My Darling Arrow

She taught me to crave something more than cold and lonely perfection. Something warm and cozy and sweet. Something wild and savage and provocative. Her. I crave her.

I fell in love with him like dead leaves fall from the branch of a tree and rain falls from a swollen cloud. I fell in love with him like tears fall when you’re sad and like blood oozes out of your skin when you step on broken glass.

I kiss my darling then. And my darling kisses his sweetheart.

He bends over me, curls his sleek, cut body all around me, making himself my world. Flicking his eyes all over my face, he whispers, “Dark curls; Golden eyes.” He rubs our noses together. “Thirteen freckles; Flowers between her thighs.” He skims his lips over mine. “Sweet; So sweet; My heart; My sweetheart.

Some girls fall in love and a boy catches them. He waits for them at the bottom of the cliff with open arms. And then there are other girls. Girls like me. We’re the girls in love with the boys who belong to someone else. We’re the girls in doomed love. When girls like us fall, there’s no one to catch us. Least of all that boy for whom we’ve taken the fall.

His whole presence made me feel warm. Like he was the sun or something. My sun.

You’re every guy’s nightmare, Salem. Because you’re the girl with too much love inside you.

No one can control you. No one can bind you by rules or put you in a box or rein you in. You’re Salem. You’re probably why they name hurricanes and natural catastrophes after girls like you.

You don’t love guys like that. You get eaten up by them and you love every bite they take out of you.

I grin and ask him something I've always wanted to ask. "Why do you always stare at my nose?" He glances at it for a second before whispering, "Because you've got freckles on it. Thirteen, to be exact. And seven under your eyes.

You’re the girl every guy runs away from. You’re every guy’s nightmare, Salem. Because you’re the girl with too much love inside you.

When girls like us fall, there’s no one to catch us. Least of all that boy for whom we’ve taken the fall. We’re the girls with secrets and witchy hearts. We’re the girls who listen to sad songs. Who slow dance to them with tears streaming down our faces, even as a smile lingers on our lips. Who cry in our pillows at night and who ride our sunshine-yellow bicycle along the empty, desolate, miserable places, where no one goes.

I never knew that she shines brighter than any star that I’ve seen on the soccer field.

Darling says he’s adored and loved. But he also makes me hurt. It says that he’s both a delight to my heart and a needle to it. Loving him is the most wonderful, most awful thing in the world. Loving Arrow is my doom. So he’s not my dear, he’s my darling.

Just because the one you love is in love with someone else doesn’t mean your love isn’t gorgeous or real. It doesn’t mean that your love should be killed or it should be torn out of your heart and thrown into a river or burnt down like an extinct piece of architecture.

So if you think you’re dangerous, I’m a wrecking ball. I’m a loose cannon. A wildfire. I can burn houses down. I can burn cities down too. So don’t ever make the mistake of trying to kiss me again. Because I don’t want a needy girl clinging to me and you don’t want a guy giving you your first lesson in heartbreak.

I’m not asking him to love me, am I? I’m only asking him to use me, use my body, and he won’t even do that. And I’m too hurt and too much in love with him so I’ve lost my mind over it.

Dark curls; Golden eyes.” He rubs our noses together. “Thirteen freckles; Flowers between her thighs.” He skims his lips over mine. “Sweet; So sweet; My heart; My sweetheart.

I’m always so cold, Arrow,” I tell him. “You’re the only one who makes me feel warm. You’re my sun.

He can stab me with a knife and I’ll be lying on the ground, dying, drawing little hearts in blood.

His lips twitch and I swear to God, my witchy heart jumps in my chest for making them.

Because your happiness is my happiness. When you smile, I smile. When you hurt, I hurt.

I’ll tear my heart out and throw it at your feet if I have to. Because it’s yours. My heart that I thought I’d killed is yours. It beats for you, Salem. Like a crazy fucking maniac that doesn’t know when to quit. And if you want, you can stomp on it and set it on fire and stab it with a knife. You can do whatever you want to it, it will still be alive. It will still beat for you.