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Description
"Neither Creator nor his creatures move,
as you well know," [Virgil] said, "but in the action
of animal or mind-directed love."
-The Divine Comedy: The Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri

A girl named Erin Margaret Chii was brought into the world on October twenty-fourth of the year 1986. As of January 2008 she is twenty-one. Twenty years of her life were spent in pleasant solitude. Nothing of Love had reached her ears and, she didn't want Love. Or, at least, she pretended she didn't want Love. Whichever was the answer, it wasn't until November of her twentieth year until she found Love in the form of Hudson. As of her twenty-first year she knows the power of Love and can still vaguely recall how she lived without it.

In Erin's second and third year of schooling, when she went to Nokomis Elementary School in Florida, there was a boy that liked her. He had an infatuation with her, in reality. Infatuation because he was too young to know Love. Even if he knew Love she did not feel the same for him. She was disgusted by him but didn't know how to kindly say no. One day he, out of infatuation, he gave Erin a coloring book. This coloring book already had some of the pictures colored in, but she still told the boy, "Thank you." As soon as she got home, though, she put it in a drawer. Later it was thrown away and now it's lost to time. A sweet little gift given by a sweet little boy is now gone. A gift from infatuation.

For fourth grade, Erin went to a small school. The school, itself, was just a small little building and housed grades first through fourth in it. Erin took her stuffed bird Scuttle (from Disney's The Little Mermaid) with her and played with it during lunch. She found bringing Scuttle to school somehow liberating in some way. This year of her life she thought she had found love in a boy who I will call David. David and Erin never went out but they sure kissed a lot. Then, out of the blue, he broke up with her. She was sad and hasn't kissed anyone on the lips since. Maybe it's out of the memory of that loss, or the darker one that came later, that she doesn't kiss anymore.

With no Love Erin started to hate the color pink and romance. To her they were like what garlic was to vampires. Pink and romance was despicable to her. Maybe it was only because Erin felt something missing and yet didn't want to admit she was missing anything. She tried, as hard as she could, to tell herself that she was fine. It was in middle school when she read Romeo & Juliet by William Shakespeare. This play opened a loving of romance as long as there was tragedy. She would not dare to think that Love could turn someone whole. She was a whole person, at least she thought so, and didn't need to cling onto something as weak sounding as Love.

Erin was a writer and her writing talents were developing. She wanted to prove, to others, that you didn't need love to make a good story. She was disgusted at the thought that a love story seemed to be the standard in any story. As she was starting to write her story she decided she wanted to post her work on fanfiction.net which the only things they'd accept were fanfictions (meaning that you have to use someone else's universe to write). Erin did not like this but decided to conform and write a Star Wars fanfic series called The Books of Oyja (the first in the series being called The Books of Oyja: The Tenju). She nearly succeeded with no love story until she brought in the character of Kiem.

With this semi-failure, Erin decided to write a story where a Love story was a much needed part of the story. This piece of Love wouldn't be a Love story just for a Love story, it would be a love story so it would strengthen the entire story. This story began in The Books of Oyja II: Jash. In the story Oyja, the main character, had given up on life. It didn't want anything to be involved with anyone. It was not happy but, at the same time, didn't see a way out. It wasn't until Jash came that it changed. Erin did not fully grasp what Love was, but she didn't write a horrible story, either. She liked how Jash and Oyja didn't have an extreme physical attraction to each other and was satisfied. She had shown, to others, that the physical did not indicate true Love.

At twelfth grade was the year she finally decided that Love was useless. That people could fool you and you had to be naïve to think that things could be better. Yes, the dark cloud of her life had consumed her and it would be two years until that cloud would go away. What happened? Would be the question one would most likely ask. Yes, what happened? This Erin does hide from me. She says it is the past and keeps it to herself. A year or two later she told the stories to others but, to me, she has remained silent.

It was her first year of college and she was as lonely as before. Her first dorm room was in the top floor of Henderson and her roommate left in around a week. She was in the easiest math class and she loathed it, though the teacher was good. In a year he'd get sicker and sicker, now she doesn't know what happened to him. He might be dead and she worries about this, though it isn't at the forefront of her mind. Erin didn't like the long climb to her room nor the climb just to leave her room. She hated it. In the beginning of the semester she went to sleep before midnight and woke up on time, though that changed later. One day she started sitting with some guys during dinner and there she met her other half, though she did not recognize him nor did he recognize her. It wasn't love at first sight but it was the start of something that wouldn't blossom until the next year.

In her Sophomore year she had a sociology and recognized one of the students. He seemed familiar and somehow attractive. It was as though she were a moth and the light bulb had just been turned on. Erin finally recognized him as the guy who sat at her table the year before. One day, after class, she started talking to him and walked with him to his apartment. The sociology class became her highlight of the week. One day she was walking by Saint Edward's and she saw him. He started talking to her and said he had diabetes. Another day, on one of their walks, he invited her to his room but she had to go to class. When she told the people she ate with they told her to not expect anything, but she still had hope. She didn't know why she had hope, but the hope was there and alive.

In the next few weeks Erin learned that his name was Hudson. One day, before class started, Hudson asked to see her after class. She wondered about it because she always walked with him after class. The teacher overheard this and smiled like she knew something that Erin didn't. After class Erin and Hudson walked to his apartment after class. He asked her if she was busy that weekend. Erin, being Erin, thought that it was a literal question and had nothing underneath it. She replied, "No." with a little hint of amusement. Suddenly he let out a long sigh and laughed as though a huge weight had been lifted from him. Then, as the minutes passed, he asked her out. She agreed and that was the starting of a great relationship.

There is, of course, one more step for Erin to go through. At times she is picky at words and looks at meanings that some people would just overlook. One of these words was "girlfriend" and another was "boyfriend". Hudson, his mother, and Erin were in the car and there was a conversation. "I think you scared my girlfriend, Mom!" Hudson said and it took Erin a few minutes to realize what he meant. The thought of who Hudson's girlfriend could be raced through her mind and she decided it was her. This was the first time she had been referred to as "girlfriend". Erin thought of "girlfriend" and "boyfriend" as childish terms not to be used in a mature relationship. She wrote a poem called "Girlfriend" and gave it to Hudson on his birthday to explain what she thought.

Erin now wakes up to Love and falls asleep to Love. When she feels her happiness slipping she grasps onto the thought of Hudson. She knows that if he could be where she was he would comfort her. She knows that, if she dies, he'll be sad and she's determined to live as long as possible. The story of her Love has just started and no amount of writing, although she has tried, can explain her happiness at him. Darkness is still there, but Love has been shown to her. Now she always will be connected and, when Hudson dies, she might just follow quickly. She'll feel him leaving this world as she felt him entering her life.

Description
"Neither Creator nor his creatures move,
as you well know," [Virgil] said, "but in the action
of animal or mind-directed love."
-The Divine Comedy: The Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri

A girl named Erin Margaret Chii was brought into the world on October twenty-fourth of the year 1986. As of January 2008 she is twenty-one. Twenty years of her life were spent in pleasant solitude. Nothing of Love had reached her ears and, she didn't want Love. Or, at least, she pretended she didn't want Love. Whichever was the answer, it wasn't until November of her twentieth year until she found Love in the form of Hudson. As of her twenty-first year she knows the power of Love and can still vaguely recall how she lived without it.

In Erin's second and third year of schooling, when she went to Nokomis Elementary School in Florida, there was a boy that liked her. He had an infatuation with her, in reality. Infatuation because he was too young to know Love. Even if he knew Love she did not feel the same for him. She was disgusted by him but didn't know how to kindly say no. One day he, out of infatuation, he gave Erin a coloring book. This coloring book already had some of the pictures colored in, but she still told the boy, "Thank you." As soon as she got home, though, she put it in a drawer. Later it was thrown away and now it's lost to time. A sweet little gift given by a sweet little boy is now gone. A gift from infatuation.

For fourth grade, Erin went to a small school. The school, itself, was just a small little building and housed grades first through fourth in it. Erin took her stuffed bird Scuttle (from Disney's The Little Mermaid) with her and played with it during lunch. She found bringing Scuttle to school somehow liberating in some way. This year of her life she thought she had found love in a boy who I will call David. David and Erin never went out but they sure kissed a lot. Then, out of the blue, he broke up with her. She was sad and hasn't kissed anyone on the lips since. Maybe it's out of the memory of that loss, or the darker one that came later, that she doesn't kiss anymore.

With no Love Erin started to hate the color pink and romance. To her they were like what garlic was to vampires. Pink and romance was despicable to her. Maybe it was only because Erin felt something missing and yet didn't want to admit she was missing anything. She tried, as hard as she could, to tell herself that she was fine. It was in middle school when she read Romeo & Juliet by William Shakespeare. This play opened a loving of romance as long as there was tragedy. She would not dare to think that Love could turn someone whole. She was a whole person, at least she thought so, and didn't need to cling onto something as weak sounding as Love.

Erin was a writer and her writing talents were developing. She wanted to prove, to others, that you didn't need love to make a good story. She was disgusted at the thought that a love story seemed to be the standard in any story. As she was starting to write her story she decided she wanted to post her work on fanfiction.net which the only things they'd accept were fanfictions (meaning that you have to use someone else's universe to write). Erin did not like this but decided to conform and write a Star Wars fanfic series called The Books of Oyja (the first in the series being called The Books of Oyja: The Tenju). She nearly succeeded with no love story until she brought in the character of Kiem.

With this semi-failure, Erin decided to write a story where a Love story was a much needed part of the story. This piece of Love wouldn't be a Love story just for a Love story, it would be a love story so it would strengthen the entire story. This story began in The Books of Oyja II: Jash. In the story Oyja, the main character, had given up on life. It didn't want anything to be involved with anyone. It was not happy but, at the same time, didn't see a way out. It wasn't until Jash came that it changed. Erin did not fully grasp what Love was, but she didn't write a horrible story, either. She liked how Jash and Oyja didn't have an extreme physical attraction to each other and was satisfied. She had shown, to others, that the physical did not indicate true Love.

At twelfth grade was the year she finally decided that Love was useless. That people could fool you and you had to be naïve to think that things could be better. Yes, the dark cloud of her life had consumed her and it would be two years until that cloud would go away. What happened? Would be the question one would most likely ask. Yes, what happened? This Erin does hide from me. She says it is the past and keeps it to herself. A year or two later she told the stories to others but, to me, she has remained silent.

It was her first year of college and she was as lonely as before. Her first dorm room was in the top floor of Henderson and her roommate left in around a week. She was in the easiest math class and she loathed it, though the teacher was good. In a year he'd get sicker and sicker, now she doesn't know what happened to him. He might be dead and she worries about this, though it isn't at the forefront of her mind. Erin didn't like the long climb to her room nor the climb just to leave her room. She hated it. In the beginning of the semester she went to sleep before midnight and woke up on time, though that changed later. One day she started sitting with some guys during dinner and there she met her other half, though she did not recognize him nor did he recognize her. It wasn't love at first sight but it was the start of something that wouldn't blossom until the next year.

In her Sophomore year she had a sociology and recognized one of the students. He seemed familiar and somehow attractive. It was as though she were a moth and the light bulb had just been turned on. Erin finally recognized him as the guy who sat at her table the year before. One day, after class, she started talking to him and walked with him to his apartment. The sociology class became her highlight of the week. One day she was walking by Saint Edward's and she saw him. He started talking to her and said he had diabetes. Another day, on one of their walks, he invited her to his room but she had to go to class. When she told the people she ate with they told her to not expect anything, but she still had hope. She didn't know why she had hope, but the hope was there and alive.

In the next few weeks Erin learned that his name was Hudson. One day, before class started, Hudson asked to see her after class. She wondered about it because she always walked with him after class. The teacher overheard this and smiled like she knew something that Erin didn't. After class Erin and Hudson walked to his apartment after class. He asked her if she was busy that weekend. Erin, being Erin, thought that it was a literal question and had nothing underneath it. She replied, "No." with a little hint of amusement. Suddenly he let out a long sigh and laughed as though a huge weight had been lifted from him. Then, as the minutes passed, he asked her out. She agreed and that was the starting of a great relationship.

There is, of course, one more step for Erin to go through. At times she is picky at words and looks at meanings that some people would just overlook. One of these words was "girlfriend" and another was "boyfriend". Hudson, his mother, and Erin were in the car and there was a conversation. "I think you scared my girlfriend, Mom!" Hudson said and it took Erin a few minutes to realize what he meant. The thought of who Hudson's girlfriend could be raced through her mind and she decided it was her. This was the first time she had been referred to as "girlfriend". Erin thought of "girlfriend" and "boyfriend" as childish terms not to be used in a mature relationship. She wrote a poem called "Girlfriend" and gave it to Hudson on his birthday to explain what she thought.

Erin now wakes up to Love and falls asleep to Love. When she feels her happiness slipping she grasps onto the thought of Hudson. She knows that if he could be where she was he would comfort her. She knows that, if she dies, he'll be sad and she's determined to live as long as possible. The story of her Love has just started and no amount of writing, although she has tried, can explain her happiness at him. Darkness is still there, but Love has been shown to her. Now she always will be connected and, when Hudson dies, she might just follow quickly. She'll feel him leaving this world as she felt him entering her life.