I make a living debunking supernatural claims.
Over the years I’ve seen it all:
ghosts in haunted houses,
cursed paintings,
caves full of whispering voices,
mythological creatures,
and increasingly elaborate variations of the same deception.
None of it withstands prolonged observation.
But there’s one thing people refuse to let go of:
miracles.
I’ve debunked thirty-seven of them.
More than half seemed to have no explanation.
The devout use them to fill voids,
to support the idea
that something higher
is watching over them.
Among all those cases,
there’s one I decided to file separately.
Not because it’s more complex,
but because it’s the most widely accepted:
love.
To debunk it, I need evidence.
And evidence is abundant.
I’ve seen hands tremble
as if hiding something.
Eyes on the verge of spilling over
with no visible wound.
Nervous smiles,
acts of kindness that stretch too far,
behaviors that mimic the sacred
with unsettling precision.
I’ve heard promises rise,
swell,
deform in the air
until they lose all recognizable shape.
I’ve seen words repeated so often
they end up hollow.
I’ve documented racing heartbeats
attributable to fear,
silences that hold not peace
but calculation,
embraces that wear thin
when repeated too many times.
I’ve recorded improbable coincidences:
two bodies leaning at the same time,
two voices breaking on the same syllable,
two stories that start the same
and end in contradiction.
I’ve seen how certainties are built:
slow,
fragile,
dependent on the other’s gaze.
I’ve called tenderness a reflex,
companionship a dependency,
persistence a symptom.
I’ve reduced fires to chemistry,
waiting to a distortion of time,
names repeated in the mind
to a mild form of obsession.
I’ve seen what happens after:
breakups that leave residue,
people losing sleep,
concentration,
appetite,
faith,
will.
I’ve seen someone completely emptied
without a drop of blood.
I’ve seen someone survive
without that meaning they’re alive.
I’ve interrogated those involved.
None admit to lying.
None can hold onto their full version.
There are always inconsistencies:
altered memories,
timelines that don’t match,
details that change
depending on who tells them.
And still,
both insist
it was real.
Last night,
after a long day’s work,
I decided to stop the investigation.
Not for lack of evidence,
but out of saturation.
I sat down to observe.
That’s when it happened.
A couple,
a few feet away,
exchanged a minimal gesture.
Nothing extraordinary.
No oath,
no obvious manifestation.
Just a brief movement,
almost imperceptible.
But enough.
Something about that gesture
didn’t fit the pattern.
It didn’t respond to fear,
or habit,
or need.
It didn’t seem like calculation.
For a moment
I considered that maybe
I had been wrong.
That perhaps love
really was a miracle.
But no.
Miracles don’t leave this kind of trace.
This…
this felt more like something else.
I opened the file.
Reviewed every case.
Looked for what they all had in common.
And I found it.
Love doesn’t begin as a fraud.
It begins as a legitimate coincidence:
two bodies that meet,
two voices that fit,
two solitudes that, for a moment,
stop being solitary.
That is real.
That happens.
But over time
something changes.
One of the two
starts giving more,
believing more,
staying longer than necessary.
And then the phenomenon deforms.
It tips.
It transforms.
Love is not a miracle.
It’s a slow-motion fraud.
A tacit agreement
where both participate,
but only one
ends up paying the full cost.
The other walks away with something:
the experience,
the certainty,
sometimes even nothing.
But one loses more.
Loses sleep,
calm,
trust,
the way they understood the world.
Loses things that time doesn’t heal.
That’s what the cases say.
That’s what the evidence shows.
But that’s not
the only thing I’ve seen.
I’ve also seen the opposite.
I’ve seen someone stay
when everything said they should leave.
I’ve seen bodies heal faster,
people get up,
start talking again,
walking,
breathing differently
because of someone else’s presence.
I’ve seen families hold together
under impossible conditions.
I’ve seen people survive
thanks to something
I cannot measure.
The effect exists.
It’s real.
But it’s not constant.
Not transferable.
Not eternal.
And that makes it impossible to prove.
That’s why I keep investigating.
Not to debunk it.
But to find
a way to show
it wasn’t an isolated case.
Because I’ve seen it too.
Because I’ve felt it too.
And if I’m right,
tomorrow I will file
a new case.
I’ll give it the same name.
I won’t close it.
