To be over or under, that is the question.

He looks at her with avid glances; longing dropping from his eyelashes onto the coffee stained table. She smiles politely at the joke floating across the crowd, not noticing the sadness that permanently has found itself in her ex-boyfriend. However, as soon as he notices his current significant other striding outside the nearby window he tugs at his shirt sleeves and consciously laughs at the joke as an excuse to smile when she approaches him. It's been like this since they broke up, a masquerade ball that never ends but instead proceeds achingly with every minute he's around her. He has found something special in his girlfriend of 3 months but if given the chance to touch that raw, sexy, confident girl he once had, he's ashamed to say he would take it. Yet, when you love someone, is it bad to want that person? It's almost as if your whole relationship is scattered across a piece of glass; all you can see through this translucent slab is how things should be but you can't seem to break through it's hardened surface. So when does that longing become long gone...or does it ever? 

It seems like this disease of longing and everlasting desire has spread rapidly among my friends and I am glad for myself that I have yet to catch it, or rather be rid of it. I was torn from so many corners by Billy that eventually there was nothing left to write or to want. But I had my shot at love and I took it and of course it's still there in pieces but there's a distinct difference between loving someone and being in love with someone. My aforementioned friends seem to be soaked in romantic angst beyond any recognition of an exit sign. As much as they claim to be done with them, the impressions of their loves have not worn and are now deeper than ever before. Maybe it's only when someone else comes into the picture that we have to think about that inevitable question; are we really over it? And maybe that's why it seems so poignant in our minds every moment that a scent comes across that reminds us of that one time together or when they innocently flirt without realizing the pain it's causing us; that feeling when we really come to understand the term of a "broken heart".  

But after all is said and done (though nothing feels finished), we start over with someone new. Someone different, someone nice, someone who makes you feel the flutter of butterfly wings in the pit of your stomach, but someone who doesn't even compare to that one person. So is this new relationship a prison or a safety net... or is it possible that it can be genuine. Can you truly like another person when you're in love with someone else? And if you can, then will it ever develop into something or will it forever be limited until you find some sort of closure. It doesn't help to burn that old t-shirt they gave to you, or flirt with someone else in front of them, or rip the picture of the two of you together into as many pieces imaginable because in the end what's there is there and petty attempts at forgetting prove unsuccessful. I feel like the only time that one can truly "get over" someone is when they honestly don't want to be under them anymore...because as bittersweet as it is, sometimes it's nicer to feel the sad things than to feel nothing at all.