walks over to the door and looks at me before leaving. I drop to the floor not wanting him to see the pain that he just caused me. Feeling completely broken and devastated.I grab my phone and call Chas. She answers on the first ring. “Shiy”, but I can’t get the words out luckily she knew and said “I’m on my way home”. 

I just dropped my phone and balled up on my floor crying harder than I ever had in my entire life. Chasity opens the door, and comes to me wanting to ask me if I’m okay but she knows I’m not so she doesn’t even bother.  I look at her and say “It was all a bet, he never loved me”. Her eyes began to water and she said “Bestie I am so sorry”.

She helped me to my bed and covered me up, and she laid with me while I was crying for literally the whole night. At this moment is when my life was destroyed. Everything we shared all the late night talks, tight hugs, kisses on the forehead, dates, falling asleep in his arms, meeting each other's families, he knew everything about me and turns out I knew absolutely nothing at all about him. I often think if I never caught him would I ever even know. 

This was the first time I ever felt broken, broken past repair. I didn’t think I could put myself back together after this, and I definitely didn’t trust men after this. Thankfully, with the help of my closest friends and family members I was okay. I would be lying if I said it didn’t hurt but I’m okay now. I returned my focus to school, work and my best friend. Remembering why I came here in the first place and it was not for Liam. After him is when I understood unrequited love a little bit more. He was my unrequited love and hopefully the last, but I’m young who knows might happen again sooner than you think.