My biggest problem is I don’t believe the concept of “in love”
-Tobe Nwigwe “I Choose You”
I loved singing along. When I read about relationship anarchy over a decade ago, I saw myself. This idea that relationships need no hierarchy and that labels often lead to unspoken expectations. I knew I loved wildly. I knew I wanted to be in love with the world and have no borders to its flow. I knew I didn’t want romantic relationships to rule or define me. That my best friend would always be my wife even if she had a partner or I did.
This was not modeled for me. When I found myself loved, it felt like a cross between a miracle and a dream near the edge of sleep. It could be lost in the blink of an eye.
My only job was to keep it.
A mixture of FOMO and shame drove me towards monogamish pair-bonding. I was able to name it polyamory. I was able to convey my need for relationship anarchy. I was able to keep movement and travel the world all while keeping a “life-partner.” But three years in, they almost broke up with me because of what they weren’t getting in the relationship. I had to weigh whether it was worth the fight.
I decided it was and returned from abroad ridden with guilt. I was the “bad partner” and my only job to fall at their mercy. It was then, they told me there would be no more “relationship anarchy”—we were “primary partners.” The title itched my skin but what could I do?
I fell into my own mouth and masticated myself.
Four years and some change later after following their rules of rupture and repair; the relationship ended. I needed more freedom and they needed monogamy. Seven and a half years is impossible to unravel. Any story could be written about it. Take your pick: cast me as villain or victim, and you’d have enough evidence for either. Write us both as lambs to the slaughter, unexpected victims in the trap of our own creation.
What is probably the truest is that we were both fully formed adults that chose to love each other so forcefully we, at times, bulldozed our own needs.
There was no transition between you two.
You came and showed me what I was missing. I had never seen someone who loved the way I did up close before. You move through the world seducing everyone you meet. You care for people in a way that does not compromise the fullness of their being–or yours. You caught me off guard and I have barely found my footing.
As we laid on the couch in my dimly lit living room, I tried to put labels on what has been blossoming between us for months.
“I have something I need to tell you.”
“Tell me.”
“It’s not that simple, it could ruin everything.”
“Roll the dice! …It won’t ruin everything.”
“I love you.”
You held me silently for awhile, squeezing from time to time until I broke the silence.
“I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry. I love you, too.”
I lift my head to look at you. “What do you mean by that?” I shook my head laughing at the initial thought you could mean anything but something innocuous and platonic.
“Well…I respect you; I care for you, I feel tenderly towards you. What do you mean, huh, how about that?”
“Ugh, I don’t know.” I lifted my body off your chest.
“Okay, bye! See you in 2028.”
“2028?”
“Yeah, I feel like it’s gonna take two years to process this.”
“Haha, probably. Could we do mid-2028? I could use like two and a half years.”
“Sure.”
“Cool,” I relaxed back into your arms and wondered if I should clarify the love I felt for you when—
“You didn’t answer my question. I answered yours.”
“I don’t know, I’m in love with you. Does that answer your question?”
“Yes.”
I tapped your wrist with quiet urgency. “Do we differ?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll take, ‘I don’t know.'”
“Do you accept my love even if we do differ?”
“Yes, of course.”
From the quiet you said, “I assumed there was love between us. The way we’ve moved and interacted. I assumed there was love here.”
“I feel tenderly towards you,”
has so much more meaning than “I am in love with you.” As does, “I assumed there was love between us.” Because of course there is. It is the way our feet stall trying to find each other at every free moment. The way we kneel in front of each other when the other is crumbling in on themselves. It is the way we gently move each other in the kitchen. It’s how you slowed me sexually because you see me more clearly than I see myself. It is how you say, “tell me” or open you body to me when we are in conflict. That is what love is. That is what it looks like. And it is so much more meaningful than “I am in love with you.”
But I have to admit to doubting all of it. I told you, “I want the title because I want to feel wanted.” You responded with, “but I do want you.”
Oh, right. I keep forgetting that.
I most want a title when I think about explaining it to others. Their face, twisting in doubt as they ask me questions that amount to “are you sure you are wanted?”
I picture their faces in memory and fantasy. I imagine they see unworthy dripping off me and question if anyone could truly love me. They need artifacts from their world. Ways of showing the progression of a romcom with a white woman draped in feathered hair being loved in ways my body has never been portrayed to be.
I say, “we said, ‘I love you’” and “we’re in a relationship,” the way I used to attached turtlenecks to my head to fake having long, flowing, hair. I’ve imagined being loved so many times, but it was always in a different body.