Things with the boy progressed pretty quickly in the beginning. Any rational person would say they progressed too quickly. In looking back on my old texts for reference, I’m realizing that there wasn’t a day after that first night spent together when we didn’t talk. Typical flirtations back and forth throughout the work day, and spending the evenings together more often than not during those early weeks.
We spent a lot of time just the two of us, and did a lot of talking. Mostly about his marriage. About how they had met, the details surrounding their wedding, and the events leading up to the end. I didn’t mind that she was so often a topic of our conversations – in fact, I encouraged it. I got the impression that he hadn’t been able to be quite so open about what he was feeling in regards to the demise of his relationship when discussing it with his guy friends. Guys just don’t tend to process things that way. But if the boy and I have one thing in common, it’s our need to examine the situations in life from every angle. To contemplate and over-think and reprocess the information again and again until it makes sense. As much of an over-sharer as I am in my quest to do that – I can say that the boy is pretty much on my level completely. In fact, I would even argue that he is more of an over-thinker and over-sharer than I am. And not just about this, but about everything.
I don’t want to give the impression that we never talked about me or my “stuff”, because that’s not true. We definitely had conversations about me and what was going on in my life. It was just that what was going on with him seemed so much more prominent – so much more there in our faces. There were plenty of nights when he and I analyzed the facts together, in his infinite quest to “get” what she had done to him.
In those early weeks, we got in the habit of spending multiple nights together in a row.
I think it was partially because he didn’t like being alone, and even more because he didn’t like being in his house. I found out after the fact that for weeks after she had left, he stayed with friends for this very reason. In some ways, I started to worry that I was simply a more acceptable substitution for his need to be away from the home he had shared with her.
But… we were having fun. Always talking, regularly laughing; just getting to know each other. It was good. And as unsure as I was of where he was – I was sure of us. Of how he felt about me, and of the future we could have together. For as many times in my past as I have formulated lists in my head of the undesirable qualities the man in my life possessed, with the boy – I couldn’t come up with one. Nothing about him that stuck out to me as something I wouldn’t want in a future partner. He was loyal, and funny, and intelligent. He was a good man. And I was pretty sure that as much as it scared him – he felt exactly for me what I felt for him.
There were times I would catch him looking at me, almost like he was trying to figure it all out. Wondering how he could be having as much fun with me when just weeks before he had been so miserable. Sometimes I think he felt guilty because of it. Or like it in some way diminished what she had done to him if he was able to move on so easily – like maybe he hadn’t really loved her as much as he thought he had. And I know he struggled with those conflicted feelings. With knowing he had loved her, and she had broken his heart, but he was also feeling something for me as well.
I didn’t personally think any of it needed to be as complicated as he sometimes tried to make it. I didn’t believe it was as cut and dry as he was trying to reconcile it in his head. I just… I didn’t think his feelings for me had anything to do with her. They were two separate subjects as far as I was concerned. Which is probably why I never got particularly jealous when she came up either. She was something he had to work through, and I understood that. I just figured that in the end, when he was past what she had done to him, I would still be there. We would still have something great.
We were about 3 weeks in before he first expressed a possible desire to put the brakes on. I’m not sure entirely what the trigger was, or if there even was a trigger. In some ways, I think he had entered into a relationship with me assuming that at some point something would happen causing it to simply be over. I think he had prepared himself for that – a nice distraction that would inevitably fizzle out on its own. But as he got to know me better and became more and more invested in having me in his life – I think that fear started to creep in.
Up to that point, I would say we had been fairly inseparable. If we were both in town – we were together. With only a few exceptions. This night had been one of those exceptions, and I remember it being one of the first nights when he hadn’t called me immediately after work. As much as I wanted to call him though, I took a deep breath and made myself wait to hear from him. That had been one of my rules for myself from the beginning – I would not pursue him. I would not push. I would not make demands upon this relationship without first being sure he was ready to meet them.
I had known from the start that I would let him guide us wherever it was we were going as he felt comfortable. But still, when I hadn’t heard from him by 10 I started to get anxious. We had texted that day – joking about a drug test he had been too dehydrated to take. I guess you had to be there, but it had been hysterical to picture him sitting at the clinic for a mandatory drug test through his company (a requirement for all employees), unable to go – likely causing everyone there to wonder if he was primed to fail (which he wasn’t). He had called me when he was finally leaving the clinic, regaling me with all the details about that happy little experience.
So maybe I shouldn’t have been worried, but… I had grown used to those post work phone calls. Used to him taking any excuse he could come up with to spend the night at my place. When I didn’t hear from him… it was weird.
Around 10:45 though, I got a text. Just asking if I was awake. When I responded that I was, he said he was going to call me. And as soon as I heard his voice, I knew he was having a rough night.
At first he was just talking about his day. Small talk that didn’t really amount to much of anything.
Then (kind of out of nowhere - like he was building up to it all along), he said that he wanted us to take things a little slower, and that he was just "really screwed up right now". He was actually incredibly sweet about it (listing all the things he liked about me, and saying over and over again how much he enjoyed spending time with me, and how much happier he’d been since I had come into his life), but he just kept saying how screwed up he was right now and that he wasn't ready to be in a relationship – even though in reality, we had never really clarified what we were. And even though at least on my end, there had never been any pressure. The time we spent together, and the conversations we had – it had all been initiated from him. So we had never been anything more than he himself had pushed for us to be.
He said he’d been thinking a lot about "us" though, and he was worried about hurting me. He told me that I had quickly become one of his closest friends, but he was completely unsure of wherever else this was going.
It wasn’t a bad conversation at all, and even though I maybe should have – I felt no dread going into it. In fact, I was pretty calm and rational as we spoke. I told him what I had already decided – that I was going to let him lead this as he saw fit. That I wouldn’t be pushing or enforcing my own agenda at all. That I liked him, but more than anything – I cared about him. And if he couldn’t do this, that would be fine. We could step back and just be friends. I would be happy with us just being friends. But I told him if he did want more – we could take it one day at a time. That I wasn’t looking for a big commitment on his part at this point, and as long as he continued to be honest with me – we would be fine. We would just figure it out as we went along.
It was at that point that I told him that in my gut I knew that no matter what, we would be friends. Because I trusted him to be careful with me and my feelings. I trusted him to move forward with honesty, and to put the brakes on things when and if he realized there was no hope for anything more for us. I told him that if it came down to it, I believed that we were meant to at the very least be friends, and that I could adjust to whatever it was he thought he wanted or needed from there.
Hearing all that seemed to calm him. He assured me that he didn’t want us to be just friends, but that he wasn’t sure what it was he was capable of right now. Talking it out helped him to take a deep breath and stop worrying about what it was or wasn’t going to become though. By the time we got off the phone, we were making plans for a bonfire with his friends in just a few days – when I would be returning from a work trip I was leaving for the next morning.
So a few days went by without us seeing each other or talking (as I was located remotely and didn't have access to a phone). The timing was actually kind of perfect. An enforced breather, right when it seemed like he needed it the most. But when I returned, things were good. We drank and hung out by the fire with his friends, and cuddled up next to each other that night. Laughing and talking and catching up after our few days of separation.
The following morning we decided to go on a mini-camping trip with his best friend (the one I had originally been meant to be set up with) and his new girlfriend. It was going to be one of the first really couple-y things we had done. A night out in the woods with another couple – no denying at that point that we had become something to each other.
It would end up being the first such outing where he would have me by his side instead of her.
That fact had not been lost on me.
For the most part though, things went well. The guys set up the tents, and the new girlfriend and I got to know each other by the fire. When they were out of earshot, she told me how much the boy had talked about me - how clear it was that he really liked me. Before my plane had gotten in the night before, he had apparently been filling everyone at his house in. He had told them about how there for him I had been, and how funny I was, and how much he loved talking to me. And then he had said that I was really pretty - in a way that was totally different from anyone else he had ever met.
Which kind of made me melt.
We had hiked down a steep little trail to the creek, which was still not quite yet thawed. It was chilly, and it being my first real outdoorsy Alaskan adventure (hey – my idea of camping up to that point involved cabins and running water!), I was ill prepared.
And freezing.
My shoes were soaked (one of those outings where I should have opted for boots), and I didn’t bring nearly enough layers. But rather than be annoyed with me, the boy simply laughed and piled me on with all the extra layers he himself had packed. By night though, we were both freezing. Anxious to get into our tent and huddled into our sleeping bags.
I had harbored all sorts of romantic ideas of what our night out under the stars would entail, but in the end – we were both so cold we immediately crawled into our separate sleeping bags and didn’t touch at all.
Initially we were laughing. Joking about some thing or another and struggling to shut ourselves up and go to bed. The two in the other tent were making multiple cracks about our inability to stop talking and joking for even just a few minutes. The entire thing was just too comical. We were both wrapped up as tightly as we could manage, but still… freezing.
Eventually though, we quieted down and I was sure he had drifted off to sleep.
Except he hadn’t. And when I least expected it, he spoke again – saying only that suddenly, he had just gotten really sad.
He said it just like that. "I just got really sad." His voice cracking as he spit the words out - like maybe he was on the verge of tears.
And there was nothing I could do about it. Wrapped as tightly as I was – I couldn’t comfort him. I couldn’t reach out to touch him. And with his friends in a tent right next to ours, I knew he didn’t want to launch into one of our long conversations about what was going through his head.
For the first time since things had began with us, I felt trapped. Helpless. Unable to do anything to soothe his hurt.
And it had come on so quickly. Seemingly out of nowhere, we had gone from laughing and enjoying each other to – whatever it was this was.
I didn’t sleep well that night, and I know he didn't either. When the next morning came around I was stumped to find him still distant. Withdrawn. Barely looking me in the eye at all.
I felt rejected, and I couldn’t figure out why. I just knew that this wasn’t the same boy I had hiked down into this canyon with.
At some point I know I said something. Asking if there was anything I could do, and even expressing my concern that my presence on an outing she normally would have been by his side for had actually made things worse. I was sick to my stomach over it – feeling like he had needed me to live up to this memory he had of her, and had been sorely disappointed to discover that instead it was just me he was stuck in a tent with.
I couldn’t figure it out; how things had shifted so quickly. I just knew I felt responsible. And for the first time like I had been a contributer to his pain, rather than a salve for it.
The hike out was painful - in a million different ways. I still had on the wrong shoes, and my less than stellar athleticism was on display for all to see.
He didn't stop me, or ask me to stay.
I called Loo on the drive. Told her I was sure I had lost him. That my gut said it was over and I wouldn’t hear from him again. It was the first time he had ever been so silent with me. The first time I hadn’t known what he was thinking or what was going through his head. I was sure we were done.
That no matter what I had convinced myself he felt for me, he was over it.
And my brief romance with the boy had come to an abrupt and final end.
Before it had really even been given chance to start.
(to be continued...)
