[ WP ] I feel like there is a lack of love on this subreddit . Write a Love Story !

He needed to stop writing sad stories of broken hearts. Maybe, he thinks, he could write a story with a happy ending. Not like the last. Maybe start believing in something besides the inevitable. And, he thinks, maybe he is in trouble because he thinks of the sour in life as being inevitable. 
 
 
 He starts thinking of starting a story with the words things were n't actually that bad. Maybe this time the main character could be likable. He starts there. He starts just where he has never decided to start before. At first, subtly, he does n't notice the difference. 
 
 
 Things were n't actually that bad. They were n't great, but they were really starting to turn around. He did n't have much money—that was n't turning around. But his attitudes on how much money he needed were changing, so that helped. A lot of things were working out like that. Events he could n't change or had n't changed yet. 
 
 
 He could never be young again. Never change the past. He writes this down. You can never change the past. He writes in a notebook. Filled with other things he's written down. Not all of them sound like they are said by a therapist, but some do. It was, after all a technique he had learned from a therapist. Write what comes to mind. Edit it out later. 
 
 
 Now he writes buy milk. Sometimes he just uses it to write anything, not just spontaneous things. But after that, he feels a little guilty, so writes something more inspired. I need to sit on the other side of the bed more often. But this does n't have the feel he is looking for. He wants it to mean something. He knows, for the most part, he only sleeps on one side of the bed because his apartment is so small, a room really, that he often eats on the other side and there are crumbs in the sheets. He wants to find a way to write this so that his reader knows that he misses someone, and wants to find some way to relate the emptiness he finds in his life to the emptiness he finds in his bed. And then he realizes he just did. So he writes it. The emptiness in my bed, the blankness of the cold side, is losing the warmth of the memory of her next to me. 
 
 
 But he is in tragedy mode again. Things, he must remember before he writes anything else, really were n't that bad. So start writing the next part. 
 
 
 The next part, however, is n't in the notepad. It's on his nice paper. The paper he prints resumes on. Or poetry. Anything he feels is particularly important. Or something he wants to be important. It's his way of crossing his fingers. He writes a letter to her on a typewriter, embarrassed of his handwriting, and wanting her to be impressed. 
 
 
 Hello Love. That's been his fallback lately. Because she told him that she liked it when he called her that. Now he puts it behind every hello. He's hoping it still makes her feel special. It is n't that he would mind calling her anything else she'd like. He just likes the idea of calling her something that makes her smile. And, this early in their courtship, it's all he's really learned. A sure fire. He's really counting on sure fires. Does n't want to mess this up. Pretty hopeful; More hopeful than he's been in awhile. He writes that down in the small notepad. Writes awhile. Just because he thinks something needs to balance that sentence. But as he writes it, he ca n't picture a time in his life that he has ever felt more hopeful. But that sounds sappy. He almost writes it. But he does n't. Figures, if it comes out later, after this story is done, after he is sure that it has a happy ending, he can go back and edit it in. Ultimately he does. He writes it before he even writes much more. That is how hopeful he is. That's clear. So clear, he writes it. 
 
 
 And then he goes back to the letter. Tries to write it like the kind of song that makes a person rewind and replay. Or the kind of voicemail that is n't really necessary to save, but a person does anyways. He wants her to feel like he felt when he opened his PO Box at the post office, seeing her letter patiently waiting. He's told her, over the phone, how he disregarded 10 other items in his box, some probably important notices or bills, just to open her letter first. That was n't true. It could have been. He definitely would have. Would have thrown away plane tickets to some exotic location, like Brazil or Greenland. He realizes, though, that that actually sounds stupid, that he thinks of a places like Brazil and Greenland as exotic. Silly, really. Feels much more confident in telling her that the other items in the box could have been anything. By leaving it vague, she could think of things she really wants in the mail at that moment, and the idea of discarding those things to choose a letter—well, it makes her feel pretty special. So whether or not it is true, it is easy to see why he does it—to make her feel special. 
 
 
 The letter goes well. She likes it. She likes a lot of things he sends her. He sent her flowers once, for no reason at all. Another time, he sent her a bath kit. She hated taking baths. Preferred to shower. He, lost in a haze of new things to remember about a new person, forgot. Bought her a luxury bath kit. Mailed it to her. Only, it was out of stock, so it got back ordered. Before it shipped, he remembered that early detail, that she did n't like baths. And told her, but she still did n't want him to give away the surprise. She laughed. Kept saying she could n't imagine what it is that he would've gotten her that she'd said she would n't like. She thought of him like the guy in the romantic movie that is a little awkward, but has such a big heart that you ca n't help but fall for him. She saw that big heart in him. And the funny thing is, the more she saw his big heart, the more he felt his heart grow. 
 
 
 The bad present, the bath kit, was laughed about. But two nights later she actually used it. Told him she loved it. He felt like he had just read the last three pages of a really happy book. The kind where the hero falls in love, wins, and rides off into the sunset. He ca n't think of another way to convey that feeling, so he just writes, rides into the sunset. He writes that at the back of the notebook. This will be his ending. It is here, that he realizes that he is committed to this story having a happy ending. At this point, he goes back and writes the part about how hopeful he is. 
 
 
 She calls him in the morning. He has n't seen her in a few weeks. He knows that if he writes that in the story, it will sound ridiculous that he was so sure. Also knows he seems crazy when he writes how much he already loves her, even though he's only known her a little over three months. Only ever spent time with her in person a couple of weeks when the days were added together. He wants to write about how he understands that it is illogical, but that it did n't need to be logical. He loved her. So he writes I do n't care if it makes sense to anyone, it makes sense to me. 
 
 
 He keeps writing. Writes about the late night phone calls and texts, and how he sometimes disregards the time and just has to hear her voice. She is so sweet about it. She let's him wake her up—even says she likes it when he wakes her up. He's never felt so loved. When she tells him how much she likes his phone calls, he feels like the world's best telemarketer. He knows this sounds silly, so he does n't tell her. He writes it down. 
 
 
 She sends him cookies and a new shirt and a painting of a typewriter. He puts together a care package of poetry, a compilation of music, and thinks of including the story he writes for her. But he ca n't think of an ending. He wants it to be happily ever after, so she knows he thinks of them as having happily ever after potential. But he does n't know how to finish it. He writes, in the middle of the page, three question marks. They look like this: 
 
 
 
 
 
? 
 
? 
 
? 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 He puts the story aside for a while. Focuses on her music compilation. He's nervous about doing this. He adds songs, then takes away. This goes on for days. 
 
 
 Each night, he lays in bed, reflecting on his song choices. He gets up, looks at the list he's started, also in his notebook, and scribbles out three songs. He wants to get this right. Imagines one wrong song turning this all around, making her question her decision. But then he thinks of her, who she really is, how much she really says she likes him, and he puts the songs back on the list. 
 
 
 The story is on the edge of the precipice of what their lives will be, and he just is n't sure how to make it fly, not fall. Not sure how it will end. But he tells himself he ca n't send her a story with no ending. It has to have a happy ending. That was the whole idea of this story, was n't it? But it was n't. He reminds himself of that. The idea was to not have a sad ending. That night he falls asleep listening to his voicemail, to the first message she left him. 
 
 
 He does n't finish the story. He ca n't. No scribbles in notebooks or revelations round it out. But he has become happy with the result: with no ending, the story is, after all, void of a sad ending. His heart is not yet broken, and might not ever be. Sure, he'll be the first to concede that there was no happy ending with no ending at all, but he saw the possibility of one. He could write the ending with her. And, maybe, it would be a very happy one. If the story of them had a happy ending, a happily ever after kind of ending, it would look like this:
