Love Made Me Do It by Tamekia Nicole

night.  I dreamt about being with him and causing discord in his relationship. I woke up the next morning feeling like a million bucks. This was it, my big break.  My relationship with the roommate was on a fast track downhill.  I couldn’t wait for it to be over and done with.  But I knew that I would have to be the one to pull the trigger.  I did just that.
    I was going to Chabot Jr College taking a night class and the roommate picked me up every night.  This night was no different.  Accept he had no idea about the bomb I was about to drop. I got in the car and I looked at him….. “I don’t want to do this anymore,” he looked at me and starting crying.  “I knew you would do this, I knew you would break my heart.” There was nothing I could say.  “I’m sorry, can you just take me home.”
    That night my heart sank and I felt as if I reached an all-time low in my life.  I hurt someone who probably really loved me. I lay in the bed looking at all his junk stored in my bedroom.  I tried everything to get a good night’s sleep.  Right when I started to drift off, “Johnson, Johnson,” then it was louder “TAMEKIA, TAMEKIA….I KNOW YOU HEAR ME…GET UP!”… It was the roommate he was in my backyard.
    I opened my window “Dude, what do you want… it’s 3am?” “Get the fuck out of here?” “Give me my gun!” Shaking my head in disbelief I just replied “No!” I closed my blinds and my window and lay back down. When he had moved most of his stuff to my house to store, one of those items was a gun. There was no way in hell that I was giving him this gun.
    The morning came and I looked out into my backyard and of course he wasn’t there.  But I had a million missed calls from this maniac. I checked my voicemail and he left a message saying that he left my lovers house and would not be going back there.   He had stolen his company cell phone and if I needed to reach him that was the only way. Fuck!  Seriously this is not the way I wanted to start my day!  I had created a monster.
    Now love was making him do it .  I called him, and told him to come and get his gun and all the other shit he left behind. He pulled up to my house in his work truck.  He didn’t take any of his items accept the gun. I still had the keys to the mustang.  I would be keeping those until I felt like giving them back. 
    I was on pins and needles wondering if I would see him on the news.  It was like I had been holding my breath and I desperately needed to exhale.  I needed to live.  I needed to feel.  I was praying, and wishing that ending it with the roommate, would allow me to rectify my life. Of course an escape is never easy.  Breakups never just end in one day. He showed up at my house begging to talk to me for a few minutes, so I let him in. I sat on my bed expecting him to sit next to me so we could talk.  Instead he got down on one knee and asked me if I would marry him.
    What in the fuck is going on? I was continuously caught in a storm drain and garbage kept falling on me.  I said no.  I had to say no. I didn’t love him. I didn’t love him like he deserved.  I think at that point I didn’t even love myself. I wanted to be with my neighbor….my lover… I already had proved over and over again that I loved him.  More than I loved anything else.  I loved thy neighbor, just like I loved thyself.  The bible says that is what you are supposed to do.  See my mind set was always like that.  Looking for justification for the bullshit I was doing.
    Looking back now… I think that saying no to a person that had been so good to me, may have been one of my biggest regrets in life. But I would have dogged him in a marriage, much worse than I did in our relationship. This I knew for a fact.  He left, only returning to get his car keys. 
    This was wrong.  He was hurt and he was picking up his Mustang on an empty tank.  Plus a scratched bumper.  It was a cold world I was living in.  So if it