I dreamed about him pulling me close and saying, “I love you.”

On the way to the tunnel,

A truck driver lights his cigarrette.

Soon:

A firetruck sounds.

There are flames.

november

i’m most affected by the memory of my being with him, and his being with me, when I am trying to feel close to someone else. I met an extremely nice boy who is smart and interesting and a horrible kisser, and still, I said I needed to try to know him. I I want to be happy with someone. He turned out to be not so sweet, or innocent acting, as he had in the week during which we’d planned a date out, and then a movie at my house; I didn’t in particular want to kiss him when he kissed me, and certainly not after, so unappetizing it was.

But I still thought I’d try him out (since I am, obviously, just test-driving cars here, finding a good match for my needs); and so I tried to see him yesterday. He was at a club, and he didn’t want to leave, and I didn’t want to go, and he informed me I was missing a “hilarious” time there, and I didn’t respond, and I got off the bus – - after staring at the floor the entire ride; staring and thinking about having been held by another person; and quite possibly terrifying the girl who sat staring at me with a quizzical look on her face – - and cried, holding my gloved hands over my eyes on the sidewalk, and entered my house and lay down on the stairs and cried more, and more.

And then I told myself I was being silly, and I got up. I don’t feel sad now, at least no sadder than usual; maybe a bit bored with this Sunday, but not ready to weep.

argh.

gone?

Here’s what I visualize when I think about relationships gone bad: A tumor. I’m excising a malicious tumor htat wants to take over my body. I cut it out, cleanly; ignore those calls, don’t initiate contact. Hell, I delete photos! But this is one persistent tumor. He still resides in me; I still think about him much more than I should – - and not in the way one should think about the past. It’s still present; I am living with him still; I am fighting with him still. I still try to think how we might be together. When he leaves that boy, then we’ll be okay. When he calms down, we’ll be able to elope.

Which is disgusting, prima facie. A year – - a year – - I have thought about this kid. Pining for him, becoming his friend, becoming his boyfriend, getting locked into him, getting thrown away, getting asked back, and then being told gently, softly, almost apologetically (for him) that, sorry, but there’s someone else. A year of that, and what else have I been thinking about? Finding a way to fill that void the cancer surgery has left in me. Work, writing, clubbing, friends, eating, plays, reading, taking trips: they won’t fill it.

At a party this weekend, I met someone dressed as a clown – - B1MB0, THE REB0UND CL0WN!

If only it was that easy to rebound. Or to want to rebound.

He came over, and I let him, and we did it, and I was so crazy for him, and I cried about it and talked about it with a friend and thought I was better.

And now I’m going to go see him again.

She said that if he cared about me, he wouldn’t be doing this, because he would know how deeply I cared about what I did with him–that it isn’t just some dumb game, that I have feelings involved. It’s not even all his fault; I let him come over, and I even initiated some things.

But the fact is he went back to his real life; I’m living in a fantasy. I have been for forever, and I don’t know how to stop. Because I love him so much, or I think I love him, or I’m so emotionally connected to him that it’s all I think love could be.

Emo emo emo. Well I have a right to be emo. I’m with–no, you’re actually not with–someone who keeps me around to feel good about himself.

If I could have anything right now, it would be: a boy who really liked me, who I really liked back, who would go on trips with me and be proud of me and love me and take me out to dinner and talk to me and think I was funny.

So what are you doing chasing a dead end?

well

Well, I saw him again yesterday. The moment I hugged him, I remembered why I liked him to begin with, and I could barely look him in the eye. He noticed this, and told me to do so a lot during our time together. But each time I glanced up at him and his blond hair and green eyes, I was just overcome; I just wanted to be with him again.

Why am I wasting my time? Not seeing him—what’s an hour, after all, for a guy you used to date—but still dreaming of him? Knowing that he’s with someone else is what kills me, and it’s not just anyone. If it was a nice person, I’d maybe care less. But he chose such an asshole, and idiot, and stuck-up prick, that… well, whatever.

I should move on but I can’t. After I hugged him, I started to cry.

I haven’t

seen him since.

I’ve been busy. There have been a few phone calls, but we both know it’s over.

And yet I still think about him, when I’m alone: about how it felt to wake up with my arms around him; about the movies he liked to watch; about his biting humor. It’s then that I want to return to him, to take out the man in his life now and steal him back.

But I remember, then, what we really were: two immature boys who couldn’t talk to each other; who couldn’t express their love for the other without resorting to insults and destructive behavior.

I remember the times he wanted me to come over after he’d slept with someone else; about the way his biting humor felt more like cruel invective against me, someone he claimed to love.

There were so many feelings with Boy — good and bad — that it’s hard to not want to go back. After all, who’d want to live in an emotionless existence, with everything smooth sailing? But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from this boy, it’s that you don’t have to take the bad with the good; that I deserve someone with a sense of decency developed enough to not need to denigrate me to feel good about himself.

And that is a good lesson to learn for a guy who, after all, just got into this thing to have some fun.

fa

Twas a ridiculous night, it was.  He brought wine, and so I got friendly, and kissed him, even though he didn’t want to at first (a first: him trying to avoid my kissing him). But we did, eventually, and then he didn’t want to stay over, which he’d planned to but couldn’t now because we were kissing and not being just friends, and then he complained that I only wanted him to sleep over because he was drunk (he’d bought the wine! I’d like to point out).

It ended with his referring to my “faggy-ass friends” and me deciding that he would never grow up, and that I, too, could never look at him as just a friend (not now at least; I’d asked for time away from each other last month and he’d gotten so upset that he couldn’t see me that I gave in, thinking deep down somewhere that maybe we’d get back together somehow).

But no talking since the violent (over the phone) argument. And that’s probably for the best. I just wish he liked me and that he was a good person, because I’ve really fallen for him.

so

It’s been a while, eh, dear reader(s???)?

It’s been somewhat up and down and back and forth, if you know. For two weeks, I didn’t see him; then I did, and it was very physical for a few days. Then the honeymoon was over, and there were some fights (well, a ‘discussion’ about the fact that we weren’t together, we would never date, and we could not be together, followed by a listing of what each of us did wrong and how we were immature… and then we slept together).

I told myself I couldn’t sleep with him after that; that night, before we went to bed, I told myself I wanted to remember what it was like to sleep there. We talked before going to bed–and even told each other that the other was the best kisser he’d ever known. “Maybe that’s the way you know if that’s who you’re supposed to be with,” he said, which is self-contradictory, coming as it did an hour after he’d said we could not be together, especially (!) when his traveling boyfriend returned. But I still wanted to remember it–to remember what it was about him that draws me to him. And that night I had an upsetting dream; in it, a man was following me, pestering me to do something. He wouldn’t leave me alone, even after I told him to go. And so I flung my fist toward him.

And hit the boy I was sleeping next to.

Of course, it wasn’t too hard–mostly my arm falling on him, as I woke up halfway through my slap. “You hit me!” he said–joking mostly; it hadn’t hurt. But in the second before I did so, I looked over and saw him, curled up there with my arm around his shoulder, he breathing quietly, and it was so goddamned beautiful that it broke my heart. It broke my heart that this beautiful guy was here in my arms and that we both knew it wouldn’t work.

That morning, we woke up late (there was sex for him, and only half for me, if you must know…). We wandered out late. And then, after I told him I never knew the name of the man who hands out flyers near the subway (he did), he told me that that was natural for a Democrat to like groups of people but not care about the individual–to go through life liking people in theory but being mean to them individually.

It was something I’d thought of before, like when he gave a homeless man a cigarette or talked to a crazy-looking woman passing us on the street. I didn’t have a quick-enough mind or sharp-enough tongue to retort that I was the one who volunteered on the weekends–that perhaps voting the right way and volunteering with groups was a better way to go through life, a way to have a more positive impact, than just talking to random people you happen to meet. But because I’m insecure about how I am with people–how I continue to figure that people don’t really want to talk to me, as I used to when I was a kid–I think that jab of his was the most cutting one yet. I walked mostly in silence until we said goodbye. Showering at home, I wept; I had to stop shaving to cry.

Never again! Like always, I told myself.  But it was a special day for him soon; I’d already promised to see him twice that weekend. He had big plans–going to sleep, waking up and cooking breakfast, spending as much time as possible together. I ruined them, though; I’d already decided I would not be sleeping over there, even though I was exhausted and, like most, didn’t particularly like sleeping by myself. But I went home; he was upset and gave me a perfunctory hug, even though the whole night he’d been utterly sweet (to the point where it was obvious he was acting), kissing me on the cheek and forehead.

I called. He said he was angry–and that if I was going to mope around, I shouldn’t even come to the party the next day.

I did–go, that is–and I had a good time. Which really annoyed him. He said he didn’t even expect me to come (I hadn’t called first). I was slightly tipsy, so I decided it would be a good decision to follow him outside to meet his friend, the whole five-minute trip of which consisted of him berating me for being annoying. (I blocked most of this out.) Highlights of the night also included making out on his bed when he went to look for a pen; him telling me to leave and find another boy to sleep with like I had a few weeks before (side note: You have a boyfriend. And another fuck buddy. And you’re mad at… me?); and seeing said fuck buddy at his party. At least he didn’t kiss him in front of me (he did, however, kiss me in front of his friends).  Oh, and the best part: We had our emphatically stated “last kiss”–it was long and passionate, and in his bedroom; and when it was over he opened the door and said I should leave so I didn’t get there too late.

And yet I saw him the next day, and he got mad at me again for being moody and not having a good time (someone’s not having a good time–> yell at them—> has less of a good time //vicious cycle). And then he said in a message that I was very important to him. And I thought about how I liked him again.

It will basically never end, it seems, until the boy comes back, at which point I hope I get in a fistfight with one or both of them.

And I am seeing him tonight. And he will sleep over, and I will not kiss him. I promise.

Nearly two weeks

Is it REAL this time??

I believe so, dear reader.