Love hurts...

When I was young there was this girl. She was beautiful, attractive and a pleasure to be around. She wasn’t tough or butch like the other girls. In fact, she was a bit vulnerable. But that was part of the attraction – I wanted to fight for her and protect her.

I courted her for a long time, singing her praises, focusing on her positives and her attractiveness, telling everyone about her potential. I fought for her and, eventually, we came to the edge of something special.

Then, despite all the promises and all the supposed shared desire, there was a sudden turn. I waited you see, but she didn’t turn up. The time and place was all agreed, there was an air of optimism and excitement. We were on the brink of proving everyone wrong when, without warning, she simply failed to show up.

In a moment I was crushed, as the realisation hit me that it wasn’t to be. I thought about pursuing it further, trying to force something. But I realised that you can’t make people want something. They either have the passion and the desire for it or they don’t. It’s either in them to want to make it happen, to create something special, or it isn’t. It’s down to them and them only and, if the fire doesn’t burn inside, then there is little you can do to change things.

So I gave up hoping. Dejected, I turned my thoughts to other things, blocking her out of my mind, ignoring what might have been. While I hurt on the inside and it ate away at me, on the outside I gave the impression, at least, that I was strong and together.

Then, after some time had passed, I saw her father. I brought myself to ask him what had happened. Why had all our promises been broken? Why did we not have what we thought we had? Why would we not be what we had the potential to be?

“The pitch was shit,” he said.