Pygmalion's Love (tentative title)

Excerpt from the story formerly known as "Desert and Ocean"

 

“You were always treating me like an outsider,” Lillith said, standing up to look me straight in the eyes. “You were treating me like the devil or an alien, and now you’re treating me like a woman.”

 

“Isn’t that what you wanted?” I yelled back exasperated. It was three-thirty in the morning, and I was dead tired. “You want to be treated like a woman, don’t you?”

 

“You got it all wrong,” she yelled back, with tears in her eyes. “You don’t know how to treat me.”

 

“I’ve treated you like s**t in the past, I’ve said that several times already!” I yelled throwing my hands up in the air. “I don’t know how many times I can say I’m sorry or how to make it better, but damnit, I’m trying! I’ve treated you like dirt, I’ve treated you like an alien, I treated you like the devil, and then I treat you like a woman and it’s still not enough! What do you want from me, Lillith?! How else do you expect me to treat you?!” The second I finished that, I realized in that instant that if she cried, I would too.

 

“WHY DON’T YOU TRY TREATING ME LIKE A HUMAN BEING!” Lillith screamed before turning around and running out of my dorm. I knew my pores were sweating profusely, but for some reason I can’t explain, I felt completely clean inside of my body. Even as I ran out the door to catch Lillith, the air was suddenly so clean and fresh. I could hear the crashing sounds of the ocean on the beach as I ran down the hill from where my dorm was and Lillith began running furiously alongside the water’s edge, as if she knew where she was going, but running out of energy to get there. I jogged to her, and shifted into a full out run the second she realized I was after her and began to run with what little she had left in her. Even though I wasn’t the best jumper in school, my legs bent down to propel me to her, and as I sailed through the air and got my arms around her, a sense of relief washed over me. Maybe now we could stop running.

 

“Let go of me, a*****e!” she screamed, fighting against me while kicking and socking me with her fists. “Get your f*****g hands off of me!” I turned her around to face me before I pushed her back into the sand and getting on top of her. Her eyes widened.

 

“Don’t you f*****g dare,” she threatened.

 

“I’m not going to,” I said, turning onto my back and guiding her to my hips. I lowered my voice, and I felt that ticklish feeling in my chest that I hadn’t felt since we were in the third grade. “You are.”

 

“Like hell I am,” Lillith sneered.

 

“Lillith,” I whispered, stroking her hair. I might have caught her off-guard in that instant; I had never spoken this softly to her.

 

“Mark, don’t do this,” Lillith said, her eyes welling up again.

 

“I have to,” I said, beginning to cry. “It’s the only way I know to make up for everything I ever did to you.”

 

“There’s got to be another way,” Lillith said, leaning down to me and pressing her forehead against mine.

 

“I almost wish there was, Lillith, but there isn’t,” I said feeling the tears roll off my cheeks. “Don’t you understand? If I hadn’t treated you like s**t, you wouldn’t be who you are today. You wouldn’t be this passionate person who fights for the rights of everyone who can’t stand up for themselves. You said yourself that you know what it’s like to be mistreated and not given any dignity. And it’s my fault, Lillith. I threw you into the boys’ room for fun, I made fun of those dresses you had to wear, and I called you every name in the book except the name you were born with. I took your dignity away. I took you away just for a good laugh. Lillith, I’ve been sorry for a lot of things I did, but the thing I’m the most sorry for is making you cry so I could laugh at you. But there isn’t any other way I can make it up to you. I’m sorry that I hurt you Lillith, and if you want me to spend the rest of my life saying that over and over again to you, I’ll do it. I’ll do it for you. But at the same time, I don’t want to take back one thing I did to you.”

 

“Why?” Lillith demanded, the tears falling onto my chest, washing away sand that got on my shirt. “You’re sorry but you wouldn’t change a thing? How is that supposed to work, Mark?”

 

“Remember in class,” I said, stroking her left arm, “how you said that there’s a chance that if you make that cake, you better be ready to eat it?”

 

“Yeah?” Lillith said putting her hands on her hips. “And? Exactly what will you be eating tonight?” I ran my hands up and down her arms, eliciting a soft moan from her.

 

“I made fun of the icing,” I said, tugging on her shirt, “but I prefer the cake under it so much better.” Lillith’s eyes widened, but instead of a look of disgust that I had grown fond of, now she was worried more than ever. She shook her head, put her hands up in surrender and began to get off of me.

 

“No, you can’t just say ‘We’ll have sex’ and expect that to make it better,” she said, fighting against me as she tried to leave me again. “It won’t, Mark. You can’t just ask for sex and expect to make what you did in the past ok.”

 

“I’m not expecting you to be ok with what happened,” I said, holding her in place with my hands still on her arms. “I’m not asking you to just forget about it or to be happy with it. But can’t you accept that I’m sorry? Can’t you accept that I feel like utter s**t for everything I did to you? Can’t you accept that it meant something that day we kissed?”

 

“How do I know this isn’t some elaborate joke?” she demanded. “How do I know your little buddies aren’t hiding in the bushes with a camera, ready to put this onto Youtube? How do I know that you changed for s**t over these past ten years, huh?” I leaned my head back into the sand, staring at the stars.

 

“What do you want me to tell you?” I asked. “What do you need me to say to make you understand?”

 

“Understand what?” she asked, leaning into me. I took a deep breath. I hoped my voice wouldn’t shake as I said this.

 

“What do you need me to say,” I said choosing my words carefully, “to make you understand that the only reason why I started picking on you is because I didn’t understand your jokes and I didn’t wanna look like the moron who didn’t know why you were so funny?” She froze for a second, stunned by what I said before she shoved me further into the sand and flared with fire.

 

“So that’s what it was all about?” she yelled at me. “All over a stupid joke I heard my dad say that you didn’t get? And you just didn’t want to look stupid in front of people so you made my life a living hell just to cover your dumb a*s?!” Lillith stood up storming away from me growling and screaming to the sky. I decided to get up from the sand to go after her. I grabbed her arm again and spun her around to me.

 

“Lillith, stop running away from me and help me make this right!” I yelled at her. “I was wrong, ok? I’m sorry I can’t change the past but, Lillith, I need you to help me! I can’t change the past, but I’d do anything to make everything here and now right! Tell me what I have to do, Lillith. What do I have to do so I don’t make you cry anymore?” Lillith cupped her face into her hands and wept bitterly. I held her tightly to my chest. Maybe asking her not to cry anymore was too much to ask in that moment.

 

I took her to the sand with me and kneeled. I let her cry for as long as she needed to. I looked at the scar on my arm from when my brother and I were rough housing. It healed, but there would always be a scar from there on out.

 

I felt Lillith’s soft lips pecking me gently where my jaw met my neck. I almost cried. I had been through rough years playing football with some of the best players in our league, I was in countless near-car-accidents, lost a mother during 9/11, and yet, the kiss of the woman I put through hell and who came out a stunning angel was the one who could make me cry.

 

“Lillith,” I whispered, leaning back and letting her straddle me the way she wanted to.

 

“Mark, you hurt me,” she said, still weeping, but now she was running her hands up and down my chest.

 

“Lillith…please forgive me,” I begged.

 

“But Mark,” she started.

 

“If you can’t forgive me, I understand,” I said.

 

“Mark,” she said firmly.

 

“I understand if there’s nothing I can do to fix what I did to you,” I said, weeping again. “But more so, I’m sorry that being in love with you can’t make up for anything.”

 

“Mark,” she said gently. I looked up at her, trying to control my sniffling.

 

“Yeah?” I asked. She bit her bottom lip as if she were still in pain.

 

“Say my name,” she said.

 

“What?” I asked raising my eyebrows.

 

“Say my name,” she said, her voice cracking. “Show me that you know my name. Show me that you know who I am.” I smiled brightly for the first time that night.

 

“Lillith,” I said. I loved the way her name sounded. The way the “l” and the “th” sounds make the name that I was just truly learning. I repeated her name, calling it up to her from where I lay in the sand. I love how she forgave me; but I would go without it forever if it meant I never would hurt her again.

Author's Note

Ok Tommie...tell me what you think okies?