Do you remember our trip to the mountains? The one where we slept near that tiny creek, in front of the valley, the sunset in our face? It was the first time I told you… I love you.
I believed then, and I still believe today, that there is nothing that would stop this love from growing stronger and stronger.
We made love in the tent. We had a few drops of rain in the morning, before sunrise, that were like a pleasant music. We climbed up to the lookout and went back to Seattle to discover that people thought you had gone missing.
Right now, I am in a motel in Big Bear, CA. There is a band playing country music across the street, but I am dead tired. I slept in my hammock yesterday, on the road, somewhere in the Angeles National Park, and did a few small hikes in the morning. But this last night made me realize how much I need you. I felt empty, I had no will whatsoever to even look for a hotel or a proper camping. My wish was to let time fly. Disappear until Tuesday and go back to work, to a sense of purpose, before jumping in an airplane to go back to your arms.
And to lie down like we were on that couch, last Sunday. It felt like I could have stayed there, enlacing you, for the whole night and the night after. I did not care much about what we were watching, the real satisfaction came from you being there near me, in my arms.
Something keeps coming back to my mind at time. I think I dreamed about it in my half-awake state last night, and it is not the first time I have that picture in mind. You, looking at me, on your bed, just before my sister left. I remember the pain in your eyes. It is engraved in my memory and I cannot get rid of it. Nor do I want, in a way, to forget it… I think, somehow, that it was the first time I realized that I could make you suffer that much. That I had that power in me of making you cry your heart out. We had a few fights before, but I never saw your face showing your pain in such a strong, indelible way. This discovery, somehow, was like a slap in my face, because deep down I only want you to be happy and to take care of you.
Become better with you.
Learn to be better with you.
Because my life is not as fun when you are not there.
Somehow, I feel like this night did a… tabula rasa, a shift on the way I was seeing our relationship. I remember telling you that, somehow, me hurting you was something I was always scared of in the back of my mind. I think that, in some ways, this night overcame that feeling, because I understood at once that the us suddenly mattered more than the you and me. It made me realize that there was… I don’t know exactly how to describe it… Maybe… Maybe a new form of maturity in our relation. That it had reached the critical mass where, suddenly, we realize more seriously that it is there to last, and that we must treat it in consequence. That we should not take it for granted but that we now need to engrave it deeper, making it stronger.
More than all, I feel humbled that you chose me to share that deep love. And I want, more than anything, to cherish this love for the life to come.
I would never have thought of a better partner to go through this life.
Thank you.