All At Once.

12:57 pm.

He was 3 minutes early.  We were supposed to meet for lunch at 1, and he was already here.  I'd spent hours thinking about what I would wear today, what we would talk about, if I should wear my sunglasses, where we should go...and now it was 12:57 pm, and he was here.  It finally hit me.

Our first encounter since that awful phone call.  That horrid phone conversation where everything was laid out on the table, nothing was held back, and we just let loose.  I'd explained everything to him--my mixed feelings about his girlfriend, about our friendship, about our past, our present, our future.  And he said a lot of things that night that I needed to hear, that I'd been dying to hear.  How exactly was this going to go down?  Do we talk about it?  Will it have an affect on us?

My stomach went upside down.  I was nervous as all hell.  Suddenly the dress I was wearing wasn't flattering enough, suddenly I felt like I'd gained 20 pounds, suddenly I wasn't wearing enough make-up, my hair was flat, and I became horribly self-conscious of my legs.  Since when did my dress get this short?

I decided to use the restroom before breaking for lunch.  As I was walking back to the classroom we were rehearsing in...I saw him.  He was down the hall outside of a different door.  He didn't see me.  I watched him.  He was going from door to door, just looking around the building.  I don't know if he was trying to find our classroom or what, I didn't care.  As soon as I saw him, all the nerves went away.  He became human.  I didn't feel like I had to please him, or impress him.  Suddenly I was me again.  I smiled to myself and walked back into the classroom.

I've been feeling different lately.  A good different.  I don't feel as incomplete anymore.  I'm on my own, I'm doing fine, and I haven't worried about love or relationships for a while.  I haven't worried about him.  I haven't worried about anybody.  I've only been taking care of myself, doing things that make me happy.  All on my own, too.  My job is wonderful, absolutely amazing.  The people I work with are great.  I've been going to concerts and plays and movies.  Things are super great.  I don't feel like a kid.  I don't feel like a 58 year old woman.  I finally, for the first time in my life, feel like my age.  I am 20.  I'm not tired or weary or worn out.  I'm happy.  Wow.  I'm actually happy.

He and I had lots of fun at lunch.  He was actually quite the gentleman, which was new for us.  We made crude jokes, talked about theatre, laughed about people...we were friends.  We had fun.  It's so hard to wrap my mind around all of this.

There was a moment today when I was talking to my director about a rehearsal space issue and how I was handling it, and he turns to my director and says, "Isn't she great?"  My director looks at him and says, "She's wonderful."  I looked at him and smiled brightly.  It was one of my proudest moments.

Kids.

"You're an ass!" she screamed.  There was a long silence on the other end of the line, on the other end of this mistake of a phone call, on the other end of this drunken stupor.  She looked at the phone to make sure she still had service.  Yup, he was still there.  She just shut him up.

She looked around at the room she'd locked herself in.  Her best friend's room, hundreds of miles from her hometown.  She was in this room because she was on vacation.  Well, technically she was in this room because everyone except her knew this phone call was a mistake, and her persistence had led to her locking the door and somehow taking her friend's phone hostage.  What had happened to hers?

"Why am I an ass?" he replied.

She sifted through melted thoughts and painful memories for an answer.  Here she was: on the phone with the boy who took over her life for years, the boy she was never good enough for, the boy who...was still on the phone.  Why was he still on the phone.  Why hadn't he run.

She knew what she wanted to say to him and began with a holler, only to find that she'd lost service.  There was no one on the other line listening her venting, her feelings unleashed.  She could hear her friends in the other room discussing the situation.  They didn't approve.  Of course they didn't, the situation was ridiculous in all honesty.  Here she was on vacation, in the beautiful city of San Francisco, surrounded by some of her closest friends, drinking beer and not having to worry about anything except for maybe the hangover tomorrow, and she decides to call her ex-boyfriend and scream about their issues?  It didn't add up.  Most situations involving an ex-boyfriend don't, though.  I think we can accept this as a universal truth.

She walked over to the window and opened it, staring out at the fire escape.  The cool air felt good against her warm face filled with pent-up emotion and growing frustration towards cell phone service.  She looked down at her friend's phone (still wondering where hers was), and hit redial.

"Hello." he said quietly.

"Hi." she replied softly.

"What were you saying?"  His reply was calm.  It inspired her to react the same.  For a few short moments anyway.

"Why won't you look at my art?" she asked.  The words fell out her mouth with no control.  Really?, she thought, This is the pressing issue?

"I'm looking at your art right now." he replied.  Right.  The paintings she'd given him.  How could she have forgotten?  Four of them.  Two of them were her best work.  All four didn't make it into her portfolio application for art school.  She had asked to borrow them, and he refused.  He thought she wouldn't give them back, flattering and cruel at the same time.  Obviously he had an attachment to them, but she was disgusted that he would think that of her.  Through a small maze of meandering and drunken thought, a recap of this story came pouring out into the conversation at hand as well, just to fill you in.

More silence.

Or so she thought.

In her tipsy state, she had actually mistaken herself rambling for silence.  She'd been talking and talking and talking, saying thought after thought after thought; everything was candid, no censors, no edits.  Finally she stopped.  And then there was silence.

"Are you going to say anything?" she asked timidly.

"No.  I just want to hear you talk." he replied, in a sincere and soft tone. "I'll be your punching bag if you need one."

Amazingly enough, after he said that, she had nothing to say.  It was then she realized she was crying.  Slowly she was falling out of her inebriated state.  Slowly she was starting to realize where she was and what she was doing and it was scaring her.  Slowly she was coming back to a place of uncertainty and non-clarity.  The alcohol got rid of all those filters; would she be able to hold up this conversation?

She fought, crying all the while.  He listened, patiently.  A lot more patiently than she'd expected.  She told him she had hope for their friendship, but told him it wasn't going to be easy.  He said he figured since it'd been about three years.  She told him that they can't deny what they were, because that's cheating and blatant ignorance.  He never actually agreed, but he understood.

"I just want to get to a point where we're ok.  Where I don't think everything is your fault, because it is definitely not." she blurted out.

"It's not your fault either." he said.

She'd been able to hold in her tears for almost three minutes until he said that.

"Yes it is." she replied through a high-pitched whimper.

A sigh came through the other line.  Not an exasperated sigh, more of an apologetic sigh, a sigh saying "you're wrong, but I know I can't convince you otherwise."

"Why am I still talking to you?  I could've stopped calling you.  I could've stopped talking to you after you got a girlfriend.  But I didn't." she said, again through a whimper.

"I could've done the same.  I like talking to you.  I like what we had, what we have, and most of the time I look forward to what's ahead.  I need you.  Maybe not as much as you need me, but there's still a need there that I can't deny.  And a lot of the time I feel horrible because I know it's not the same need that you have."

There was a lot said in that response, but the only thing she completely took in was when he said "I need you."  It had been a phrase she had wanted to hear since the day she'd met him.  And there it was.  She felt a small chapter close; something had finally been resolved.  There were still several other issues, but at least this conversation hadn't been a complete waste.  Sure the phrase had been watered down with other thoughts, but it was still there, right?  He'd said it, right?  At the root of it all, he did need her.

As the conversation wore on, her sleep deprivation became clearer and clearer.  Towards the end of the phone call she was tempted to apologize.  After all, who in their right mind likes to hear from their drunken ex-girlfriend on a Tuesday night?  But she held off.  Did she really have anything to apologize for?

"Well, I think I'm going to drink a tall glass of water and then go to bed." she said.

"That sounds like a good idea." he replied.

They both didn't entirely know what to say.  Neither wanted to apologize, neither wanted to say thank you, neither had any idea what would happen after this phone call.

"Well, maybe I'll talk to you later, I guess." she mumbled.

"Yeah, of course." he said.

"And maybe I'll see you when you're in town, or something." she mumbled again.  She didn't entirely mean it.  By this point, she hardly wanted to see him.  It was more by force of habit and politeness than anything.  But his answer surprised her all the same.

"You will."

A small smile brushed across her face for what could've only been a millisecond, but there was no denying it was there.  And she knew that answer was going to haunt her in the weeks to come.

She hung up the phone, stared out the window for a minute, and then fell onto the bed, soaking the white pillow with her mascara diluted tears.

Too Many Questions.

There are times where that wall inside my brain that separates me from you disappears.  I can't explain it.  One minute it's there, and the next I can't breathe, my hands are above my head, and I can't stop crying.  There are times where I see every mistake I made, and the ones I'm still making.  There are times when I all I can do is sit in bed wide-eyed, frightened, wondering just what the hell went wrong.

How could I have been stronger? Why didn't you hold my hand?  Why didn't I follow my instincts?  What were you thinking?  What was I thinking?  What did the people around us think?  Why did I let you become my life?  Will you ever leave me alone?  Why on earth do you still call me at odd hours of the night?  Do you actually miss me?  Did you ever miss me?  Did you ever love me?

Did you ever love me.  Try as I might, that's the question that is asked in between questions.  I don't hear the echoes of the other questions, I hear this played over and over.  This question, this five word seemingly simple inquiry defines my very existence.  Because I have to be completely sure to do anything.  There are no maybe's when it comes to my decision-making.  So when I kiss someone, it's not on instinct or a whim, it's with confidence.  I KNOW what I am feeling.  And I KNOW what might happen.  If I am unsure in any respect, then it is a definite no.

I don't know how you couldn't have known that would destroy me.  I have no idea how you could've done anything unless you had some type of feeling for me.  But why wasn't it enough.  Why wasn't it ever enough.  Why wasn't it enough to make those memories good ones.  Why wasn't I worth it.  What did I do wrong.

It makes me want to throw up, it really does.

And I just keep YELLING at myself.  WHY WON'T YOU LET HIM GO.  WHY CAN'T YOU JUST LET IT DIE.  WHY WON'T YOU STOP SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS.  STOP.  STOP.  STOP.

And then he calls me, drunk and half-high; and the smile returns, the laugh returns, and I'm on autopilot, setting myself up for another disastrous evening in the near future.

Murtaugh

I've found the reason I don't want to write is because I don't want to invest.  I've been wanting to write for a long time, about something, anything, but I don't feel like investing too strongly in any situation.

Recently I've felt like everything I need has eluded my grasp.  God, I hate that sentence.  But it's true.

I can't talk about anything.  I don't feel like talking about anything.  I kind of just want to be a blank slate right now.  Start over.  Reboot.  Maybe I'm just getting too old for this.

Untitled.

I don't even want to write "Dear" to start off this letter.  I don't know why.  Too formal I guess.  Too much like the past.  Then again, even the thought of writing this letter is too much like the past.  But I have been wanting to write a letter for some time.  I don't know why it has taken me so long.  Maybe because I thought if I wrote it, I'd be tempted to send it to you.  I'm still scared of that happening, but I like to think I have enough self-control this time around to refrain from doing that.

Jake, even after all these years I still see you in the face of every boy that I meet.  My own dear friend Zach has been the one to receive all the backlash and aftermath of our relationship, unfortunately.  You're too far away from me now to confront you about anything, so now all my energy has been channeled towards him.  My insecurities and overdramatic tendencies have driven him insane.  And all of them root back to when you and I were...whatever we were.  That drives me crazy.  You don't even know.  Because you made it VERY clear that we weren't a couple, and you made it even clearer that we weren't "best friends", but in my mind we were both.  You were both to me.  My first real connection with a boy and I can't even consider you a boyfriend?  You have no idea how much that kills me.  You have no idea how used that makes me feel.  I still really really want to know what you were thinking when you decided it was ok for us to kiss, to be any closer than we were.  The only things I ever come up with were that you either pitied me or you were just bored and the only other girls around were Nicole (who hated your guts), Claire (who you had nothing in common with), Lucy (who was with Toby), and Roxie (I don't even need to explain this one).  So you chose me.

There is a deeply rooted part of me that believes you had at least some feelings for me, but as more time passes, I begin to believe that less and less.

There is a whole other part of me that wants to forget any of it ever happened, move on, bottle up any emotion I have towards you, and try to be the friend you always wanted me to be, the friend I always wished I could be.

But I see it in everything I do.  I see it in every decision I make, every boy that I meet, every song that I write, and every drink I down.  I see it in sunsets and oceans, in trees and snow, in books and movies.  Your face, your smell, your eyes, your voice, your hair, your hands, they're in everyone else, everything else.

I don't keep giving you chances, no.  I keep giving MYSELF chances.  I keep giving myself the chance to accept you as just a person, just a normal guy who I talk to sometimes on the phone.  But that's not who you are to me at all.

You're Jake.  You're the Swamp Monster, you're the boy who "killed kittens", the boy who called me Blueberry and whose phone conversations led me to having my phone taken away.  You were the reason I started ditching class; the reason I pursued acting at all; the reason I love the Beatles and the Who and Led Zeppelin and the Doors.  You're the boy who held me in his arms and told me I'd be ok when I thought there was nothing left.  You're the boy I bled over, the boy I cried over night after night, the boy I hated with everything I had but loved more than anything at the same time.  You were the reason I began to hate myself, the reason I failed every class senior year, the reason I don't feel ready to do anything in my life.  You're the reason why I need meditation, why I need therapy.  You're the reason why I want to be alone.  Because being alone is so much easier than rejection.  You're the reason my confidence is shot, my love life is non-existent, and why I can't seem to commit to anything.

You are my goddam cocoon.  The thing I crawl back to when I can't handle the idea of something new.  The thing I immerse myself in when everything seems so far from my grasp.  Because you're so familiar.  It's not that I still love you, it's that the familiarity of our past gives me a sense of control.

I can't talk to you anymore.  Not until I stop seeing your reflection in everything.  Not until I am myself again, whatever that may mean.  You can't be any part of this life I create.  You're not necessary, you don't belong.  So, goodbye.

I don't even know.

It took me four years, you know.  Four of the most miserable years of my life, just to put a few inches away from my thoughts.  You were still there, you were always there, but finally after four years, I was able to push you a little bit further away.  I still always thought about you, it was impossible to completely remove you.  But then finally, FINALLY, you were a secondary thought rather than a first priority.

You can't have it both ways.  I can't be the girl you always run to, I can't be that friend you talk to every night on the phone if you're not gonna even make an effort to see me when we're in the same city.  

You Better Wise Up, Janet Weiss.

I don't know what I am doing.  I'm neglecting everything.  I can't seem to break out of the familiar, I keep returning to it.  I auditioned for a play.  I volunteered to work in a theater.  I'm not doing homework, I'm not doing anything.  I keep looking for a way out.

Sometimes I wish I was on drugs.  I feel like my life and my mind would make a lot more sense if I had a drug problem.  Of course, then I would create a whole other issue for myself, but at least with something like that...that shit can be fixed.  It's difficult and it fucks with you, but it can be fixed.  The mess I'm in...can't.  Or it can, but I just don't know how.  I don't know what I need, I don't know what I want, the only thing I can ever think is "Out, out, out, out, out..."  Why do I need to get out so badly?  Why do I always feel like I'm missing out on something else?

My history of bad relationships, or lack thereof, doesn't help either.  I'm a good friend, that's one thing I can be sure of.  So good in fact, that no one will even DARE start a relationship with me, in fear of ruining that wonderful friendship.  In some respects, this is nice.  But every time I am given the "just friends" talk, that hole within my heart just gets bigger and bigger and consumes some aspect of my personality.  And I know, in life all I have is myself, I can only control myself, I can only take care of myself, but fucking shit, it'd be nice if just someone, ANYONE decided I matter to them, too.

I'm unloveable.  And sometimes that's ok.  Sometimes I honestly feel like if someone else was thrown into my life and became just as important as my own well being, I would not be able to handle it and I wouldn't want to handle it.  But there are other times where even a glance means the world, a smile brightens everything, and a touch no matter how gentle or swift is absolutely breathtaking.

I can't tell if it was a good idea to let him back into my life.  I'm not crying about him, as far as I know anyway.  But I can't tell if he's a reminder.  If by staying friends with him and including him in my life, I'm subconsciously reinforcing the idea that I'm unloveable.  He really made me believe I was unworthy of just about anything and everyone.  His presence made me forget about God, forget about faith, forget about my future, my past, my priorities, my friends, my family, my passion...myself.  And I don't know who I am anymore, and I keep running and running and running from city to city, state to state, school to school, interest to interest, just trying to figure it all out, just trying to find even a trace of the person I was before I met him.  I feel so numb and so vulnerable all at the same time.  Sometimes I look over the side of balconies and wonder if the fall would kill me.  Sometimes I wish I would go to sleep and not wake up.  And that's so selfish, I know!  Because there are several people out there with far worse problems than myself who are praying for LIFE, and here I am condemning it.

It's not his fault.  It's not his fault I'm unhappy, I really have to remember that.  I threw myself in way too deep, and now I need to find my way back to the shallow end.  And it can't happen in one night, and it can't happen in one year, and it can't even happen at one school.

My mind needs to just stop fucking with me and get this shit figured out.

Perfect Situation

It's been a while since I've been here before.  I'm definitely wigging out.  I've been looking at colleges in California for hours now.  It makes me sick to even think about.

I can't tell if I'm freaking out by habit or because I'm actually scared.  Every year around this time, something devastating has happened.  Something where I had to change my life drastically and start over and look into something else.  But here I am in Ventura, just letting the days drop off till Wednesday when I leave for San Francisco, and then Sunday when I leave for Colorado.  It's all so simple this time around.  I'm not in jumbles.  I'm not applying to schools, figuring out classes, or wallowing in self-despair.  There's a plan, there's a course of action, all I have to do is follow it.  Just walk.  That's all I have to do.  I don't even have to run.  I could fucking crawl if I wanted to.  So why am I standing still?

I thought by week 2 I'd be aching to go back to Colorado.  I thought I would be counting down the days.

...Wait, what am I saying?  I have to do this.  This is what people do.  This is what Erin and Alex and Kait and all of my friends have done for the past 3 years.  They leave school, they come home, and then leave for school again.  That's how it is.  And I'm freaking out cuz I'm finally apart of that?  Life is suddenly easy for me, and I'm complaining?

Good lord, Aly Bennett.  Get over yourself.