I love you.

The words, barely escaping his lips, transcended the barriers of apprehension, lifted through the prevalence of self-doubt, and permeated the air. Hand in hand, the two lovers looked into each other’s eyes in a silence that can only be described as dauntingly beautiful. As the words escaped his lips, he could feel the presence that they commanded in the room-- a trance-like aura that suspended time and replaced it with pure, raw emotion.

The “I” had preceded a pause, pregnant with suspense.

The “love,” had followed the pause with a lethargic, yet emphatic defiance that summoned an unparalleled amount of confidence.

As he approached the “you,” the word had been eagerly awaiting its release from the confines of his mouth-- and subsequently his mind—as the grip of the hands and the bond shared between the eyes grew firmer.

The reservations that had been acquired consequences of failed romances and past lovers had been shattered. There, he sat, more vulnerable than he had been before, but knowing that it had been worthwhile. Worthwhile in the sense that he had found the one. Worthwhile in the sense that this tattered organ he called a heart had been remedied by the affectation of this external entity.
As his heart beat at superhuman speeds, as his mind traversed over the loves that had previously destroyed him with their tumultuous ends, as he smiled on the inside with the self-validating relief, he had sub-consciously tuned out the words barely making it past the dimensions of his teary-eyed, tight-lipped counterpart’s mouth.




All he heard was three words-- yet they were enough.



Three words.
Nine letters.
One breath.





“I’m so sorry....”