Romance and Its Discontents

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Romance and Its Discontents
There is no love story that does not have its downsides. Staying in love, demands a lot of commitment from the partners. Distractions are always prevalent in a healthy love relationship. Previous partners and dissatisfaction in a relationship have been used to disrupt many relationships. Kate Chopin shows how a former partner can spoil a relationship while Elizabeth Tallent shows how dissatisfaction in a relationship can lead to extramarital affairs. Calxita and Jack are entangled in what love offers in the two stories below.
The Storm by Kate Chopin
The family of Bobint is deep in love as can be deciphered from the questions Bibi asks when he is made aware of the imminent storm (Chopin pg. 1). Chopin uses the third person narration to write the story of Bobint, Bibi, Calixta, and Alce Laballire. Calixta is at the center of all the love that flows in Chopin’s narration. Calixta may at one time been in love with Alce.
Alce is a minor character in the love story of Calixta while Bobint is a major character. Bobint is probably the major character of the story because he is the father of Bibi and husband of Calixta. Alce was last in the life of Calixta five years ago before the day of the storm (Chopin pg. 8). It is at the end of the story that the reader learns that Alce may be living in the neighborhood when the laughing made by Calixta and Bobint is said to be heard from Acle’s house.
Calixta and Alce shared a moment that reminds them of their past at Assumption.

Calixta may have been young at the time that it was not appropriate to engage with her at the time. Alce had to make a desperate flight away from Assumption since he thought he would violate Calixta (Chopin pg. 7). In the present when they find themselves in the house alone, Alce thinks it is now appropriate to engage with Calixta, but that never happens. Calixta is scared and uneasy as she keeps looking out through the window all worries about her Bibi and Bobint.
For the love that Calixta has for Bobint, he abstains from the attempts to get intimate with Alce and waits for her Bobint. Alce goes on to write a letter to his wife and children forbidding them from returning soon as a desperate attempt to get time to pursue Calixta. Chopin depicts Calixta as being true to Bobint and committed to keeping her family happy (Chopin pg. 10).
No One’s a Mystery by Elizabeth Tallent
Elizabeth Tallent uses the first person in her story. Jack and an eighteen-year-old are deep in love that most of the time Jack is free they spend driving around in his truck (Tallent 1). Jack is so used to his wife that he claims to know even what she is going to cook for supper. Jack, the wife of Jack and the eighteen-year-old who narrates the story are the only characters in the story. Jack and the eighteen-year-old are the major characters of the story while the wife of Jack is a minor character.
Jack is in love with the eighteen-year-old but also he fears to lose her wife. When the wife of Jack is seen driving from a distance in her Cadillac, the eighteen-year-old is made to go down the floor of the dirty pickup of Jack to avoid being seen by Jacks wife (Tallent 1). It is Jack who pushes the young lady down the floor, and the eighteen-year kid does not hide out of volition. Once the wife of Jack passes by, the two love birds are up happy chatting.
Jack believes what he has with the eighteen-year-old is some short time fling but the kid has a different perspective of their affair (Tallent 3). Jack may be unhappy with her wife, but he intends to keep the marriage. Jack has been wearing the same boots for two years since he met the eighteen-year-old while his wife drives in a Cadillac. The pickup of Jack is also no match to what his wife drives (Tallent 2). The conversation that Jack engages in with the eighteen-year-old tells of how deeply the girl is in love with Jack. Jack thinks there is no future between him and the girl, but there is a future with Jack for the lady. The girl thinks of having a family with Jack, staying up late waiting for Jack to show up and to have babies for Jack.
The two stories are a view of what the society serves people in relationships on a daily basis. There are those who are committed to making their relationships a success but their past keeps haunting them. While on the other side of life, there are those people who stay in relationships only to continuously cheat. What can be concluded from the actions of the two categories of persons brought forward by these stories is people are continuously in pursuit of happiness. Jack is happy being around the eighteen-year-old while Alce is happy being around Calixta.
Getting intimate is center to the two love stories. Alce thinks hard of kissing Calxita as she reminds him of Assumption where they kissed last. The eighteen-year-old thinks of bearing babies to Jack (Tallent 3). Kissing and bearing babies cannot happen if the partners cannot get intimate. Getting intimate gets the partners to a relationship more connected to each other. Even the thought of getting intimate makes people develop strong ties to a person. Alce stops his family from coming over such that he can have more time to pursue his old flame Calxita. Jack gets overly excited when he listens to the eighteen-year-old tell him what she is going to write in the diary when she goes to sleep. The eighteen-year-old continues to tell Jack what she will be writing in the diary three years from her eighteenth birthday. All those moments, the eighteen-year-old gives Jack a different perspective of their relationship. Jack declares his likeness to the story of the eighteen-year-old even though he holds that their relationship will soon come to an end.
Maintaining a healthy relationship demands a total commitment of the partners of the relationship. It is better off to avoid getting into an extramarital relationship because someone is uncomfortable in the current relationship. Calixta is strong willed as she fights with her past not to spoil her current relationship. Jack is that weak individual who would not correct the mistakes in his relationship but seek solace elsewhere. Alce is also that one person who keeps on looking back putting his relationship in a perilous position.

Works cited
Chopin, Kate. “The Storm.” Americanliterature.com. N.p., 2016. Web. 4 Oct. 2016.
Tallent, Elizabeth. No One’s A Mystery. 1st ed. 2016. Web. 4 Oct. 2016.