“Spencer.” I could feel my throat starting to swell and my heart take a plunge. “Baby, please don’t tell me…” Her eyes tried desperately to avoid locking onto mine. I started to rub my eyes ferociously. “Why, baby? Why, why, why!” She jumped a little bit. How could she be doing this to herself? How could she be hurting herself so bad? I felt so angry, so fucking mad! Not at my baby, just…. Fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK! How did I miss this? I racked my memory trying to find clues. I came up with a bunch of ‘not hungries’ ‘already ate’, irrational insecurities about her body, things she mentioned that her mother said…. Her mother… PAULA. “How long?” I hissed out in anger. Big blue eyes, stormy gray with fear, looked up at me. “How long, Spencer?”

“After we broke up,” she whispered, her head hung low. “I’m sorry…” and I didn’t know if she meant about not telling me, or because I started to cry, or about the whole thing in general. “I think I should leave.” I could save this now – finally. I could hold her in my arms and tell her that we’d be ok and kiss her and love her – say that she has nothing to be sorry about. I could save this by just telling her I was going to help her.

“I think you should too.” But I didn’t… “I’ll take you home.” She started to shake hard.

“D – don’t leave me again, Ashey! I’ve lost everyone for you!” The anger and animosity felt like knives piercing every inch of my skin. She screamed even louder. “I’M GOING TO LOSE MY FAMILY FOR YOU!”

And then it was silent because everything was out in the open. Now we both knew that she had to choose and she could only choose one. She would either loose her family, or lose me…

“Love, like truth and beauty, is concrete. Love is not fundamentally a sweet feeling; not, at heart, a matter of sentiment, attachment, or being "drawn toward." Love is active, effective, a matter of making reciprocal and mutually beneficial relation with one’s friends and enemies.” – Carter Heyward