The Third Love

Love wasn't always dramatic. Sometimes, it was just… comfortable. Safe. Familiar in a way that felt like home. That's what our days were becoming—beautifully ordinary, in the best way.

We had developed routines without even realizing it. Sunday mornings meant pancakes and gospel music. Friday evenings meant street food and watching something funny on Zeon's old laptop. And on most nights, even if we were tired, we made time for a late-night talk—no phones, no distractions, just us.

"Do you think we'll always be like this?" I asked him one evening, while we lay on the couch, tangled in blankets.

He looked at me and smiled. "No," he said. "I think we'll be even better."

---

Those words stayed with me. Because better didn't mean richer or more successful. It meant deeper. Wiser. Stronger. And as we grew together, we truly became those things.

There were still moments of struggle. Zeon was trying to balance work with plans of starting his own small business on the side. I was dealing with the pressure of preparing for part-time studies while figuring out how to help at home. Life didn't stop being life. But somehow, with him, everything felt more manageable.

He surprised me with a weekend picnic one day, using money he had been quietly saving. "You're always doing so much," he said. "Today, let me spoil you, even if it's just with peanut butter sandwiches and Coke."

And it was perfect. We sat under a tree, laughed about everything and nothing, played music off a tiny speaker, and danced barefoot in the grass like little kids.

That night, we talked about the future again.

"How many kids do you want?" I asked.

"Two. Maybe three if we survive the first two."

We both laughed.

"Do you want a big wedding?" he asked me in return.

"Not really. I want something meaningful. Something with just the right people and the right love."

"Then that's exactly what we'll have," he said.

---

His mother visited more often. She told me one day, "I see a different version of my son when he's with you. He's softer. Smarter. You've given him something no one else could."

I didn't know how to respond. So I just smiled and held back tears.

Because that's what love is. You don't always notice how deeply you're changing someone—or how they're changing you—until someone else points it out.

Zeon had taught me patience. Loyalty. The power of staying. And I had shown him what it meant to feel safe. Seen. Truly loved.

---

Late nights became our quiet paradise. We'd lie in the dark, sharing old stories we never told anyone else. He'd talk about the day he first saw me and how that long eye contact "messed up his whole week." I'd confess how I was scared to fall, but how he made it feel like flying instead.

We didn't need entertainment. We were the entertainment.

We didn't need big dreams to feel proud. We just needed each other.

Our relationship wasn't perfect. But it was real. And real meant everything.

That chapter in our lives—of love, laughter, and late nights—wasn't the end.

It was the beginning of something deeper.

The kind of love that outlasts time.