This Ain’t A Fairytale

She stood frozen to her spot on the floor as she heard his voice on the phone. He sounded weak, unsure and a little bit afraid.
“Do you love me?” he asked quietly.
She looked at her feet and gulped. Did she love him?
She took a deep breath before answering. 
“Yes”
He smiled from the other end of the line. He felt a little hopeful now.
“Will you give me another chance?”
She let her breath out but didn’t say anything.
Could she give him another chance?

---

6 months earlier

“And then…. And then he leaned forward and whispered ‘I love you’ before kissing me!” she squealed, almost making her friend drop her smoothie.
“Well that’s nice!” the friend commented plainly, “I’m happy you’re taking this forward. So, you really like this guy?”
The lovesick girl grinned. “Of course I do. I think we really have something special. It feels like a fairy tale” she said, with a dreamy look in her eyes.
Her friend twirled the straw in her drink. “Well, there’s something you should know about him.”

She couldn’t believe her friend. “No way. He wouldn’t do that.”
“But he does, and he will. He’s done that with each and everyone he’s dated, and you’re no different.” her friend warned her.
She got up furiously, “I’m not the same as everyone else. He loves me and we’re going to make this work. He’s not going to be a playboy this time, you’ll see.”
Her friend simply looked at her with concern, “Babe, he may be your Prince, but you’re not his princess”
And that’s the last thing her friend ever said to her after that.

---

1 week earlier

It was pretty late. She’d had a bad day, and she didn’t want to be alone. As she walked down the road to her apartment, she called her boyfriend.
He picked up the call, “Hey babe, where are you?”
“Almost home. Would you come over please? Today was kind of crappy and I really need you to be there”
It was an odd request, because they never really spent nights together. And when they occasionally did, it was at his place.
He hesitated before answering, “Sorry hon, can’t make it today. My mum’s ill and I’ve got to be here for her”
She frowned as she heard a woman’s voice in the background, a voice too young to be his mother’s.
“And that’s her. She needs soup. I’ll call you tomorrow? Thanks and sorry. Love you” he hung up.
Something told her he was lying, but she blamed her doubts on the crappy day. She sighed as she turned a corner

Tonight, she took a different route, one she doesn’t take often. Tonight she took a route she almost wishes she hadn’t. Because if she didn’t take that route, she wouldn’t have seen her boyfriend. She wouldn’t have seen her boyfriend in front of another girl’s house, taking in groceries together. She wouldn’t have seen the girl with him.
If she hadn’t taken that route, she wouldn’t have seen her boyfriend drop the bags at his feet before pulling the said girl in for a kiss. If she hadn’t seen that, she wouldn’t have yelped in surprise and tears wouldn’t have stung the corners of her eyes. He wouldn’t have seen her and she wouldn’t have ran away. If she hadn’t taken that route, then maybe she still would’ve believed in fairy tales.

---

After that day, she learnt a lesson the hard way – fairy tales remain in the books. Princes don’t come looking for their princesses through night and storm. Princes don’t cut through poison ivy to kiss their princess. In fact, princes in real life grew the poison ivy that looked like roses and stung their princess. She had been naive and he had been deceiving.
He was her prince, but she wasn’t his princess.
She wasn’t the one he swept off her feet, led her up the stairwell. This wasn’t a fairy tale, this was reality. And reality hurt like a bitch.

---

“Do you love me?” he asked quietly.
She took a deep breath in.
She thought about all the times he made her believe in fairy tales.
“Yes” she replied.
“Can you give me another chance?” he asked, afraid of the answer.
She let her breath go.
She remembered when he ruined her fairy tale. When he made her realize that fairy tales don’t exist. 
“No.” she decided, before hanging up.

---

All credits go to Taylor Swift and her beautiful lyrics of White Horse ❤