I told him I loved him before he could say it back.

And it was embarrassing and strange and I felt far too vulnerable. I regretted it almost instantly when he wasn’t ready to say it back. In the interim between when he could say it, I felt beyond awkward about it and worried that I had overextended myself. I’m usually not the person to say it first and when he couldn’t genuinely reciprocate, it scared me shitless and brought up some old, rotten feelings about being abandoned or suddenly disliked. Call it irrational, but it is what it is.

When he did, it was an accident. It slipped out twice in succession, once via text message before he came over and once when he was at my place before we saw this movie. He stood by it when he caught himself saying it, he was even happy and proud of it. 

And so, when this scene came up watching the movie a few hours later, I couldn’t help but choke up. Call me a cheeseball all you want, but it’s not always about the whips and chains.