why do I pull you close, and then ask you for space

Tell me God, is this a sign? Are you trying to make me see that this is impossible and irrational, that not only my fingers will get burnt, but I’ll end up with third-degree burns all over my body at the end of it all?

Two girls seated next to me on the train were having a conversation about one of their exes, and she shared how she couldn’t resist physical intimacy even though they both knew it was wrong to engage in pre-marital sex. Through and through, they ended things badly because she felt ashamed, dirty and used by her then boyfriend that coaxed her into the indulgence of carnal pleasures. They both met through church but she didn’t know he would be so persistent to encourage her to sin, again and again. Her friend started sharing about how we should all put God as our bedrock in a relationship, because it’s His unconditional and inexhaustible love that will bind a couple together.

I can’t helped but look back at all 4 of my failed relationships, they all ended tragically and I think I see a common theme. None of the boys I'd dated shared the same relationship I have with God. One of them was verbally abusive and hurt me so badly when I was at my lowest. He would constantly chide me for drinking and smoking excessively, but he was a hypocrite.

Another cheated on me when he was in Japan with his friends, yet he always claimed to be madly in love with me, and would do anything to hide from his family that he wasn’t a good and proper Muslim boy. He could still bring up the fact of asking me to quit pork for him and do other ridiculous things against my beliefs. Another hypocrite, and he assumed I would convert to Islam for him, even though he was a terrible one.

I’m scared, and although I always appear to be reckless and unthinking, a lot of my time goes to bouncing all these thoughts in my tiny brain, and struggling to prevent a sudden eruption of cerebral fluids.

I want to run away from this because it's fucking with my head, but this person just keeps pulling and letting go of the rope, playing me like a game of tug-of-war. And I know one day when I tug onto the rope, I'd find nobody there, because the person would be gone just like that. And once again, I'm left like a heap of bones on the ground, beaten and battered.