I'm Gonna Make You Love Me

It was playing on the radio as he made love to me.

He tells me so often how much he loves me, how beautiful I am and how the thought of seeing me and being with me ‘makes his tummy tingly’.

You cannot understand how warm and fuzzy that makes me after I spent so long trying to make him love me.

You see, when we first got together, he did care about me… but not enough to want to put aside my married status and just allow himself to fall in love with me.  He wanted a proper girlfriend.

There was a time when we almost split up… more than one time… because of that stumbling block.  He told me he loved me but there was always a ‘but’…

And, each time, as I took it on the chin and tried not to let the tears fall, all I could do was remind him of  the good things we had together.  What it was like when we were together.   The amazing sex and the completely relaxed intimacy that we had managed to achieve.  Part of me always knew that he loved me but I had to try to make him recognise that fact.  It was so hard always trying to justify my position in his life.

It was not until we had been seeing each other every month for almost two years that he finally stopped fighting me and relaxed into the inevitability of our relationship.  He told me he loved me, but…   still, there was always the elephant in the room.  The man whose name I bore and against whom I was committing a cardinal sin.  I was still always trying to sanction my right to be with him.

And then, when I called to tell him that I had told my Husband it was over, he was so shocked.  He had always thought that I would wait until my children had left home.  That there were at least three years before we could ever have a proper relationship. 

I had done it without even discussing it with Ruf… because I did not do it for him…  I left because I needed to do it for me.

In the last eight months, Ruf is a changed man.  I have no doubt that he is totally in love with me… because he tells me all the time.

So, as we lay there in the crumpled bed, listening to this song and humming along, I couldn’t help thinking about those times.

Glancing up at him shyly and  smiling, I whispered:

‘I made you love me…’

He looked into my eyes and laughed.

‘I know’

And then he pulled me in closer and kissed me again.