Cowardice

I truly believed there was a connection and passion with him that was unlike anything I’d ever experienced in this lifetime. But a man who’s a real Lothario would have played trickster a thousand times before, and another thousand times since. He would know exactly how to make a woman feel special.

And when he disappears without warning after the haze of dreamy lovemaking has subsided, with nothing except the smoky scent of his cigarette-kissed breath lingering on your body, you’re left wondering if any part of it was real. Or if it’s just a night you only dare to dream of again as you touch yourself to the thought of his strong hands grasping your body in untamed desire. The feeling of his tongue inside of you as you remember the way his eyes never left yours.

There’s a reason you never end up with the handsome stranger that swept you off your feet one cool December. Because he’s not real. He’ll materialise when you least expect it, trickle gasoline across the parts of you that lay dormant, and caress you with such intimacy until the fire inside of you reignites with hopeless longing. And just as you’re riding that wave of euphoria, he’ll vanish into the cracks of your memory, and the fantasy that you mistook for reality will be no more.

What incredible destruction he spreads in his wake, while you agonise for hours over your misguided bliss and wasted afflictions. A path of calculated manipulation designed to leave you wanting more. Until you realise the tender plantation he built in your heart, adorned with forehead kisses, the warmth of his body curled up against yours, the flecks of marbled maturity worn into his chestnut hair, and the fire trail his fingertips left as they traced the curve of your spine…well they were just deluded projections from a womaniser too afraid to ever explore the possibility of something real.