For So Long

For so long I’ve imagined what it would be like for us to be together—what if? I’ve thought about it so many times and played out so many scenarios on how it would occur—that fateful meetings and the unfolding of a life together. But when I’m honest—when I’m really honest with myself—I know it would end up terrible. I know this because of the hesitance and uncertainty that would always surround the situation. But let me begin with my dream.

I imagine us meeting in some sort of coffee shop (most likely a Starbucks) in the Fall. Perhaps in north Florida where we met. So, the leaves don’t change colors, but you know it’s Autumn. She’ll order her Caramel Apple Cider, and I’ll get a Pumpkin Spice Latte—flavors of the season in those cute red cups. We’ll chit-chat about stuff while we wait for our beverages.

“How’s work been?”
“It pays the bills. How about you?”
“Livin’ the dream.”

When we get out drinks, we sit at one of those cute little tables completely devoid of comfort. Of course, they’ll be playing some sort of Josh Groban/Norah Jones compilation, which supposedly relaxes you to a state of being that’s borders being high. I think it’s legal, though.

“So, what did you want to talk about?” She says, sipping her drink.
Her hair looks different—darker, I noticed immediately when she came into the store. I like it dark.
“Well, I just needed to say something.” I’m shaking worse than I imagine I ever have before. It’s ridiculous, actually.
“You couldn’t just say this on the phone? You came all the way to Florida?”
Why do I need a reason to see you, I want to say.
“I just need to say this. It’s foolish, I already know that. I’m already well aware you’ve heard this spiel before, but I feel like I need to say it again.”

I look down suddenly, and I notice I’m picking the skin around my cuticles. It’s taken me 23 years to break the habit of biting my nails, but I still tug at the skin when I’m nervous or bored. I’m fairly certain I’m the former, at this moment.

“I’m still in love with you. I can’t shake it. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you, I just can’t do it. And I don’t know why. I know it’s creepy, and clingy, and disgusting, and pathetic. I know it’s all of these things you’ve always said about me. I know it would never work, but I just needed to tell you.”

I said all that in one breath, and I’m sure my face was now red. She just sipped her drink. She never reacted the way you’d think “normal” people would react.
“Are you finished?” She said, with one eyebrow raised and a smirk. I don’t know if I’d prefer a non-threatening response like this or not.
“I am.” I had grasped quite a large sliver of skin around my cuticle.
“What do you want me to say? You think that even if I said yes that would make things ok for you?”
That was a simple enough question, but why did I not have answer?
“I don’t know. I don’t know what I expected. I just want to say this:”

I cleared my throat and was ready to give my long awaited and often prepared speech:
“I love you more than I could possibly love anyone else. You know me, I’ve been through how many relationships? And the whole time, I end up thinking about you. I end up comparing things because something just never felt right with them. They were nice, yeah, but can you hold a conversation for long periods of time? I can with you. I’m never bored with you.“

At that, she laughed. “Thanks.” She said.
“I don’t mean it like that. What I mean is, I feel like we have so much in common and have spent so much time together that we know each other. We know each other better than we could possibly know anyone else. Living in a dorm and apartment together for 4 years while ignoring other people makes that happen.”
She knew I was right, but she didn’t care, I could tell.
“I love you, and that’s all that matters. I would never hurt you. I can’t imagine why I would even have an impulse to even look at another person in a sexual way. Why would I? All the guys I’ve been with bore me and seem as though they lack something.”

I was wishing she would say something, but at the same time I wasn’t. Did I really expect her to say, ‘Ok’?
“Look, I love you too, and you know that—“
“No listen, I’m not done.” I knew I was, but her sentence scared me.
“No you listen and shut the fuck up. You talk all the fucking time and go around the issue. Get to the fucking point. What do you want? You want to move in together? You want to get married? You want us to adopt children and live happily ever after? Do you think could work?”
I had the strongest urge to say “In Massachusetts maybe,” but I didn’t. I knew what she meant. I really didn’t know what to say.
“But like I was saying, I love you too. But I don’t love you like that. Why do you have to bring this shit up all the time? Why can’t we just be friends like I thought we had been for years?” She was saying all this rather casually, still sipping the apple cider.
I felt like she was basically saying, “Why don’t you grow up?” But I didn’t know.
“I can’t just be friends with you. I can’t. I’ve tried for years, but I feel like I’m lying to myself if I tried to ignore this part of me that wants you like that. And I’m sorry, you didn’t always give off the ‘I swear I’m not gay vibe.” I knew I shouldn’t have said that.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” But she knew. She knew exactly what I meant.
“Come on…remember?”

As much as she had tried to forget over the years by filing away bits and pieces of parts of her memory, she couldn’t forget that. The only time she had ever been intimate with anyone.
“So what? It was a mistake, we agreed to that—remember?”
“But I don’t understand how you could keep doing it over and over again and write it off like some sort of ‘college experimentation,’ which, I must add, are usually one-time occurrences.”
I hit a nerve, and I could tell. She had been questioned—just like I had—for years about her sexuality. And I really didn’t question hers, but I just didn’t understand that whole “thing” we did for so long.
“I don’t know what to say. I was young, I was stupid, I was horny as fuck, and I only knew you. And I knew how you felt, and I knew you’d keep doing it—but thankfully, I have a good imagination.” There was some definite acid in that remark, but it wasn’t new to me. She had told me before she thought about men when we made-out, but it didn’t matter to me.
All of a sudden, she stood up.
“Look, I really don’t have time for this shit.” She flung her purse over her shoulder.
“I’ve been looking at places closer to where you live.”
I couldn’t believe it—a dream I’d had for so long.

“If you want to, I need a place to stay…and we’ll see what happens.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I didn’t want to ask and ruin it.

So flash forward, what if became reality. Here we were—a year later—living in an apartment in Arlington, Virginia. We both had jobs, I was finishing my degree, and was just starting hers. Fucking peachy.
We had just sat down for dinner—in front of the tv—and a commercial came on while watching “Project Runway.” She cleared her throat.
“I can’t do this anymore.” She said, not taking her eyes off the tv.

“What do you mean?” My head had snapped quickly towards her. I already knew what she meant, somehow.
“We can’t live together anymore. We can’t do…this.” As she said that, she waved her hand from around indicating she meant us.
“What’s wrong? What happened?” I knew I was sounding whiny, but I was getting scared. I grasped the skin around my cuticle.
“I just can’t do it anymore.”
“What the fuck do you mean? What the hell happened?” I was always the first to yell, and I don’t know why. It’s been that way since college.

“Would you calm the fuck down? Do you know how long I’ve been wanting to say this? Just give me a minute. I hate expressing…feelings.”

She kind of shivered when she said that. I just sat that, plate in hand, mouth hanging open.
“I’m not happy. I hate living here—I fucking hate DC. I hate that every time I talk to my parents on the phone, it’s awkward. It’s like there’s a death in the family and they don’t want to discuss it. I hate that my sister doesn’t talk to me. I hate that my brother think I’M weird when he’s always been the weird one.” Her face was getting pink and her eyes were tearing up. Here it comes.

“I hate that you’re always in my fucking business and jealous of everything. I hate that we stay in the house all the time and I feel like I can’t leave if I just want to go hang out with someone else. You’re fucking smothering me. I can’t have normal conversations with people. I can’t talk about my boyfriend—because I don’t fucking have one. I can’t talk about you, because I can’t explain what you are to me.”

She was crying hard now, and as usual, I didn’t know how to respond.
“And I don’t love you. In fact, I think that I hate you. I’m sorry. I just feel like you’ve ruined my life.” She brought her hands to her face—no doubt to not see mine.
“I’m sorry that was so blunt, but I’ve always lacked tact when I’m mad.”

I just sat there, and I knew what she said was true.
I had fucked it up. I was clingy and immature—just like I’d always been. I was suspicious of so many things; especially her love. I felt like she could never be mine, no matter what I did, and this had all gone too far.
She continued to cry for about 5 minutes. It was one of those gasping cries like you’re completely dumfounded at the situation and you don’t know how to deal with it, let alone breathe. Her eyes rolled upward toward the ceiling, as if looking for an explanation from God. She quickly remembered there was no such thing, and looked back at her hands.
Eventually she stopped, and just stared at me. Her eyes started to get wide. And she pointed—

“What the fuck did you do?!”
My hand was bleeding bad. Apparently, I had pulled off quite a large chunk of skin around my cuticle and the blood was dripping on the ground. It didn’t hurt, or if it did, I didn’t feel it.