About 3 and a half years ago I met her. Her dad was friends with my dad (somehow) and one day he came over with her. The first time I saw her I was getting applesauce out of the refrigerator.
my dad: Brian this is so and so's daughter
me: (looks over does a hand wave type thing) hey (walks away eating applesauce)
her: (returns the hand wave thing) hey
We go to Arby's to get some food. She declines all offers. I know she's hungry, so I insist she takes some of my fries.
An hour or so later I enter the living room and start doing some shit on the computer. She comes in the room shortly after that. My sister is already in the room watching some gay shit on the Disney Channel. I start making fun of the shows my sister is watching and everyone laughs. My stepmother enters the room.
Stepmother: You guys want to go to Movie Gallery or something?
sister: yeah I'll drive!
stepmother: Brian?
me: uhhh I guess.
She comes with us. We browse some films and I make some shitty jokes but they both laugh because we have similar senses of humor. I insist on some awful Hillary Duff movie. This was for two reasons: First, I had a mad crush on Hillary Duff, and Secondly, to make fun of my sister who watched some Disney channel shit with her in it.
We get home and try to watch it. We last 45 minutes. Me and her sit next to each other. I don't really feel all that attracted to her but I'm nervous. I'm always nervous but I suck it up. I had a feeling she liked me and that gave me enough courage to sit "close" to her. After we stop watching the movie she gets a call from her boyfriend. Afterwards, she bitches about her boyfriend. Nothing really happens after that and she and her father leave.
Next time I see her is sometime later. She broke up with her boyfriend. We've been hanging out for a while. She loves my music and I love that she loves it. We're in my room. We've been in there for a while. We're both on my bed. I'm nervous. Everything I did was entirely instinctual, everything I said was only spoken after special deliberation (which didn't mean it was any good). Time progresses nothing happens. More time passes we're both laying on my bed. I start to gather my guts. I kiss her.
I'll never forget this.
Her: Are you trying to make out with me?
me: (Who the fuck asks that?) uhhhhhh I guess I am? {I'm crazy smooth I know}
Her: (laughs)
We continue smooching. I take her home. She asks me to play Copeland. I smile and say, "Which one?"
"You know the one"
I smile and put it on "No one really wins".
The next time I see her is a bunch of vague jumbled memories of supermarkets and shit tacos my parents made. Her dad comes to pick her up. We're on my couch in the other room waiting for my dad and hers to stop talking. When they do we'll stop kissing and touching but until then we lust. We don't want them to know about it.
The next time I see her is months later. She lives in North Carolina and I live in Alabama. We talk occasionally on the phone. Maybe once every 2 weeks or so. She comes over. I take her to my best friends house. We play Super Smash Bros. on the GameCube. All of my best friends are there. She's too shy to do much of anything. I get her to play and totally go out of my way to dominate her. I can tell she's not having much fun no matter how much me or my friends try to make it more interesting. I make up some excuse and we leave. I make a pit stop at Burger King for a delicious double stack. I destroy that shit in front of my house in the car while we listen to some tasty tunes. We go to my room. We're listening to music. Her sister is supposed to be picking her up soon. We are all over each other. She gets a call from her sister. She's at a party and it will be sometime before she comes. We continue.
I'd like to say what happens next in detail but it might be too graphic. Basically, some of our clothes were taken off, we started doing stuff but before anything major happens I fall asleep. I just blacked out. I know I'm more lame than you probably have guessed. In my defense I was extremely tired for staying up the previous night. It was about 2 am when I fell asleep. When I woke up her sister arrived. I often feel like that blackout was caused by something greater than me.
We talk occasionally on the phone. After a while we stop talking. I say Happy Birthday on her birthday she says nothing back. My birthday passes and nothing happens. Her next Birthday comes up. She responds. We start talking again. Occasionally again but the conversations are better. I tell her I'll be going to Alabama soon to visit and that I'd like to see her (I moved to California a month before that first happy birthday). We make some arrangements. We both thought she wasn't going to be able to come. I was driving south from Virginia (I flew to Virginia to stay with my friend and we drove to Alabama from there). While driving through I wanted to stop by and see her. It was early as fuck in the morning and she didn't answer. We talk two more times on the phone and she's not coming. Four days before I leave she calls me and asks what I'm doing tomorrow. I tell her "Nothing anymore." She comes early in the morning. I'm still laying in bed. She lays down with me for a little while then I take a shower. We spend all day in bed. No sex. Just talking, touching and smooching. It's 5 pm now and I take her to Red Lobster (I promised her Red Lobster if she came to see me). We hold hands nearly the whole trip. We eat a fuck ton of sea food. We go home. We hold hands. I tell her to pick out some tunes. She puts in Minus the Bear then Copeland. When we get home I tell her I think I love her (refer to prior post on specifics). We're on the bed again. Things escalate but it's that time of the month for her. We try some different methods of doing things. It ends poorly. We take a shower together and watch "A Night at the Roxbury" (my favorite movie). She gets mad because I quote everything. I shut up. She falls asleep with her head on my chest. I smile and close my eyes. We both wake up and she has to go. I walk her to her car, we hug for a long time and she drives off. The next day she calls me, when we talk about that "love thing":
Me: I really think I do
Her: I know I do
Me: You do what?
Her: Love you.
Me: How? When?
Her: For a while. I broke up with my boyfriend the day I met you. I didn't know what was going to happen with us. But you were so much better and I didn't want him anymore. And when you held my hand when we were going to Red Lobster that pretty much sealed it.
Me: (laughs) hand holding sealed it?
Her: You held my hand the whole way... I don't know I thought it was really sweet and that's pretty much when I knew for sure.
We start talking regularly. Almost everyday. Roughly 5 days a week or so. Four months later I see her again. She flies to California, I pick her up from the airport and take her home. The first night we go to my grandparents house and she meets my grandmother and my uncle Carlos. I eat a bunch of my grandma's cooking while she watches me eat. I insist she tries some but she declines. Later that night we go to my room and stay there. The rest of the time she's there each day has one main adventure then a substantial portion of "bed" time.
Day1: arrival
Day2: Go on tour of the town and drive aimlessly
Day 3: Cook an awesome feast for dinner and we take pictures for my photography class. That is followed by some viral videos rather unorthodox in nature. She actually watches them and inquires and is genuinely interested. Maybe I do love her
Day 4: Driving aimlessly, decide to go bowling, she has no socks, an adventure to find a sock store ensues
Day 5: She helps me study and I get annoyed about something. She gets close enough but keeps distance. That night we made up without talking or touching.
Day 6: Bowling then epic arcade battles. (she is terrible at shooting games)
Day 7: We drive down south and hang out with my cousin and his friends on the beach.
Day 8: we stay in my room and watch movies and talk
Day 9: I take her to the airport. We hold hands most of the way. She cries and I pretend not to notice. When we get to the Airport I'm perfectly fine. I'm worried about the fact that me not crying might hurt her feelings somehow. When we get inside and wait I start to cry. Nothing I can do can stop it. I try everything. She tries everything. She cleans my face and holds my hand. When I leave I can't stop crying. After 50 miles of driving I was able to keep the tears back. I thought to myself "Why am I being such a bitch? Maybe I really do love her."
She goes to basic training. The first time I get a letter from her is on the 13th of January 2010. That day I couldn't stop smiling. We write each other fairly regularly. I write her a letter telling her what happened between me and that girl (I was in a very heated debate with myself as to postpone the news so I could tell her in person or tell her right after it happened). I wrote her the next day. When she called me a couple of weeks later I was super excited. Then she expressed her disappointment in me. I made no excuses. I told her the truth and we both reprimanded me until she had to go. She wasn't really mad though. Let me explain, she was upset but she knew it meant nothing to me. And we both understand how I feel about morality and doing things that I feel are right or wrong or beneficial. This was something beneficial to someone at no cost to me (at least I thought there was no cost but I miscalculated).
I was never sure if it was authentic "love" or just my unbearable loneliness that evoked my feelings for her. And still to this day I reserve the right to have doubt. Over these past years we've spent very little time in close proximity to each other. I don't know what to think of that.
I think she arrived in San Diego today. It's roughly 6 hours from where I live. The next time we talk we are going to figure out who's visiting who and when.
P.S. Don't think that the fact that I remembered such great detail of our past means anything particularly special, even though it could or probably does. I just fucking remember everything.
2 comments:
I'm really glad you wrote this. It made your last post easier to understand.
I couldn't tell you if it's love or not. I don’t even know what liking someone that intensely could feel like. But I'd say that if you're even questioning it, it might not be.
She sounds like she makes you really happy though. So long as you're happy, keep doing whatever it is you're doing.
My favorite Copeland song was 'You Have my Attention' not 'No One Really Wins.'
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