Jealousy typically refers to the thoughts, feelings, and behaviours that occur when a person believes a valued relationship is being threatened by a rival.
It's a difficult thing, you know. Being in love.
Because there are so many different types of it.
It's also a difficult thing to define. How do you know that you are truly in love with somebody? More so, how do you know if the love is true, since it is not a thing to be defined?
It's dangerous, not knowing if you are or are not in love with someone.
One time, I fell whilst tending the fields. I was cutting down the old crops from the previous season with Marlin's sickle. Marlin always liked to keep his sickle sharp. There was a brief biting sensation, and then pure blood stained the brown dirt.
I had to endure several stitches sitting plainly in my hand for three weeks, while the cut healed. The doctor knew that the wound was deep, and that something had to be done, because he was medically trained. If the cut was infected, he would have known, because somewhere, some clever little man had sat down and wrote a definition for infections inside of wounds, so that others can know if they have one.
Love cannot be defined.
When love hurts, you don't know what to do. You're unsure of whether to leave your lover, or to attempt to continue the relationship - to forget about the wound, to try and live with it, or to visit a doctor and have it closed up. Sealed. Forgotten.
Marlin had always been there for me. When I was eleven, my parents brought me to Forget Me Not Valley - and never came back. Vesta took me in; she made me feel welcome, and I appreciated that. But it was Marlin who made me feel wanted. Day after day, he eased me slowly into the farmer's way of life, of his way of life. He was very gentle with me, too. He seemed to treat me similar to how I would treat a doll, a doll that could easily be broken - whenever Vesta asked me to go fishing, to catch a nice big fish for that night's dinner, Marlin would hastily chase after me, and offer to do the job himself. I would politely refuse, but he would still follow me alongside the river, watching with a wary eye as I cast the rod into the deep blue waters.
When Jack came to Forget Me Not Valley, I was aware of what a kind, hard-working young gentleman he was. Vesta had told me so, and yet, for the first time, I didn't need her words to convince me. Jack always spoke to me. He always asked me when purchasing seeds for the upcoming season, not Vesta. He didn't seem to ever talk to Marlin or Vesta the same way that he spoke to me. I liked his friendliness. He was cautious, honest, gentle.
I fell in love with him.
I fell in love with his warmth, with his kind ways. He, unlike Marlin, treated me as a girl, a girl with feelings, a living, breathing girl. Jack let me do what I wanted, but at the same time, it was obvious that he still cared for me.
I wasn't aware that I loved Marlin - my love for him was completely different to my love for Jack, in one way or another. I couldn't describe it - love is difficult to define - but I knew it, where it mattered. In my heart.
Jack had always had to put up with a lot from Marlin. Whenever he came to visit me on Vesta's farm, to see me or to talk, Marlin would stare at him as if he were the most vile creature to ever walk into his home. Marlin liked to act as if Jack didn't love me, as if Jack only wanted to see me because he was a womaniser. At Marlin even suggesting this, I was horrified. Horrified that Marlin, my Marlin, could say such a thing.
When I told Marlin this, when I asked him how he could even possibly say something so cruel to hurt me, he had just laughed coldly.
He had said, 'Your Marlin? Your Marlin? I think you made the choice between me and Jack a long time ago, my Celia.'
I was concerned about Marlin; he would deliberately try to humiliate me, and cause me pain, simply for the reason that I loved Jack - and not him. I was not a fool. I knew that Marlin loved me, that he had always loved me, and that in some way, I loved him back; but my love for him was not enough to even compete with Jack's.
When Jack proposed, I was ecstatic. He and I had been walking by the river, hand in hand, when he had broken the contact to fish around in his pocket for something.
The blue feather was beautiful. I had heard many stories about the legends, and customs of the way of farm folk - blue feathers were an eternal sign, of love, of trust, and of happiness. Of marriage.
I accepted, with joy, and our marriage took place in the Spring.
Five years later, our love was extended with a baby - our sweet, brown eyed, baby boy.
I didn't ever forget Marlin, of course. He was still my friend, my dearest friend. I invited him to the wedding, but he never came. I didn't know why, whether it was to hurt me, or simply because he himself was in too much pain. It saddened me that I had put him through heartache; but it was unintentionally so.
On good days, when I was feeling happy, or light hearted, I would attempt to resolve my friendship with Marlin. I wanted to talk to him like I used to, to laugh with him. As much as I hated the fact that I had hurt him, I felt slightly affronted that he couldn't feel happy for me - Vesta was pleased for me, but he couldn't even bring himself to pretend.
But pretence was not what I wanted. I wanted the old Marlin back, the Marlin that had existed before Jack had come to the Valley.
But I could never again have my Marlin back again - the Marlin that I had loved.
He was gone forever, taken and transformed by some invisible being - the invisible being of jealousy.
Marlin had the brightest pair of emerald green eyes that I had ever seen.