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I first met him at a bar. I hadn’t really noticed him, but my best friend said he was hot. Honestly, I had been talking to another guy who was at the bar and I was sort of drunk. I grabbed the bar backs’ arm and asked him for a beer. He smiled and brought me one while I looked over to see if the other guy was looking at me. My best friend nodded towards the bar back while he was opening my beer. “He’s cute, he has a nice body”, she said. I checked him out and laughed. After chatting with me for a few minutes, he put his phone on the bar and asked me to put in my number, so I did. I wanted the guy I had been talking to see. My best friend smiled at me and I laughed.
You always think about your future, you know, but you never think about the tiny moments that lead to a catalyst for change. I never expected that night to matter or change my life, but it did.
I had been in a funk. More like a depressive phase. My friends didn’t really understand, as they had their own lives and fun to think about. We were 22, after all. All I can really remember from those days was that I was housesitting, and I was very, very alone. I had been living with roommates for a while; going through the motions of college and work, and socializing and drinking. I didn’t realize I was in a low and anxious place until I took on a housesitting job in the country. The house was big and pretty- a perfect Vermont getaway. When I first got there I was excited. A hot tub, a pool, my own King bed… and I was getting paid. After a couple days though, I sank. My world shrunk into a pit of loneliness. I truly didn’t know what was happening at the time, I just felt numb. I sat with myself… I tried to exercise, tried to watch TV, tried to cook. Nothing felt meaningful to me in the slightest; my world felt hopeless and deep and dark. I know it sounds extreme that those feeling came up within a few days, but my life truly felt empty, unfulfilling, and pointless. I felt a huge sense of self-hatred for what I was going through. How can a decent looking girl, with a supportive family, good friends, who had just been though college, feel so disappointed and lost? My life didn’t feel ok. My friends were kind and fun, but I couldn’t explain to myself, not to mention them, how I was feeling. I reached out to them and they decided I needed a night out. I didn’t want to go but what else was I going to do? Fast-forward to that night at the bar…
I never really planned on hanging out with him. He had texted me after I gave him my number that night and he definitely didn’t seem like anyone special. Really, one day a couple weeks later I just happened to be in one of those moods where I felt like taking a little risk. I asked him if he wanted to go for a run, though I assumed he would say no. He took me up on it and a couple hours later I found myself meeting him at the waterfront. We ran together, though I hadn’t really been running lately and was out of shape. He was no one special though, and I was feeling a bit cocky about myself, so I out ran him and was relaxed. He didn’t seem like he had done much cardio before, though he ran with me and chatted the whole time. We stopped at a circle of stones by the waterfront, and I took a picture of his silhouette in the sunset. It was fine, fun even, but I didn’t really expect I would want to see him again.
The next few months were a whirlwind. I hadn’t felt immediately attracted to this person, yet I found myself waiting for him to respond to my texts. I didn’t understand why I felt as though I was out of his league, yet couldn’t seem to read his mind or understand how he felt about me. It didn’t seem like it should have been important to me, what he thought, but it was so important. I found myself sick with worry when he didn’t answer my text for a night or blew off seeing me. It seemed so simple to me: I was a catch, and he was just some guy I met at a shitty bar. Why would he back out of plans with me, or more commonly, blow off the plans completely, not even texting me back. I was perplexed. I wanted him to see that I was a great person and that he should have been grasping at the chance to see me.
He wasn’t, though. He was cold much of the time. When he was warm, though, he told me about his life. How he grew up poor- a low-income family that wasn’t supportive, nice, nor loving. His story made me sad. It made me feel closer to him and made me feel protective. I couldn’t change his past but I wanted to change his future. I wanted to show him that not everyone in his life had malicious intentions and, in fact, humans could be kind and beautiful. I wanted him to see how I could be kind and beautiful. I opened myself to him. I tried to soothe him, comfort him, mother him. I wanted to make up for lost time and, somehow, I wanted to fix all the pain he had experienced. I wanted to heal him and change him and make him an emotional and beautiful person. I wanted to save him.
It is scary though, how your wants can sabotage your needs. My man, my guy, who I thought had had a tragic and hurtful past, didn’t seem to want the same thing I did. He fought it every minute. Every time I reached for him and tried to fix his pain, he became distant; upset, angry, bitter. I didn’t understand it except for the huge loss and broken heart I felt for him. He had been through so much. So much pain, so much loss, so much trauma. I wasn’t sure specifically, but I felt and knew that he had experienced these things. His eyes were so lost and so, so empty. And when he kissed me I felt his pain. I felt as though he was giving in to me helping him. Saving him from his past.
It’s absolutely insane what one’s mind can do to a person. Self-sabotage, self-loathing, denial, they are all real. That summer I really, truly, felt as though I was helping him and maybe even saving him. Yes, he would be distant, even gone for days at a time with no word, but every time he disappeared, my heart broke for him. He was so lost, so undervalued by those in his life. I missed him each time he stopped talking to me because each time I thought he was lost and hurting. I wanted him to show up and hold me, cry on me, tell me he felt whole with me because finally, finally someone understood him. It felt so fundamentally correct that I would wait for him to return to me so that I could soothe and comfort him. Sometimes he did come to me, too. He would break down on my lap. He would give me sweet kisses and tell me how he had never felt a love like mine. He would look me in the eyes and promise me the world. He would hold me, kiss me, make love to me, and tell me I was his savior and his whole world. In those moments I felt… peaceful. I felt high, ecstatic, in love, and most of all, at peace. I felt like my purpose was fulfilled, appreciated and seen. He made me feel as though every moment of pain and doubt I experienced was valid, real, and truly significant. When he looked at me that way and kissed me like he needed me, my whole world spun in circles and, when I collapsed on him after we made love, my world collapsed too. Into peace, and deep and real salvation. Never, ever in my life had I feel so satisfied, fulfilled, and complete in those moments he opened up to me and accepted me loving him. He showed me purpose and hope.
They say every high comes with a low, and every sunlight needs darkness. I understood this in that first year with him. When we were good, we were high. Nothing could shatter the bond between us. He was my baby, my man, my future. When we were low, though, I felt empty. Desperate, empty, and disgusting. I didn’t understand why or what I could do differently to make him feel ok, feel whole again. I had grabbed his hand when he was down, helped him up, then…nothing. What was I doing? As soon as I felt like we were on track and in love, something happened. He would become irritable, emotionless, and distant. He was withdrawn to the point where I would retreat, lost and huddled, by myself. I desperately wanted to understand the pain that he was feeling, but couldn’t, because, despite my best efforts, he was gone. Emotionally withdrawn and just… lost. I tried to connect with him but it was impossible despite my best efforts. How is it so impossibly hard for someone to see the truth about someone when it is right in front of them?
We stayed like that for a very long time. He made promises, then broke them. He lied, he persuaded, and he made me feel so, so lonely. But at the time, I saw a lost and broken human. He looked into my eyes and cried, kissed me, made love to me, and I felt his broken heart. I swear I did. His eyes would lock on mine and I could see the lost and broken boy inside them. He never asked for it, but my heart broke for his and I made it my mission to save him. That was my first and most fatal mistake.
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This is beautifully written. It is so hard when someone doesn't realize what their pain can do to others.
ReplyThanks, hun. There are three more years of events that transpired after this initial few months. I will be sharing more of my story eventually.
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