Cruise Boy

deep

Making friends actually meant circling the ship trying to scout out the cute boys and the different  groups of teens hanging out. Up the left outside staircase. Across the upper deck overlooking the pool. Through to put-put course. Around the outer deck of the ship. Down the back stairs to the back pool. Through the buffet area. Back to the pool. Repeat. I traced my steps about three times just taking in the different people I'd come across. There's a lot of people on a cruise ship, but you'd be surprised how often you see the same people around.

I ran into my brother, who acted like he didn't know me when he saw me. I'm used to it. He does it all the time because, if he tells people that I'm his sister, they only talk to him about me; he doesn't quite appreciate that. So, he walks right past me without acknowledging me, and I do the same. Of course, I can hear his friends make comments when they think I'm out of hearing range; I just smirked knowing that if they kept it up, Jax would, without a doubt, smack the living shit out of them. It's a little bit adorable - how protective he is.

Throughout my repetitive laps, I encountered multiple flattering reactions; but, they didn't phase me because I was in a subconscious state, only thinking about AJ. 

It's sad. It truly is. You're told your entire life that heartbreak is one of the worst pains you can endure, but you think, "Nah. Not me. I'm in love. He loves me. He wouldn't hurt me. I KNOW him." I'm guilty of this mindset. Two years. Two years of sitting on the stinging, cold bleachers for three hours on a Friday night to watch him through a leather ball to his "brother". Two years of sneaking out of the second story window for a 2a.m. drive on an old, back road with the windows down and the music blaring. Two years of those "it's-okay-baby-girl-i've-got-you" hugs. Two years worth of letters and pictures and text messages and phone calls and holidays and cuddling and love thrown away for sex on a drunken night. We're taught in Catholic school to wait until marriage because the man who waits for you is the one for you. Little did I know that, although he said he'd wait for me, he didn't mean he'd wait for the pleasure. You go on believing that he's the one- the one whose arms give you the same sense of security you had when your dad used to hold you as a little girl. "I love you, and I'd never hurt you. And if anyone does try to hurt you, they better hope they don't have to face me. No one is going to hurt you, baby girl."

He's the last one you expected to hurt you. But he did. And it hurts like hell. You can't explain the hurt to anyone else because, although they try to empathize, they don't get it. They didn't experience those nights you both lay on his roof looking at the stars. They didn't experience the time he told you with tears in his eyes that he would make you his wife if it was the last thing he did because he wanted his children to be raised by a woman like you. They didn't experience the time he accidentally said he loved you for the first time in front of the football team, but when he realized he did, he screamed it even louder. They weren't part of that. So they are inclined to tell you that you deserve better and that everything is going to be ok. But something in the back of your mind still causes you to question whether or not this is your fault. Are you to blame for his actions? How ca you expect him not to do it?  You tear yourself apart wondering what you could've done better. All the while, your heart is still yearning for his criminal touch, his deceiving voice, his  invidious laugh, his cunning smile, his piercing green eyes. Because no matter what wrongs he has committed, he is your better half, and you love him unconditionally- even when you shouldn't.