Used

Winter came a week early, and I felt it like I felt myself slipping away from Nicholas over the summer – suddenly and unbelievably. How could I have left him? I loved him. I swear I did. And yet, his voice irritated me with its drawn out syllables and small-squared teeth, constantly reminding me of the differences between us. Nicholas: tall, lean, smart, handsome, sexually liberated (his words), and Diego: short, skinny, between majors in college, nice smile, sexually repressed (Catholic background).

I’m sitting across from him in my memories right now in a Noodles & Company from over the summer, and he’s telling me how he and sister were so bored that one time they were in London when they were little. Can you believe that? Across the ocean, not a worry about money in sight, and sitting contentedly in a café with a chocolate cookie surrounded by my family… He says it was a drag while he was there. I nod, and agree with him. “Yeah, that’s tough for a kid to sit still for so long.” Yet, being still, keeping quiet, and obeying the rules was exactly how I spent my childhood in a Catholic, lower-middle class family who sent their kids to Catholic school up through their senior year. For our vacation? To the mall down the hill. Half the shops have closed since then.

So, he’s a bit conceited. That’s fine. I actually admire his confidence – even envy it. Anyway, he does love me. At least, he says he does. There were also a bunch of unwrapped condoms in his bathroom trash bin, though… and I swore I saw a Tindr notification on his phone the other day… I must just be paranoid. Although, he did mention his instructor at hot yoga was really eyeing him down the other day, too – but, that couldn’t be anything, right? No. Of course not. He loves me.

Another memory – same summer, different day. We’re in the apartment he subleased for the summer, a brick building on the edge of campus. I walk by it still on my way to Target. That night in July, I had surprised him with a visit. He says he felt bad he couldn’t spend the next day with me since he has work. I apologize. I didn’t think my visit completely through, I guess. Tonight, though, we have the bedroom to ourselves, he says, and leans in for a kiss. After three months together, his lips know their place on mine now, and his tongue never shies away from a greeting.

We start in the bathroom, the bathtub spouting white noise in the background and a candle lit by the bathroom sink. We’re both already undressed, and he says he wants to try something different. “Turn around,” and he kneels down to press his face between my legs from behind. It’s supposed to feel good, but I can only see myself in third-person, hands and chest fastened to the wall with eyes cemented to the metal bathroom shelf beside me: extra toilet paper, tooth paste, shampoo, conditioner.

A few minutes pass and then he’s inside of me now while I’m in the same position. If he notices my legs trembling to stay on their tiptoes while he inserts himself, he doesn’t show it. I don’t want to make him upset if I tell him he’s too tall, so I say nothing and enjoy none of it while he lets out a sigh of pleasure and shoves my head into the wall from behind. He loves me.

Across the hall in his bedroom, I’m safe from any more pain while we make out again, and I’m able to forgive him for slamming my head into the bathroom wall. I’m on top of him in bed, kissing until he turns me around on my back and he stands beside the bed. His fingers go inside me first, and I realize his touch hurts more than usual. I tell him to go slow once his fingers are out. He goes in again, gently, softly, then quickening, hungry, aching for the feeling.

It hurts too much – more than before – and I tell him to stop. “Wait for me to finish. I’m almost there,” he replies in a breath. Of course. Be reasonable, Diego. Be tough. Don’t sacrifice his pleasure because you can’t handle what any other bottom could handle in your position. He’s almost there. He loves me.

I never came. Meanwhile, he was preparing for his third orgasm of the night. I reach inside of myself and feel the tender and irritated skin left behind by him. “Those are cuts,” I thought. I tell him and he checks his nails. The ends of them are thick crescent moons with a few hangnails. “Oh, sorry about that, babe. I’ll cut them for next time.” He loves me.

“Hey, do you like having sex with me?” he asks while we’re in bed later that night. “I mean, cause, I’m over here making love to you and I feel like you’re just in pain.” He meant physically in pain, but I’m more than a body. Unfortunately, I can hurt in more than one way.

“It does hurt when we do it, but I do like kissing you,” I say a bit too hurriedly, sensing his boredom for me growing each time I fail to enjoy having sex with him. Only, this time, I was also thinking about my freshman theology class. There isn’t a lot I still agree with from those theology lessons, but this one always resurfaces when I think of that night.

My freshman year of high school, my theology teacher taught us that the opposite of love is use. When we use another, we strip them of their humanity by objectifying them and using them for our own gratification, sexual or otherwise. In contrast, love is selfless, and it always does what is best for the other. Love wills the good of the other while use only concerns the wishes of the self.

That’s how I felt each time we had sex. Used. Each time he told me he felt horny when he looked at me. Used. Each time he slapped my leg or choked me during sex. Used. Whenever he touched my knee beneath the table while out at dinner with friends. Used. Whenever he brought up how much he masturbated while thinking of me. Used. 

Why didn’t I tell him that I felt any of this then? I didn’t want to admit that I actually didn’t enjoy having sex with him. While he “made love” to me, I made excuses to invalidate why I felt uncomfortable when we were alone together – a combination of You’re just not used to it’s and He loves you’s. When we broke up in September, I could only mutter that I needed to take care of myself with him not around. I didn’t have the words back then to express and accept the insecurity I felt in our relationship. But, now, here they are – the words, the memories, the love, and the use. I couldn’t use Nicholas like he wanted me to. Even though, for a while, that’s all I tried to do – to be more present in sex, to focus less on the discomfort and pain of it, to enjoy when my body touched his body, and to ignore the fear I had for the physical strength he had over me. But, I could never be like him. My love could never use another. I could never be enough for him, and I’m still forgiving myself for trying to be.

Winter is whistling through my windows now, and it’s been three months since we last spoke face to face. I still wonder if we could have grown closer together if I hadn’t left him and attempted to find the words to describe the pain he caused me, instead. Would he have changed his expectations for me during sex? Would I have been loved? Or would my head feel the wall again, held there by the arm he isn’t using to hold me against his hips while he whispers he’s almost there? Would I just be used? I don’t know, and I suppose I never will. I’m simply here for the ride of Life, trying to love and belong. It doesn’t matter if I said or did the wrong thing. That’s just Life. It doesn’t matter if I blew it or if I missed an opportunity. Life goes on. And where there is Life, there is always a chance, a potential, a choice, to smile, to forgive, to cry, to speak, to hug, and to love.

I could keep on wondering about the alternate outcomes of our relationship. I could keep trying to fight time and the reality of us becoming strangers once again. Or, I could sigh, look around, and live. The future might just be wonderful.