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The dinner conversation with Alik tore at my conscience. I woke several times during the night, tossing and turning in Inna’s guest bed, getting up to brush my teeth, go to the bathroom, or check my phone for messages. I worried he wouldn’t respect my choice, and then I worried that he would. Knowing I made the right decision didn’t diminish my desire to be with him. I told myself I was infatuated with the way this beautiful man treated me. He made me feel special, desirable, important. It wasn’t that I was truly in love with him. This was a low point in my life. I was vulnerable. In time my attraction would weaken and my feelings for Mark would strengthen. I just needed to give it time.
Sometime around three am, the cell phone lying beside me buzzed. I had a text message. It was from Alik.
I sent you a message on Facebook.
I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and propped my head up on my pillows, grabbing the laptop from underneath the bed and pushing the buttons to read his message.
Broken sleep yet again. You fill my mind...distract me from rest. I have to tell you some things before we can no longer speak this way.........Natalie.......I love you......I’m in love with you....in the deepest....... purest.....most true way. To ask me to stop showing that I care for you is to ask me not to breathe.....not to live...... I weigh the consequence of losing you completely.....so yes I will try very hard to hold back my feelings... I need you in my life. Not selfishly want.....need. I was built...designed to love you...it’s in my genetics. I loved you before I knew you..this is my fate...my destiny....whether it is yours or not. If I bite my tongue and don’t display my heartfelt feelings for you, it’s because I love you that much, to make the sacrifice to keep you in my life. My love for you will not dissipate...will not change. I will hurt..die a little as I draw back from you. Please know...I will always be here for you..time and distance will not alter my love.
I stared at the body of the note, reading over particular sentences and then re-reading the message in its entirety. Could he really feel this way? Was it possible to fall in love with someone so deeply in a matter of months? I shook my head and read the message again.
This was dangerous. It wouldn’t lead anywhere good for anyone involved. Alik needed to find someone who didn’t already have a husband and children, someone who could fully appreciate his love. It was up to me to set him straight.
Alik, I read your note. I texted him back. Pretty intense.
I rolled over on my back and waited for his response. When I didn’t get one right away, I texted him again. You there?
Five minutes ticked by. The phone rang.
“You didn’t like it?” he asked.
“I did like it. It just worries me that you feel so strongly.”
“Great, you think I’m crazy now. It’s too late for me to take it back. I can’t undo what I said.”
“Alik, someone you care about is pulling away from you and your emotions are getting the best of you.”
“You don’t think my feelings are real?” He sounded desperate.
“I know it feels real to you right now, but I’m also sure it will lessen over time. You’re so young, there are so many life experiences ahead of you that will reshape your perspective.”
“With all due respect, you are wrong.” I could hear his breath catch. “My grandmother met my granddad when she was thirteen years old. They were married at sixteen and are still very much in love with each other after all these years. I’m twenty-four, plenty old enough to recognize the real thing when I feel it.”
“Sometimes when you’re in the middle of such powerful emotions, it’s difficult to interpret what is real from what is a temporary sense of loss.”
“I’m hurt that you’re minimalizing my feelings, but it doesn’t change anything.”
“I’m so sorry, Alik. I don’t think our being friends is a good idea. We shouldn’t talk to each other outside of work anymore.”
“Do you love me?”
Anger choked out my sympathy. He wasn’t respecting my wishes. He was acting as if I were free to do whatever I pleased. “I’m not a kid, Alik. I can’t breakup with my husband because I like someone else.”
“I’m not asking you to do anything. I want to know how you feel about me.”
“I care about you. I love being with you, talking with you, thinking about you. It doesn’t mean I’m in love with you. I think it’s more of that initial rush you get when you first fall for someone new. Lust.”
“Will you close your eyes for me?”
“Why?”
“I want you to imagine something. Just close your eyes.”
I shut my eyes. “Okay, they’re closed.”
“Are you lying down?”
“Yes. Go.”
“Okay, I want you to picture yourself at seventy years old. Really see yourself. Imagine you are sitting on the couch.”
Stretching my body out straighter and flatter on the bed, I splayed out my free arm and imagined myself older. I added laugh lines, a droopy jowl, and deep parenthesis around my mouth. The couch was the same as the one I owned now, brown suede, not all together comfortable. I looked a lot like my mom, only with a better hairstyle.
“Now, I want you to picture me sitting next to you,” Alik whispered into the phone.
I saw him there right next to me. He held my hand as we watched television. I rested my head on his shoulder and pulled my cozy blanket up higher on my waist.
“Do you see me?” he asked.
“Yes, I see you.”
“Sitting there with you? Is it a happy scene?”
“Yes.”
“Then you love me.”
I opened my eyes. “Explain.”
“I dated my high school girlfriend for seven years—the last two years of high school and all throughout college. She wanted to get married. I bought her a ring. But when I closed my eyes, I couldn’t see her sitting next to me when I grew older. I could only see her in my present.” He inhaled, and I pictured him lying in his own bed in Santa Monica, in some bare, post-college apartment, his body propped up on pillows, his long legs stretched out before him. “When I think about you, I see forever. I see us sitting on that couch together.”
“I don’t know what to say Alik. That’s pretty damn romantic.”
“So what’s next?”
“Next, we stop talking for a while, let things cool down.”
“Are you sure that’s what you want? I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too, I’m sure of that.”
“I love you, Natalie.”
“I care about you too. I’ll see you at work. We’ll say hello and that’s it. Okay?”
“I’ll do whatever you want.”
“Thank you.” I hung up the phone and closed my eyes, already wanting to hit redial and hear his voice again. I was in far deeper than I had realized.