He was a poet, or at least a would-be poet, in love with love, until she cured him.

She had a beautiful face, and smile, and hair and throat, a body she made pretty with a lot of effort and careful selection of accouterments, and a philosophy of love very at odds with his.

To her love was based on complements and compliments.  The compliments, his to give and hers to receive; the complements, not all that different, in hindsight, not different at all.  A taker on one side giving nothing in return and a giver on the other, without any expectations.

To him that seemed as though it would only work in an absolutely bipolar sadomasochistic relationship.  She smiled, looked at her nails, and flashed an even bigger, more dazzling smile which left him confused, forgetting what it was they’d been discussing, and he smiled back.

Then she was gone.  With quite a bit of his money and quite a bit of his stuff, and a frown rather than a smile.

And he was relieved, at least until he realized she’d taken his ability to love as well.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2017; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.