If there's anything I want to remember and thank you for, it's this--your keen interest and support in my writing. Thank you for always inquiring about my current reads and writing projects. I am forever thankful for your persistent messages about wanting to read something new that I might be willing to share. Oh and also, thank you for finally understanding (maybe a little too late but that's alright) what I've always stood so firm in--that nobody will ever understand what we had, shared, and felt except for us. Nobody can tell us otherwise.
* * *
I didn't expect anything when I met you inside my favorite bar on a Friday evening of the in-between hours of the happy hour crowd and the party crowd. But that was where I began to heal.
It was busy enough so nobody could overhear our conversation but empty enough for us to have our own booth. You placed your coat across the booth and sat next to me. At first we didn't have much to say. You played with the candle on the table and I wiped the condensation from my half-drunk glass. I considered making an escape to meet my friends in Brooklyn because it didn't seem like we had much in common. But by the time I knew it, we were already two or three rounds of drinks into the night. And I was wrong; we did have a lot in common.
I humored you while you gave me a psychology spiel. Yes, everything you told me, I had learned in Psy101. But we laughed. We laughed a lot. You asked questions that made me want to share more. You laughed at all the right moments. You spoke confidently and deliberately. You bumped your shoulder into me whenever I made a smart comment, which was often. I don't think you were expecting it but you took pleasure in not knowing how to respond. You rubbed the small of my back when I turned to face you, my chin resting on my elbow. You did this to get closer to me. And even though there was an undeniable attraction, I still held back.
What you didn't know about me and what I would keep from you for months to follow was that I had no intention of ever being anything more than friends. In all honesty, I just wanted your company to pass the time. I didn't expect anything to come from it. I was still on the mend. It wouldn't have been fair to you. But we both know now that we were both in the same position and we weren't very fair to one another.
I tried to end the night. I wanted to see my friends but I was having the first good night in a long time with you. You walked me to the subway but tried to convince me to stay in the city with you.
"Doing what?" I asked you.
"I don't know. Anything you want," you responded. But I couldn't. My allegiance was to my friends, who were blowing up my phone about my whereabouts.
"Fine. I'll call you. I'll definitely call you. Or text," you said as I walked down the subway stairs.
* * *
On the train, I finally felt it. The burden and ache of brokenness lifting off of me. But what I had been waiting for for so long made me uncomfortable. Sadly, a part of me wanted to continue to wallow in self-pity. The other part told me to seize the moment and hold on to it because it was what I needed. Wasn't this kind of freedom and aliveness what I had been yearning for?
Whatever the case, you were the catalyst for it. And I guess that's something else I've never properly thanked you for.
Labels: bee phlat, on the mend, why-you-kay, you told me to write about you so i will but i'm not done