“Bro… are you an idiot?”

“Excuse me?”

I had hoped to ask Yaki for some advice on the situation I had found myself in that day, but the moment I finished telling her what had happened, she simply insulted me. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, but I had expected at least some hesitation.

“So, you suggested distancing yourself from Pep so she could be with this other girl, which caused her to cry her eyes out?”

“Yeah?”

“And you did this despite a painful feeling in your gut telling you it was a bad decision?”

“That’s right.”

“And when you realised there was a misunderstanding she demanded that you never try and separate from her again because you’re too important to her?”

“That’s about the half of it.”

“…and you still haven’t realised?”

“Realised what?”

Yaki sat and stared at me blankly as if I was speaking a different language. Hell, sometimes I wondered if we were speaking the same language, because I could say one thing and she’d draw an entirely separate conclusion.

Somehow, those random conclusions ended up right more often than not. I wasn’t sure if her social awareness was just extraordinarily high, or if she just peeked at the notes for future chapters.

“Jesus Christ, I can’t believe I have to spell this out for you. Check.” Yaki said, playing a seemingly safe bishop check.

“Spell what out? If you have something to say, speak clearly,” I replied, capturing the bishop with my knight.”

“Isn’t it blindingly obvious?” She asked, retaking with her queen. “You and Pep are in love with each other.”

Just as I reached to play my brilliant bishop sacrifice that would eventually win the now-mispositioned queen, Yaki’s words caused me to fumble and knock over half the pieces on the board.

“Are you completely insane? So you not only now believe that Pep has a thing for me, you also think I reciprocate those imaginary feelings?”

“As if you’re trying to argue with me on this. How did you describe the feeling you got when you decided to tell Pep you were distancing yourself from her, remind me?”

“Immediate soul crushing regret, why?”

“There’s no way you could possibly be this dense to your own feelings.” She put her face in her palm as I reset the board to the starting position. “Let me put it this way: when you think of Pep, what comes to mind?”

“When I think of Pep? Uhh…” I let my mind wander for a second, with the only prompt for my thoughts being Pep’s name. “I guess… her smile? And… her energy… and her ability to raise the mood of a room just by being herself… and her face…”

“You’re drooling. Disgusting.”

“Wha-“ I wiped my mouth and found no drool, which meant she was lying to me, but I had fallen into her trap anyway.

“See, you wiped your face because you believed me for a second. You get all starry eyed and gushy when you talk about her, like some sort of lovestruck maiden,” she said, opening with e4.

“Look, I appreciate her, of course. She’s my best- my only friend. So obviously separating myself from her didn’t feel good. But that by no means I’m in love with her. And even if I was, like I said before, she has a huge crush on the other member of the chess club. Would you please learn any opening on white that isn’t the scotch?” I said, looking for any novelty move that would prevent us playing the exact same game we had played a thousand times already.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

“Remember what she said when we were shopping with her, though? She said she’s interested in “a person or two.” Just because you’re not the first doesn’t mean you’re not the second. Not to mention, you two have known each other for years. If it came down to a love triangle, I’m sure you’d win. Check.”

“Oh, we both know that’s bullshit. The childhood friend always loses. It’s written in stone. Terrible check, by the way.” I said, blocking the queen’s line to my king and opening up long-castle next turn. “Just trust me on this, there is nothing romantic about my relationship with Pep. We’re longtime friends and nothing more.”

“No completely platonic friend flirts as openly as Pep does with you,” she replied, wasting a move by castling and letting me harass her queen. I was down one pawn but ahead in development and tempo. Considering the mighty sigh she let out, however, I assumed Yaki didn’t really care all that much about the game. “Just… why are you so insistent that you can never be more than friends with her? How are you so adamant that your relationship goes no deeper than that?”

“I… it’s not just about Pep, okay? I just… I don’t think all this stuff is for me.”

“What do you mean ‘all this stuff?’”

“I mean… y’know… romance, love, dating, that whole song and dance. I just… don’t think I’m compatible with it.”

More accurately, I didn’t believe I was compatible with human relationships at all. Every great empire eventually fell from within, because of the untrustworthy nature of people. Humanity excels at two things: expressing their superficial ideas, and hiding their true intentions. Both on the micro and macro, that’s what everything boiled down to.

So one could call another person their ‘boyfriend’ or ‘girlfriend,’ say they love that person, and promise to be with them forever. In fact, one could even buy their own lie. But as much as couples brag about their communication skills, most end up falling apart anyway.

Humans fundamentally don’t understand one another. We invented language and a dozen other forms of communication, but we’ve utterly failed at using these tools effectively. People say one thing while meaning another, then anger themselves when the other party misunderstands their intentions.

A society built upon such absurd rules was one that I could not belong in. And that’s why I did not form relationships outside of those I already had.

“‘Not compatible with it,’ he says. What sort of cope is that? You’re just putting up a wall and refusing to peek over the top of it, because you’re scared you’ll get hurt without it.” Yaki tutted at me like a parent talking down to a naughty child

“Can you blame me? Humanity hasn’t exactly been kind to me. For what reason could I possibly want to interact with it any more than I have to?”

“Even if that was a good point, which it isn’t, what does that have to do with Pep? You can do your whole misanthropy schtick as long as you want but that doesn’t change the fact that you love her.”

“Maybe when humans were hunter-gatherers living in the wild there really was such thing as ‘true love,’ but these days it’s just another commodity sold by companies and managed by institutions. You can’t just love someone for the sake of love, you have to prove it by spending arbitrary amounts of time together in societally appropriate and expensive venues, and signing legally binding contracts so the government can tax you together, and celebrating at the correct state-mandated holidays, and all this other crap. Even if I were head over heels for Pep, I would want absolutely no part in the modern disease of “dating.” Pep loves that sort of stuff, but I can’t stand it.”

“And your own petty gripes are enough to make you give up the love of your life to some girl she met a week ago?”

“Just because you think she and I should date doesn’t mean she’s the love of my life. Checkmate in three.”

“Would you stop with the damn chess game for a moment!” Yaki said, slamming her hands down on the table and grabbing my shirt at the neck. “For god’s sake, you idiot, open your eyes! The only two people on the planet with the patience for your emo bullshit are that girl and your own sister, and you still dare to go on your tirade about how love is fake?! You wanna know what genuine love looks like?! That girl transferred to that shithole of a school just to stay with you! No matter how much everyone tells her you’re a lost cause that should be left to rot, she defends you at every corner! You could never ask for a more perfect girl to fall into your lap, and you still have the gall to say you don’t love her? Or that she doesn’t love you?! Imbecile!”

She let get of my shirt with a shove and left the living room, slamming the door behind her as she went. Which meant that the one person I knew who was close to my level in chess had just upped and left in the middle of the practice matches we had agreed to play. Wonderful.

You’d think her words would cut deep, that they’d force me question my beliefs.

But I knew she was wrong. Pep and I… what we had wasn’t love. Not real love anyway. It was eternal debt. She felt she owed me gratitude and love for what I did for her back then, and I felt I owed her in turn for sticking with me when everyone else left my side. Some would think that two such debts would cancel each other out, and that we could stand on even footing because of it.

But they’d be foolish.

The bond of gratitude was strong, but it wasn’t love. Even if the other person truly believe they owed you more than you owed them, you would never allow yourself to stand even with them as long as you felt a debt was owed.

And can any relationship without even ground truly be considered love?