WHEN JEALOUSY CONSUMES

Keira would always get jealous when Tom talked about his past. It didn’t even have to be his sexual past; it was anything he did in life before she came into it that made her crazy. I would always try to bring her back to reality; to make her understand that his past was what made up the person she fell in love with, but she couldn’t grasp my rationale. She had already turned into someone else. A person who was tortured by their own thoughts, letting jealousy deteriorate their soul, and rot their personality and relationship until there was nothing left to be saved.
If she would have just not let it consume her for one second she would have realized she was being ridiculous, and that it was making her repulsive to him, in turn making her even more jealous as he strayed from her; a continuous circle of tainted thoughts and actions.
At first, it wasn’t intentional. In the beginning, she really tried not to let it get to her, or take over her every thought. It started off as any other human would react to certain things when they are committed to someone. No matter how self-confident one is, there’s always that fear of losing your love to someone else, someone better.
There were times when Tom didn’t answer his phone, and she wondered if he were with someone else. There were his ex-girlfriends, who he was still friends with. Or his editing suite partner, who was the epitome of a Los Angeles beauty queen. When he said he had to work late, Keira wondered if it was the truth. Soon after, she started checking his emails and listening to his voicemail behind his back. She'd start huge arguments about him looking at women on TV. If he looked up from his menu and past her at a restaurant, she would turn around to make sure he wasn’t looking at another woman. The poor guy couldn’t even talk to a female telemarketer about his long distance carrier without Keira wondering if he wanted to fuck her.
She would always call me when she felt out of control. I don’t know how many times I had to talk her down from a hyperventilating fit on the phone about something he had done wrong. Something that to her was cheating, when in reality it was just normal human behavior.
After two years, he’d had enough. He could no longer take the unnecessary guilt, the screaming matches, her self-abuse, and the prison she’d created for him. He didn’t know any other ways to convince her that she was the one he loved, and that he never had and never would have done anything to hurt her.
Keira lost him because she let herself go crazy. That’s what happens when jealousy consumes.