What is danger? I always personally thought that the most dangerous people were the ones we love. They can weed themselves into our hearts and ruin us within a matter of seconds. They play on the emotion of love and compassion, feeding and tending to it for days, months, maybe even years. Their prey falls deeper and deeper into their clutches until their victims are oblivious to the sharp jaws closing around them. By the time those naïve souls realize how far they've fallen, it's always too late. They're left broken at the feet of the predator, pleading and bleeding out from the hearts for answers.

I thought the most dangerous human emotion was love. It is the most common human weakness, after all. Love can make the strongest man fall to his knees. Love can turn the most sensible woman into a little girl gasping for the unrequited love to be returned as if starving for air. Then there are the few of us who have an undying hunger for affection, attention, and love. Neglect can have that effect on people. They starve for it, they search for it, and they'd die for it. Those people trust easily, fall easily, and bleed easily. They're too compassionate for their own good. They trust too easily and always burn themselves in the end. No matter how many times predators pluck at the veins in their hearts and let them bleed before them, they forgive or trust the first person to show them an ounce of kindness. Each time they tell themselves this time it will be different, but it never is.

The true danger sometimes is ourselves. We allow ourselves to fall for the wrong people, sometimes even knowingly. We cloud our eyes with rose colored glasses and pretend that everything is fine. We lie to ourselves. Yes, the most dangerous people are the those we love. Yes, the most dangerous human emotion is love. But some people neglect to realize how dangerous we are to ourselves. We feed into our own minds negative thoughts or allow ourselves to create a chamber of torment to constantly crush our own souls.

I have felt all three dangers in my life.

The first danger will linger like a bitter taste in the back of your mouth. Always there, but a distant reminder that attacks the edges of even the healthiest relationship. Once scorned once, that thought will always be a fear in the back of your mind. You'll question every motive and every conversation. You'll question whether that sigh of annoyance is directed towards yourself. You'll question if a small change in someone's demeaner is anger towards something you've done. It's a constant tang on your tongue, one that no matter how often you try to subdue it, it resurfaces.  

The second pain will be suffocating, painful, and numbing all at once. Love will terrify you. It will make you short of breath because you're panicked and confused. Falling in love or loving someone will make you feel like you're an animal trapped in a cage. And it can be numbing. Numbing to the point you question if you can love again or whether you even have a heart anymore. You don't know the pain of being hurt by someone you love, until suddenly your numb and that numbness terrifies you. You're terrified that numbness will never go away. You don't know fear until you are unable to feel love… unable to feel your own heart. It feels like a hole in your chest. A hole that aches from memories and for affection it never could receive. A hole that's numb, suffocating, and swallowing you whole with every day that passes.

And the third pain will be a cold, dark, clammy shadow following you forever. It's a danger you've created within your own mind. Your own personal torture chamber you've concocted on your own. It will suffocate you, break you, bleed you, and kill you. It will crush every hope, dream, and passion you have in life.

How do you get to this point? Some are born with these issues already embedded into their minds. Others, like myself, we're created. The first danger comes with an angelic smile and a little wink. The second danger comes and embeds itself into your mind, your heart, your body, and your soul. And the third danger comes when that first danger breaks you. It comes when your love is shredded before your eyes and belittled to be nothing. It doesn't have to be a lover, it could be a friend, a mother or father, and even someone who you thought you knew well.

That's why I find it hard to believe that he could ever love me.