Love as Fate and Love as Choice

Darling,

As we live in the middle of a storm made of your late pregnancy, my job applications for any tenure track job in the country, and my torn Achilles tendon, I find myself reflecting on the crux of what makes it all possible to endure. Our relationship, or rather, how it has changed over time.

We often talk about how it took the most unusual circumstances for us to meet. Looking back on that day, encountering each other on that mountain so far away from our homes felt almost cosmic. Like the universe had to hand-pick its particles, calculate their trajectories, and cross its fingers as it sent us flying towards each other from different parts of the world. I think we had to be the bravest versions of ourselves at that point in our lives just to get there. Meeting you felt like destiny. How rare and beautiful it was to encounter you was so apparent to me the night we spent talking under the stars. Those hours and hours made me want to live forever just to talk to you. It’s hard to believe we were there for only a total of four nights. Maybe it was the way you asked if you could kiss me. But meeting you there for that brief moment was all it took for me to feel like there was an end to my loneliness. I was young, newly gay, and you made me finally feel like the horizon bore the lightning of possible love.

Now, it is different. Meeting each other felt destined. But we left that mountain thinking we would never see each other again. I don’t think our relationship after that point was necessarily meant to be. No amount of celestial architecture could puppet us into living the life we live together now. It was a conscious decision to fly towards each other again. Now, we choose each other, again and again, every day. We choose a life of us. Sometimes it is hard and it hurts to choose each other. Sometimes it’s the most natural thing to do. But it always feels like I belong with you; that I am supposed to be here with you. Maybe it is the repetition of choice that makes it feel like fate. I don’t know if there was a particular moment when I knew I loved you or that you loved me. But there are echoes of it everywhere. You stop what you’re saying, and say you can see it in my eyes that I want to kiss you. I look at photos of us, and wonder when we started smiling the same way. We’ve done it so many times now, chosen each other. It feels like I blinked and before I knew it, you were buried in my ribs. When I can summon the world to be still and quiet for a moment, I can feel my skin vibrate as if it realizes it is not touching you.

You’re in the bedroom sleeping as I write this. I miss you now, so it’s time for me to join you.