I moved from Rockville, Maryland to Hudson, Florida in early spring 2000. I spent my time in Maryland making all the mistakes I could and I had just plum run out of things to fuck up. I didn’t know what I needed, just that I needed to get out of there as soon as possible. Things between my mother and her alcoholic boyfriend had reached a dangerous point. I did not want to be around them, I didn’t want to be at home and I was almost too overwhelmed to make any decisions. He killed out fish and threw the Christmas present I bought my mother out of the window. If I stayed any longer I was going to end someone’s life. I guess I was not too overwhelmed to break off my own disastrous relationship. It took me a long time to recognize what a controlling boyfriend looks like when you are the other half. I don’t remember how I finally did it but I had to try a few times before I was successful. He was someone in our circle of friends which means I knew him from drinking and listening to the Scorpions, which is what you do when your friends are European. Everything was out of his apartment already, I just needed to get out and Not Think About It. And since I am an Avoidance Specialist I had no problem! I stayed with a friend who I had known since I moved to Maryland. We had been in a car accident together in 1998 and since that our relationship had been seriously strained. I was devastated when I found myself unable to reach him for the year after the accident. I saw him in court once and his parents came to see me in the hospital but the part of him I wanted was nowhere. That’s when I started having the dreams about trying to catch up with him while walking around in pool full of chili. Our relationship is not something I’ve been able to categorize or explain yet, but for a minute it was back to normal, whatever that was for us. I didn’t tell him what was going on in my life and he didn’t really ask. I knew better than to ask about his life, I didn’t want to know about anything I was not a part of. I knew one day he’d be in some relationship and the thing we were having would be gone.
We chatted until the wee hours of the morning; occasionally getting up to go stand by the window and smoke but for the most part we split our time between making out and rambling. There were times when I stayed with him where he’d decided we couldn’t smoke in the apartment and so we’d have to get dressed and go outside and freeze. Freezing hardly mattered to me.
I don’t ever remember eating there. I think I was functioning on insatiable lust, and that had a higher priority than food. I was offered the occasional omelet but adding any kind of normal relationship type behavior into the mix was going to make it harder for me to live with what I had.
Leaving was the worst part, the hardest for me anyway. He would never say good bye to me, he would tell me he’d see me again. The visit after my break-up was the last time I spoke to him, the last time I saw him and I review every detail in my head over and over. I tried to call, email, visit, everything but I got nothing. I was hurt and I still am. Would I ever be able to forgive him for letting me go? And now there is no point. I am so different than I was ten years ago. Okay, not in all ways, not in the pants department. I appear to be exactly the same but I think a lot of that stems from the lack of rejection in my life. It’s one of the outcomes I can predict and there is comfort in having control over that part of my life. In every other way he knew me I don’t think he’d recognize me and maybe I don’t want him to. Maybe he would only keep causing me all this, This. I feel like the tiny window of opportunity I had with him slammed shut on my fingers and now it’s gone forever. Very rarely do I let something slide through my fingers.
