Broken vows are like broken mirrors. They leave those who held to them bleeding and staring at fractured images of themselves. (pg. 161)- Richard Paul Evans, Promise Me
Let me tell you a story. Not a sad one, not a happy one, a bland one, just like yesterday’s gruel. Fear is a terrible thing. It petrifies you to the bone, rendering your mind incapable of making any fluid or mobile decisions. But of all the sickness that plagues Man, love is the most severe.
I was cursed. Cursed by love, I’ve always had a baptism of romance since the day I was born, but I’ve never been lucky in the romantic probability. By some miracle, I’ve always been cursed to be with the worst of Men. They always start excellent and sweet at first, till they become an irony of their yesterday’s. Our future and tomorrow constantly clouded, looking bleak like a bathroom mirror condensed by steam.
The first boy I fell in love with was he who plagued me with this curse. It happened so fast that the entire relationship was likened to a fast car, maybe a Ferrari. One moment we’re riding on a fast lane at 240 mph, the wind in our hair, till we’re crashing and tumbling down the hill, blood in our eyes, our organs bulging—a hernia. Although the relationship was short, the love was long, long enough to go round my body, twice over. He was the love of my life, the entire one, the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. Then one night, the full moon was out and bright, under the Iroko tree, we made a vow to forever.
My lover died. A terrible rain fell that day, a testament to who he was, a great human being. I cried, tears bellowing from the deepest part of my body, the clouds under my eyes gave way, and it flooded. The tears never stopped for years, although with time, they reduced. They never entirely ceased. But I could never bring myself to love anyone else. Men flocked around me, Bastards and Shakespeare alike. But the curse from the vow still weighed heavily on me. It was a never-ending vow. It was my secret. It was our secret. Only us and God knew, I the only mortal party that remained in the vow.
I had to die. To break the vow, I was told by the priest that death was the only cure. I was alone and loveless because I never wanted to pass my plague to another person. I knew the repercussions that followed me breaking my vow. But the inevitable happened once. An accident, I lost my mind. The doctors called it Amnesia. To me, thinking about it now I felt God gave me a second chance, a wild card, and i escaped from my vow—only temporarily.
I forgot everything. I fell in love with a kind man. We created a family with it came beautiful kids. Life was once again perfect and sweet, everything fluid and mobile. Since I forgot, the vow was suspended or so I thought. Life continued. To a day, decades after, a dream came like a Pigeon; it brought with it memories. Memories that had been lost from my previous life. I remembered it all. And so the curse from the vow reignited. The fuel from the curse burnt everything in my new life. First my husband, then our kids. This was worse than the Egyptian plagues. The locust ate everything in its path.
Then came the last plague, Fear. Fear of death. I was scared of dying. I had tasted a new life. I have seen a better life, one better than the one I enjoyed with my dead lover, with who I made the vow. But maybe I was selfish. Perhaps I was stupid. Maybe I had been immature to understand the ramifications and responsibilities of making a vow or even a promise. But I had been stung, and it hurt. But I needed an escape. This was a prison. I needed to be free. How would I do so? How could I be free? I was lost.
I was free. But at a price. A costly one, I was told to choose between life and death—a life without love or death filled with void—an oblivion. I chose life. After all, love was the catalyst of my plague. So here am I, loveless. This is my story. It’s not a song. It’s a warning, "never be lost in the euphoria of love to make any promise or vow of forever. Learn from this, and be wise.”
To love is a vow and responsibility. Know your limits.
End Note.
To make a vow is a greater sin than to break one.-Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Wowwww. "To love is a vow and responsibility"
vows!!
never to be taken for granted.