You Deserve Love

A Story by Koiel

If these three words aren’t beautiful, I don’t know what is.

“You deserve love.”

If there were three words more beautiful, I’d have already embodied them.

You said them to me in one of my drunk fits of madness. When messes of broken glass were made in the dining room, and your stomach was bruised from my blows. You didn’t back down, no. You kept standing back up, silently sweeping up the glass that stuck to and pricked the soft underside of your bare feet. One of the chairs from the dining room was in the kitchen leaned against the cabinet. The same cabinet that held the liquor you placed up high so I couldn’t reach. But like a child I climbed up and got into it. I remember watching you watching me. It felt odd. Through my screams and kicks, you just stayed back and watched me. As if telling me, ‘I’ll let you have this moment,’ without saying anything at all, but still watching over me to make sure I didn’t hurt myself. Why you were okay with putting yourself in harms way to keep me out of it, I’m not sure. Naturally, as I always did, I blamed you. I blamed you for my illness of mind, for you were the one that took my heart. I screamed and spit at you. And you just watched me. I leaned over, dizzy and drunk, and fingered at a piece of glass on the floor.
“Koi,” you grunted. I ignored you and flicked it up into my palm, rubbing the smooth side, looking away from you.
“Koi.” Again, I ignored you.
“Koi if you press that to your skin, you’re gonna get it.”
I pressed the shard against the underbelly of my wrist.
It was at this time that you burst forward. You grabbed my hands and pushed me backwards, forcing me to back to the wall. I whipped my head to bite your hand, but your grabbed my jaw and jerked my head back to the wall. You sighed deeply and looked down at our feet, gripping my hands above my head and my jaw with your other. You tensed up.
I looked at you and began to sob, my knees getting weak. I cried pitifully against the wall and tried to pull away from you.
You looked up from the floor, our eyes meeting. Your brows were crinkled and your eyes were low. I could see the tears welling in your dark eyes.
“Baby...” you said gently, leaning your face to my neck, slowly letting go of my jaw. Your plump lips hit my tender skin, and I dropped the shard that was in my palm. You kissed my neck and breathed down my skin. I tried to pull away but you held me still, kissing up and down my neck to my jaw and my small pink lips. I looked at you, leaning into you.
“You deserve love,” you said quietly.