Let's Talk About Love

Patrick

 Patrick sat on his veranda, lost in thought, staring at nothing in particular. Life felt heavy. Then, from a neighbor’s radio, Celine Dion’s voice drifted through the evening air: Let’s Talk About Love.

He listened.

“Let’s talk about love… from the laughter of a child to the tears of a grown man…”

He didn’t even realize he was crying until warm tears rolled down his cheek. He sighed, wiped his face with the back of his hand, and the tears kept coming.

Faith was passing by when she noticed the young man sitting alone, crying silently. Something about the sight touched her heart. She walked up to the veranda.

“Good afternoon,” she said softly, a small smile on her lips.

“Good afternoon,” Patrick replied with a tired sigh. “How may I help you?”

“Please don’t be offended,” she said. “I was just passing and saw you crying. I couldn’t help but wonder what could make such a handsome man so sad.”

Patrick gave a weak smile. “It’s love. And this song… it just reminded me how much I’ve been hurt.”

“May I hear your story?” she asked gently.

He looked at her for a moment. “I suppose it won’t hurt to tell a stranger.”

As the music played softly in the background—“Let’s talk about trust… I wanna show you… Let’s talk about life… I wanna know you…”—he began.

“Where do I even start?” he muttered.

“Anywhere is fine,” Faith said.

“Okay,” he took a deep breath. “I met Charity in high school. It wasn’t one of those sudden, Cupid-arrow moments. We started as friends, and slowly, gradually, it grew into something deep. She became everything to me. I used to think she was the very air I breathed. I loved her with all my heart—so much that I would have done anything for her.

“One day I told her how I felt, and she said she felt the same. From that moment, we started dating.

“Our relationship was perfect. I was the happiest young man in the whole neighborhood. Everyone envied us. We did everything together. Because of her, I became a regular churchgoer—I attended every program just to be with her. My parents knew about us. Everyone did.

“We were the talk of the area, but we didn’t care. I was already dreaming of the family we would have one day.”

He paused and looked at Faith. “What’s your name? I can’t keep telling you my life story without knowing your name.”

She smiled. “I’m Faith.”

“I’m Patrick,” he said, stretching out his hand. She shook it warmly.

He continued. “Everything was going so well. Then I finished high school and got admission into a university very far away. But distance couldn’t break what we had. I visited whenever I could. I did everything to keep us strong.

“Then one day, she called me.

“‘I can’t continue this anymore,’ she said.

“‘What do you mean?’ I asked, confused.

“‘I can’t be with you again.’

“‘Why?’

“‘You’re still a student. You can’t take care of me.’

“I told her I had always given her whatever she wanted, even as a student. I had ambitions. I was already working toward starting a business. I begged her to give me a little more time.

“But she said, ‘No. My aunt has found a man for me. She told me to end things with you today.’

“‘You don’t even know this man!’ I shouted.

“‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘It’s over.’ And she hung up.”

Patrick’s voice cracked. “I was shattered. The pain was too much. The next day I jumped on a bus and came home to see her, to talk sense into her. But when I got there, she had already moved to her aunt’s place. The aunt refused to let me see her. I stood at the door and cried like a child.

“I left with a broken heart. To survive, I buried myself in my studies. People thought I was possessed by how hard I worked—just so I could forget.

Faith looked at him with sad eyes. “That must have hurt so much.”

“It hurt like hell,” he said with a bitter smile.

“What happened next?” she asked quietly.

“About eight months after the marriage, I got a message from her elder sister. Charity was dead.”

Faith gasped. “Dead?”

“Yes. Dead. She had given birth to a baby boy six months earlier. Then suddenly she fell sick. The doctors couldn’t find anything wrong, but she kept getting weaker until she died.”

Faith covered her mouth. “Was it… juju?”

“That’s what her sister told me.”

“And the baby?”

“The child is mute. He has never spoken a word.”

Patrick looked up at the sky, his eyes wet again. “When I heard that Celine Dion line—‘from the laughter of a child to the tears of a grown man’—something in me just broke. I couldn’t hold the tears back.”

Faith moved closer and wrapped her arms around him. “I’m so sorry, Patrick.”

“That’s not even everything,” he whispered. “Love terrifies me now. I don’t know if I can ever open my heart again.”

She pulled back just enough to look into his eyes. “Of course you can. What happened wasn’t your fault.”

“But it hurts so much.”

“It hurts now,” she said softly. “But you will heal.”

“How?”

“Let me heal you.”

He looked at her, confused. “How?”

She smiled, gentle and certain. “I will show you real love. I will give you my all.”

And in that moment, as the last notes of the song faded into the evening, something inside Patrick—something small and fragile—began to hope again.

Just then, as if the universe itself had been listening, the radio shifted to Celine Dion’s Love Doesn’t Ask Why.

The first notes floated across the veranda.

Patrick closed his eyes and let the song wash over him.

A small, trembling smile touched his lips.

For the first time in years, he wondered—quietly, almost afraid to hope—if this was the beginning of something greater.

Faith’s hand stayed warm in his.

Love, he realized, doesn’t ask why.

It simply arrives.

Love Doesn't Ask Why:

Love doesn't ask why

It speaks from the heart

And never explains

Don't you know that

Love doesn't think twice

It can come all at once

Or whisper from a distance

Don't ask me if this feeling's right or wrong

It doesn't have to make much sense

It just has to be strong

'Cause when you're in my arms

I understand

We don't have a voice

When our hearts make the choices

There's no plan

It's not in our hands

Love doesn't ask why

It speaks from the heart

And never explains

Don't you know that

Love doesn't think twice

It can come all at once

Or whisper from a distance