| | and it breaks my heart/and it makes me mad
and I'll never know/how so good went so bad
but the way things stood/I did the best I could
didn't I?
(pt. I)
From that second, from that kiss that we fell into, honestly, without saying a single word, just pulled to each other, instantly, helplessly, the rest of the weekend was sealed. He broke up with Misty, or she broke up with him, or something that was both things happened that very night - there was no question left. I floated into the hotel, twirling into Heather's room and her arms, laughing with delight. She held my hands and twirled too.
The next night I went to see him before his film series and we made out while he ran soft fingers under my skirt and up my legs as I twisted my fingers in the tangle of his hair - a deliberate, unspoken choice on both our parts to echo our first kiss. He nuzzled the spot on my neck that no one (no one ever) else has ever found and I melted into his hands and he rubbed sore spots on my feet, blisters from my shoes, and love was in every second.
The next day, I was driving to pick up the author I was escorting when I passed him on the street, walking home. I pulled over and asked if he wanted to come with me. He hopped in the van, an entirely different person from the Wes who would have fretted and worried and wrung hands over it before. Storm clouds gathered and he charmed my author with Southern pitter-patter. We parked back at campus as rain sprinkled down and we made a break for the festival shuttle. He held his coat over my head and kissed my nose before he left us to our festival business. My author approved, grinning, told me to hang on to him and the librarians waiting for the shuttle giggled and nodded and, I knew, envied me for such a boy. I beamed a smile that could not stop.
When the festival ended that weekend we kept the hotel room and wrapped up in each other, blissful, playful, relaxed, and (best of all, for me) contented, truly contented.
When I grudgingly left Mississippi, the one thing I thought for sure was that we were on the same page.
And now? Well, I think we were. I think he meant what he said to me, back in April, I think that was genuine, I do. Maybe I just want to believe that, but I do.
I guess the problem was that I stayed on that page and he didn't. No, that wasn't the problem at all, it was that he never told me he'd turned pages and I never saw.
Why didn't he tell? Why didn't I see?
--
When I got home, I wrote (in part) to the girls:
"He's this totally different guy. He's not afraid and nervous of stuff anymore, he's so much more relaxed and flexible, he's got an actual timeline for when he'll be done with school and is about to finish coursework and served as president of the Graduate Student Council. Like, who is THIS guy? And he makes it clear, pretty much from the first night, he still thinks I am swell, but that he can't really date ANYONE seriously now, because he's all wrapped up in his PhD and he just can't be a fully committed boyfriend and this is something he NEVER would have said before when he used to say 'no, I can do everything and whatever you say, just keep dating me.'
We spent that weekend together and it was awesome and low pressure and fun and relaxing and we went to the movies and it was like old times, but better! So, basically, I have no clue what's happening. We're both kinda in the 'yeah, I like you a lot but I don't really know where any of this is going, so let's just see' stage and I decided the next best way to see would be to come for another visit. Also, I never came out there to see him during the almost 10 months we were dating and apart, so this feels like something that 'needs' to be done. I doubt any of this is going to result in anything immediate for either one of us, because I know I am certainly not in that place right now and I don't think he is, but it's still a nice thing to have in my life at this point. I am crossing fingers it can maintain at this somewhat subdued level until things are even more sorted out with either him or me. It's a truly shitty time to be looking for a job, so I am happy with the one I have and who knows what might come from that? Maybe he'll end up here? I am sure there is some way this is just waiting to explode in my face, but for right now I am kinda just enjoying the feeling and not worrying too much about every single implication."
--
And I did what I said in that e-mail, I was back in Mississippi less than two months later, at the end of May, enjoying the feeling and never thinking about anything blowing up in my face at all.
--
He meant it, I say to myself, soothingly, over and over these days, he meant it, he did, at least in April, he meant it when he told you that he wanted what you wanted, that he couldn't be someone's serious boyfriend because of the PhD, he meant it. He meant it when he said that he couldn't commit, he meant that he wanted what you had to offer because it was what he had too. It was real then, all of it, what he said and when he looked at you with such love, when he touched you like you were precious, he meant it.
Right?
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| | Posted 11/5/2009 1:30 AM - 37 Views - 6 eProps - 3 comments
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