He Loves Me Not

Isabella Billings, 8th Grade Leland Middle School

Isabella Billings

Privet, I’m Dmitri. I’m a 25-year-old man that still lives with his mama and loves her half to death.

I spend a lot of time in the garden while I’m at my mother’s home. It’s cold there, but it’s beautiful. We grow flowers that often bloom in early spring. I sit on the stones I laid down around the garden with my father while they were married. I pick petals off of the living flowers one by one. “He loves me…He loves me not…He loves me…He loves me not…” I pick up another and begin again.

You might think I’m speaking of a love interest or something. Well, you’re wrong. I’m speaking of my father. I know the flower petal thing is typically a princess thing, but I find out how to change things to make it better for myself.

I’m just good at that.

I’ve had a few girlfriends in my lifetime. I didn’t really like them, though; I just did it to make my mama happy.

That always felt like my life purpose.

To make mama happy.

I also never liked it when my mom got boyfriends; it just didn’t sit right with me. People have always called me selfish for not liking my mom’s boyfriends, never staying in relationships with people for a long time because I fell out of love, and killing those beautiful Russian Lotuses. It makes me feel bad, but I can’t help it.

So, I was living with my mom and my younger brother, who never really talks to me. And we were happy. But y’know all good things must come to an end. My mom got a boyfriend and he moved in with us.

Ever since my mom got her first boyfriend, I’ve lived with the mentality that I don’t have to like a person to get along with them.

My current girlfriend, whom I’ve been with for three years, always treated me as if I’m enough for her. But at the same time, I don’t feel it. She reminds me a lot of my mother.