He doesn’t know love

I'm going to be honest – I’ve dated many guys and made mistakes. A lot of mistakes. I’ve been cheated on and I’ve been a cheater but I never thought I would be in this position. When I found out, it wasn’t as earth shattering as I imagined it would be. Perhaps I already saw the warning signs; a girl’s constant texts and calls when I’m with him, the way he tensed up when I asked him about his plans later in the day, how he suddenly goes missing during the weekends. Or maybe it didn’t hurt because I always knew we don’t stand a future together anyway, with or without her.

Still, I was at a loss when I found out.

It wasn’t something I expected. He never talked about her, not in front of me anyway. Or maybe he shared a couple of stories about her but it was always “I once dated this girl.” He never mentioned she was anything serious. I guess neither was I. This naive girl, who stupidly believed in his words, was just one of his many conquests.

I couldn’t fathom out the reason he would do this. Why was he so protective of me when I'm not his and he knew very well that we didn’t have potential? He knew from the start nothing would come out of it, he knew he was cheating, he knew he was leading me on. But he continued doing everything – all those little things. And he's still acting jealous, being overly protective even till today.

He spammed my phone with calls, he apologised, he said he cares about me. But you don't intentionally hurt the people you care about for your own selfish desires, do you? I don’t understand how can someone hold my hand in his car, play with my fingers, kiss me at every traffic light, turn around to look at me when I talk and laugh, hug me so tight when I'm leaving before driving off to meet his girlfriend? How can he bear to do this to her if he loves her? Or so he claims...

If every relationship turns out like this, I don't want to fall in love again. I wouldn't dare to. I find it utterly disgusting how someone can say something to me then turn around and say the same thing to another person. How he can sit in his car talking to me for hours, laughing about everything under the sun and kissing me when she's texting him, calling him, looking for him?

How can he do this to someone he “loves”?