Rubik's Cube

He was a Rubik's cube.

I realized that when he told me those five dreadful words that I'd never forget: "It's not you, it's me."

I could only solve one part of a Rubik's cube. Solving one color was enough. The rest was a waste of time. And he reminded me of it. What I saw in him was basically just one side, one color. I never knew he had other colors that he hid really well or colors that I failed to see.

It's so ironic that we humans have eyes to see, but sometimes end up not using them in situations like these. We become blinded by pleasure, by love, and by affection that we sometimes don't take into account all the signs--the bad ones, the ones you know are for you but you choose to look the other way because the other way feels so damn good.

It was college back then. A new guy came up to me one day and introduced himself. We got along for the first few hours and in a matter of days, I was already infatuated with him.

His charisma, charm, and way of words was what brought me to love him. He was intellectual and so down-to-earth. I praised him for being those things. He was nobody I have ever met before. But that was only because I've never met anyone else before.

We were part of a small group of students taking the Biology course. It was indeed a small world, and me being a shy introvert made it even smaller. I hung out with two people every day, my best-friend-to-be, and someone I shouldn't have loved. It was always the three of us, us against the other students from other courses. We ate lunch together, laughed together, went on friendly dates together. It was like the other guy was getting in the way of our time alone.

When we confessed our feelings, everything drastically changed. I fell too fast. My best friend distanced himself to give us our time together. Every day, my focus and attention was on the man I shouldn't have loved. Every morning I searched and longed for him. I visited his house every weekend. I became good friends with his mother and sister. I even talked to him about marriage and having kids with him.

Unfortunately, he never expressed the same thing. He knew I was going too fast. I didn't know I was because I was too young and inexperienced with love. I never knew that you had to give only a little percent of your love to someone, not invest all of it.

The more you invest, the more pain would return to you.

The first few months we were together, we constantly argued a lot. I became competitive in terms of grades and smartness. Whenever he lectured me about acting immature, I'd get offended and would lash out my tongue on him as well, sometimes personally attacking him with my words. I never noticed how much distance I had caused between us because I was so in love with him.

Yet it wasn't love. It was possessiveness.

I never noticed that every time I walked out of his sight, angry at him for lecturing me on what I had become, another girl was filling in the empty space. She was the opposite of me. She was kind, mature, smart, composed, friendly. She was everything a man would ever want.

When I've heard of the rumors, I couldn't hold back the tears. I confronted him, but all I got in the end was his insistent denials. He would hide the screen from his phone whenever he was texting someone. Whenever I suggested we hang out, he would always say he has some stuff to do in an important school organization. I became so paranoid that I did my best in investigating his movements. His actions. My possessive love made him stop hanging out with me. My strength was gone. My dreams of a wedding and a baby with him were shattered in an instant.

One Valentine's Day, he asked me out on a date. I became too happy because finally, we were going to settle things peacefully with spending time with each other. Valentine's day brought back the colors in my life.

But only for a moment.

Imagine if he never noticed me sitting alone on one of the benches in the hallway... Imagine if he never sat next to me in Botany class and agreed to be my lab partner... Imagine if he never leaned in to kiss me with a passion so great that I never knew he had been bottling up deep inside... Imagine if he never told me that he loved me...

Just imagine that if he hadn't done any of those things, I'd still be a child inside, innocent and naive. I wouldn't have had to go through all the emotional roller coaster. I wouldn't have had to visit his house every single day just to beg him to come back. I wouldn't have had to chase him and waste more of his precious time. I wouldn't have had to feel broken on a Valentine's Day, because Valentine's Day was the day he savagely tore my heart to pieces like the wolf he was.

Valentine's day was the day he showed another color. Months after that, he showed more. These colors, like the Rubik's cube, were jumbled everywhere.

It was our last date. Furthermore, it was a "break-up" date.

What a savage thing to do.

The lesson I learned in loving someone too much is realizing that I shouldn't have loved at all. Every day, I would see traces of his image floating in my memory, my dreams, and my fantasies. The obsession whirled in my head, eager to drown me in sorrow.

I no longer had the power to solve even one side of the Rubik's cube. Instead, someone else took the spot and solved him for me. Someone filled in my shoes and took great care of him for me. She was the missing piece in his life that I wasn't.

I thought he was the one. I thought he was my soulmate. He wasn't. I shouldn't have loved him.

But I was glad I did.

True, I wouldn't feel the pain, the misery, the loss. I'd be stuck at my comfort zone for a lifetime. But if I didn't take the risk to be with him, if I didn't experience all the tears, the screams, and the heartaches, I wouldn't have been able to learn how to stand on my own. I would still be a child.

During my recovery phase, I ate less. I lost weight. I researched how to move on. I hung out with friends who I thought were absurd for telling me that one day I'd laugh about the past. I forced myself to go on dates and see for myself other kinds of men. It was a daily struggle. Every day was a living hell.

But all's well that ends well. Everything was worth it.

One day, I already knew how to solve the Rubik's cube. I just had to break it and put it back together. In other words, I already knew what he was like, and I've learned and accepted that he was not meant for me.

I was meant for someone better.

And that all wouldn't happen if I hadn't realized that the man I shouldn't have loved was a Rubik's cube.