Want, Need, Love

Do you know the feeling when you don't really know what you want, but you feel pretty sure about what you don't want?

Do you know how you feel like you want something, or someone, but you're not sure if you really need that?

It was one of our awkward meetings, if not the most awkward one.

He was seems unable to stop straightening his jacket, which was already flawless. Well, it was a bit wrinkled, but who cares. He looked so gorgeous that even our server was still so obviously staring at him.

He smiled awkwardly at me, which I replied with the same amount of awkwardness. It was, probably, most likely, our last meeting in this small hometown of ours. He was going to catch the plane to his sister's place in the big city, miles away. He got the job opportunity he had been dreaming of. I knew because I was the one he used to talk to about his dreams. His fears. His everything, really.

Oh well.

These past few years had been a roller coaster ride, since I met him in my family ranch during the hunting season. It was so curious that we had never met each other until then, considering we both grew up in the same town, the same small town where everybody knows everybody. But there we met for the first time, and where after the first conversation near the ranch border we became inseparable. He was so easy to talk to and I was lonely. You would be lonely if you grew up all alone as the only child in a ranch quite isolated from the town center.

The roller coaster started when we began to date. Oh well, I was not even sure if we were dating. We were going out for dinner or movie or lunch or a stroll in the small forest near the ranch a million times, and we were not seeing other people. Not romantically. We held hands, sometimes, most of the time. We hugged. We kissed. But we never label our relationship. We never even call this a relationship.

See, the confusion led to roller coaster ride of emotion, instability, random fights, and all those mess. We both agreed that we were tired of them, but we stayed with one another nevertheless. He told me he loved me once,  but I said I was not even sure what love mean, if I even believe it. But he stayed. He stayed despite all the mess, he kept coming back.

It made me realize that maybe I should not let him go. I began to think that I want him. What I was not sure is if I need him, and vice versa. But I thought I should not let him go because I knew one thing for sure: I don't want him to leave me.

"So, how's everything at ranch?"

I startled a bit, "All's good. The chickens cluck, the cows moo."

"And how about you? How's the preparation going?" I asked him back, not sure if I really wanted to hear details about him going away.

"Yeah, everything's packed, I also have sent some stuffs ahead before my flight. Ready to go," he flashed his signature smile, which made my stomach dumbly lurched.

Our server brought our food, while giving him the eye. He looked at me with amused expression so I rolled my eyes. I just had to.

Which made him laugh. Oh that laugh I'll miss.

"...I think I love you," I blurted out while he was still laughing.

His laugh stopped midway and his gaze fixed at me.

"Oh come on. You don't even know what love mean. You don't even believe in love," he said.

I paused. Oh well, if I never say it I know I'll regret it.

"That was the thing. I don't know what love is like, but with you I never know what was I'm feeling. If I don't know what I feel and I don't know what love feel like, then maybe, maybe, what I feel to you is love?"