About a Friend Back Home

I wish you knew him.  I wish you could feel the way I light up when he arrives.  I wish you could know how excited I am when he shows up at an event that I didn’t expect to see him at, or the disappointment when he isn’t there when I expect him to be.  It’s strange, so very strange.

Just after I moved here I saw pictures of him with some other girl.  She was cute and sweet looking.  My first thought was that she didn’t seem his type.  Then again, how could I know his type?  All I could think was that he usually goes for the attractive girls, the pretty ones, the ones that everyone else seemed to want.  Strangely, seeing those pictures made me think I might have hope.  I’m not perfect, not even close, so if average is a possibility, then I might just have a chance.  Of course, if he was with some other girl, then that meant he was taken, and my world came crashing down into a jealous frustration.

All I could think was "Why did I come here?  Why did I move halfway across the country to be with Caelan?  Why didn’t I tell him how I felt when I had the chance.  At least then I would have some closure.  I wouldn’t be wondering what would happen if I’d spoken up.  If I had told him, it would have been dashed from my mind, and then I’d move on, just like I always do, just like I always have."

I thought about those times we went out to dinner.  He’d pick me up from work and take me out.  It was always sweet of him.  He always paid.  I didn’t expect it, but it was sweet of him.  I always thought he did it to be a gentleman, and because I made significantly less than he did.  Maybe it was more than that.  At this rate, I may never know.  We would go to clubs together, or I would meet him there when Karl would take me.  I always had a good time.  I found myself looking out when I was dancing to see if he was watching, which he never was.  I would brave the cold for a breath of fresh air or a cigarette just so I could spend time with him.  He’d drive me home and I would have to pry myself from the car because I couldn’t bear to leave.  I just wanted to spend time with him, enjoying his presence and relaxing into the calm he brought into my life.  It helped that he was financially pretty secure, had a pretty stable job, and was everything Caelan wasn’t.  He was also a gentleman.  He was sophisticated.  He was classy.  While it was nice to have someone so opposite from Caelan, he also gave me some real perspective on just what it was I wanted in life, in love.  I never realized how much classiness, sophistication, and all of that meant to me.  I never realized how good it was to have someone stable and relatively predictable in my life.  That’s not to say he was predictable all of the time, but I knew what to expect from him in many aspects and could rely on him to keep to his word.  I honestly can’t remember him ever actually bailing on me or even being late when we had actual plans, at least never late without calling to keep me informed.  The only times he wasn’t there were when we’d made no more than passing plans and nothing was actually set.  He’d say he would probably be at the drum circle and then wouldn’t come.  These things happen.  That’s what I get for not getting a commitment out of him to be there.  I even went out of my way to go to events I wouldn’t normally have gone to because I knew he’d be there and I just wanted to spend some time with him.  How freaky and stalkerish is that?  In truth, it was nothing I wouldn’t have gone to anyways if time, money, and exhaustion from working far too many hours wasn’t an issue.  It’s not like I started to pretend to be something I wasn’t just to win him over.  I didn’t even want to win him over.  I just wanted to spend time with him.

Looking back, I never thought I’d have a chance to be with him.  I’ve always talked myself out of it.  There were too many reasons it wouldn’t happen.  I had kids.  We just wouldn’t click in the long run.  We were too different people.  We weren’t compatable.  Recently I’ve got the added bonus of putting half the country between us.  I’ve talked myself up on the idea that it wasn’t going to work so many times that I’ve started to believe it.  For a very long time I tried to convince myself he wasn’t the person I wanted.  Then when I got down here, I realized that maybe he was.

Texas was a huge, life-changing experience for me.  I found myself looking at the new pictures he put up and wishing I was still a part of his life.  I started missing those dinners out after work.  I missed the munches in the food court, the club, and Arisia.  A part of me tried to convince myself that I just missed the attenion I got at those places, but I really didn’t get that much attention.  When I think of the moments that stand out the most from those events, all of them involve him.  I miss that oddly bemused smirk that he always got.  I missed that knowing look he’d give me when I was downplaying myself far too much.  I miss sitting outside with him on the bench and just talking, or smoking a cigarette on the back porch.  I miss those dinners, not so much for the food, but for the time with him.  It’s funny that I didn’t consider it dating.  My co-workers always thought he was my boyfriend and I was cheating on my husband or smething.  Maybe there was more to it than I saw.  Maybe I was afraid to admit what it could be.  I found myself wondering what kind of person he would be when I saw him again, and how much he must have changed.  I missed him more than I really wanted to admit.  Of all my friends back home, I missed him the most.  He’s the only one I would consider going back to Boston for.  Yes, I know my friends back there miss me, but if I was going to move back, it should be for me.  I might bend that rule for him.

Last year when I went home for Christmas, I deliberately didn’t give him any of the information.  I didn’t leave him with contact info to see me when I went back.  I didn’t want to see him.  I didn’t want my family to meet him.  I was afraid they would see it as my co-workers had.  I didn’t want him to meet my family either, to see how crazy they really were.  I didn’t want to see him for fear that I wouldn’t want to leave.  I didn’t want him to see my horrible hair as it tried to grow out.  I just wasn’t ready to deal with all of that.  I had half a mind to never see him again.  It would be too dangerous, too risky.  I guess I know myself better than I’ll admit.  Krystal’s got one point of view right.  I am afraid I’ll fall hopelessly in love with him.  That’s part of the reason I was so inclined to run away.  I think I already was.  He was getting to close and that scared the hell out of me.  I mean, that one night at Arisia we were making out on his couch.  I slept

in his bed.  Things could have probably gone a whole lot further if I’d let them, but I didn’t.  I started to feel that panic rise up in me.  I was suddenly scared.  Part of it was the fear of something triggering problems again, but most of it was simply because I was too afraid that things would change and I’d just be something casual.  I was afraid that I’d have what I thought I wanted and would realize it wasn’t at all what I wanted in the end.  Worse, I was afraid of finding out that he really was everything I wanted and I meant nothing to him.  Yes, sex does complicate things.  I didn’t want to sign the death sentence to our friendship all because we went that way.  I was too afraid to consider the possibility that perhaps he really did intend for it to be something more.  Then again, things happen at con that wouldn’t happen otherwise in the real world.  I couldn’t be sure.  I also couldn’t get involved in something casual.  I’ve never been good at fun little flings.  I need commitment, safety, and security.  Yes, I’m odd like that.

It would be so much easier if I never had to see him again.  It would be easier if I could just avoid him.  A part of me wants to.  If I never see him again, eventually I should get over him, right?  I don’t have to look at his pictures online.  I can leave him on my friend’s lists for everything without looking at his updates.  I can just ignore him.  Every once and a while a fleeting thought of "I miss him" will come to my mind, but I’m sure they’ll get fewer and fewer.  That’s what has happened in the past.  Then again, in the past I’ve realized the people I’ve walked away from have turned out to be either complete jerks or something that would never be good for me.  In his case, I don’t think he’s that kind of person.  I could be wrong, but I don’t think I am.  I don’t know.  In all that time, I’m finding that I only miss him more in time, not less.  It’s not at all working out as I had planned.  What makes me think that will change in time?  I don’t know.  Maybe I should just run away.

Yet my friends think I should tell him.  They think I should spill my guts and tell him how I feel, but I haven’t really talked to him in almost two years.  I’ve done well with avoiding him, but I can’t anymore.  He’ll be hurt if I go back to Boston and don’t so much as see him.  I can’t hurt a friend like that.  I don’t want to lose him as a friend because I can’t cope with the idea that I may just be falling for him.  I know I love him, but the question is, how?  Is it that undonditional love of friends, or is it the strong bond of family?  Is it that real passionate, soul-mate kind of love?  I hate the idea of walking out of his life because I can’t take a risk.  I don’t know.  Maybe they’re right.  Unrequited love will tear me to pieces.  Maybe I should just suck it up and say something.  It’s possible that they’re right.  I just wish I was more courageous and bold.  I’m too timid for my own good.

It’s funny how I look back in my OD and find that I haven’t really written about him.  I know why I haven’t.  I never wanted Caelan reading about him and fearing I’d leave him for this other guy.  I thought if I put it down in cyberspace, someone could read it and then I’d have to fear him knowing because someone told him.  Maybe we’d stop hanging out, or perhaps he’d treat me differently.  I couldn’t bare that, so I simply didn’t deal with it.  I didn’t write about it.  I didn’t tell anyone about it, except for Karl perhaps.  I just tried to pretend it wasn’t the case.  Then when I got down here and saw his new pictures when I finally got the internet back, I was all torn up.  He looked so happy, and all of it was without me.  Why should it hurt so bad?  Why should I care?  Why should I put myself in that equation at all?  I didn’t have him.  He was never mine to lay claim to, yet still I wanted to.  Still some part of me thought of him as mine, perhaps not now, but surely in the future.  Instead my feelings were put in text, handwritten and kept in private where no one could ever find it.  It was safer that way.  I don’t know what’s changed that I’m not so afraid of publicly admitting this long-term obsession.  Perhaps it’s the fact that I no longer fear Caelan finding out.

I’m just so afraid.  I’m afraid of rejection being thrown in my face.  I’m afraid everything will just be blown back in my face and I can’t take it right now.  I need something to be positive in my life.  I need some sense of happiness because it seems too much of my happiness is fading away these days.  I just want a fairy tale ending and happily ever after, even if ever after in reality doesn’t last all that long.  Is that so much to ask?

~*~Rave~*~