Love Story

This is a love story, doomed and perverse as it may be. This isn’t the type of love story you are used to. This isn’t about roses, cupid and all that good stuff. I guess this will have to serve as a wake-up call. Those things do not exis., Llife is never like that. If it were this story would be a tale of fiction instead of the story of my life. If you are already turned off to this story I suggest you stop reading. Like I said, life is never perfect and there isn’t always a happy ending. At least not in the stereotypical sense of the word. Love is not always a beautiful thing… and the guy doesn’t always get the girl.

The first time I saw her I didn’t think much of it, contrary to the popular myths about love at first sight. I believe in love at first sight, it simply hasn’t happened to me. It was a chemistry class (no, the irony does not escape me) and I had come in early with a few other people in the class. I actually thought it quite odd that the type of people who were there really didn’t fit my view of people who should have been there. It was mostly the sporty and athletic people. Don’t get me wrong, the world needs sporty and athletic people. I enjoy watching a basketball or football game as much as the next person. I just do not think those type would be interested in or know about chemistry. I sat in the second seat in the second row on the opposite side of the room as the jocks. Isolated sure, but it was very metaphorically accurate with how I felt. I still feel that way sometimes.

I sat in my chair, slouched down, leaned back, and crossed my arms over my chest. I’m sure I had a mean or pissed off look. Perhaps that is why person after person who entered the room sat further and further away from me. Maybe it was the fact that I was not as popular as the sporty and athletic people. It could have been the fact that I didn’t want them to sit by me and they knew it. Whatever the reason and whatever my facade, the outcome was still the same.
Then she came in.

She sat in the second chair in the first row, directly to my left. I looked at her, not because I was instantly struck by her beauty or charm, but because I was extremely distraught by someone sitting next to me when there were empty chairs nearer the more popular segment. She noticed me looking at her right in the middle of sitting down. She looked at me out of the corner of her eye and sat down slowly, wondering if I was staring at her because she had done something wrong. When she had completely sat down, she looked at me and said something. I blinked as I realized that I was staring at her and asked her what she had said.

“I said hello.”

I said, “Oh, I’m sorry. I spaced out for a minute,” and I looked back at the front of the room.

“How are you doing?” she asked

Now normally I have a list of set answers from which I pick an appropriate response. “I’m fine,” “It’s been a long day,” “Oh, I’ve seen better days.” Any of those are possible answers that I have conditioned myself to give basically at random. The question “how are you doing” is not a question to me. It’s more of like an ice breaker. I guess the only way to explain how I see this is when you say, “how are you doing,” “how do you feel,” or “how has your day been,” you have to ask yourself if you really want to know. If you expect the person you questioned to come up with an answer like those I listed, or if you really want them to tell you. If you say that you want to know the real answer, you are one of two things. Not being honest with yourself or you’re a very special person. It is the people who want a prefabricated answer who I believe more often. It is for those people that I have created my list of set answers.

I had a conditioned answer halfway to my lips as I looked over at her, as I looked into her brown eyes, her brown hair that framed her silky pale face. It was what I saw her in eyes, her face, that made me stop in mid-sentence. It was something that I had never seen before in anyone, or at least I had never allowed myself to see it. She wanted the answer. Not a prefabricated one and not one that I told everyone else. She wanted the real answer. The truth.

I didn’t know what to say. I wanted to tell her. Oh how I dearly wanted to tell her it truth. I wanted to say to her how all day I had felt more alone, more different, and more horribly depressed than I had felt in a very long while. I wanted to tell her all that ailed me, right down to the littlest thing. Most of all, I wanted to tell her how I could not stop looking into her eyes. It tore me up inside not to.

“I’ve had better days,” was apparently what came out.

She giggled softly. I really don’t know why she did. I guess it could have been the look on my face. I must have looked totally lost. It wasn’t that I was tongue-tied with love. I was merely overwhelmed by a trait that I had never been presented with. The trait of absolute innocence. The trait of wanting the truth and not knowing the opposite.

Love is exaggerated by poets and writers alike, to the point that it’s almost a cliché. There are few people who really know what love means, or at least agree on the same definition as myself. Maybe I don’t know what love is. There are so many different levels of love it makes it hard for one to use it in a sentence. I think that love is the difference between Heaven and Hell and the combination of infinity and 0. It’s that defining feature of humans, that which makes them human, yet at the same time it is what brings out their animal instincts. It is fury and calm, death and life, fire and ice. It’s a game of truth or dare with a referee. It is that which can make us whole and tear us to pieces in one stroke. The beauty of flight with the point of an arrow. Yet with all this definition and understanding, the vagueness is still present. Perhaps that is why no one knows what love is unless they have been truly in love.

There were other encounters and times that I lied in such a way. I got tongue-tied often. She had that effect on me, because it never ceased to amaze me how she seemed that she wanted to know the answer. One time I told her.

Once we had to work in groups on review questions at the end of our chapter. Usually it was just a homework assignment. The sporty and athletic people and those who flocked around them composed the largest group, leaving about seven of us to decide for ourselves what to do. I had no intentions of working with them. It would have been against my morals and better judgment. I knew that they would get the most points because the teacher was, shall we say, a fan.

Oddly enough she was not with the majority of the other kids. I do not say this to demean her in any way, but in my eyes she was at least as good or popular as anyone over there. Regardless, she stayed in her seat, directly to the left of me. I was disturbed that I was not included in their group. It was not that I wanted to be in their group, but it was merely the reinforcing an idea I had stuck in my head that I was different from everyone else. They knew it and I knew it. I think she knew it as well.

“So,” she said to me, “are we going to work together?”

I looked at her after she said the first word. It must have been much the same look I gave her that first day. Like a frightened deer stuck in the headlights of beauty. I was inclined to ask her what she had said so that I had time to decide what my position was going to be.
“Yeah,” I said hesitantly, “we can do that.”

We scooted our desks together and compared answers that we already had. I had my left arm across my desk, close to my body. It was a defense mechanism for hiding a gut that was or was not there. I was, and still am, too conscientious about such things. She saw my arm and the three scars. Two on my forearm and one on my hand. Big white slashes in a slightly brown skin.

“How’d you get those scars?”

I must have closed my eyes in shame. I knew how I got them. I also knew that I had not told a living soul the truth and I probably never would. My mind raced frantically to come up with a way to tell her. Over and over I must have told myself that she didn’t want to know. She didn’t care. She was just making conversation. I was also telling myself that I could not tell her another one of my prefabricated lists. I ran my fingers over the white lines on my arm as if doing that would help me forget why I did what I did.

I turned my head very slowly and raised my eyes to hers. I, to this day, do not know if she saw the hurt in my eyes. The inner conflict that was being waged in my head. I saw in her eyes the same thing I saw on that very first day. I lowered my head back to where it was and said very softly, “It’s a long story.”

As I remember, I was saved because class was over anyway. The rest of that day is a blur to me. I remember things before that moment and things after, but not with the exact clarity that I still hold. The disgrace I felt for not telling her still burns inside of me to this day.

That night I laid in my bed and stared at the ceiling for longer than I’d care to admit. I debated things in my head. Judgments. Decisions. Feelings. Emotions. I think it was at that moment that I knew she meant something more than any other girl ever had. Presented or imagined, real or acted, I think she cared. I hoped she cared. At the same time I didn’t want her to care, because people who care can hurt you or be hurt with no more than a thought. Words start taking on double meanings, lives and schedules change. Drastic or minuscule, things happen. Things are expected. Things are wished for. Things are dreamed.

It’s a very odd thing, getting close to someone. In as little as an hour you start to see things that you admired before more prominently showed. Things you didn’t notice are now in a clearer light. It’s like the box inside a box puzzle. You start off with a very large and very noticeable box, but as you start peeling away layers you start to see things that were there before but you hadn’t noticed. Levels are shown that you never thought, dreamed or dreaded possible. And when you see the good and the bad all at once, it can be overpowering.

As I laid there tossing ideas around in my head and telling myself things, my eyes started to burn. I did not cry but my heart wept. It needed to weep. I needed to weep. Things that were long forgotten and covered with dust and cobwebs were now back out in the open. It was much the same way I imagine flashbacks are for veterans of wars long forgotten. Things that are not put under a big enough door and not covered by a complex enough lock are shown to the owner.

I had visions of a life I did not instantly recognize as my own. Things that had been put away for my own sanity were now brought back to life with vivid clarity and precise attention to detail. I was unaccustomed to that from memories of my past. Shadowy figures that were masked from my consciousness now had faces and tongues. I brought it on myself by my own choice just as I had put them away… and they hurt.

Before I went to bed that night I wrote my thoughts and feelings down. They didn’t rhyme nor did they have a very good meter, yet some still call it a poem. It was the only way I had to deal with what was going on in my head. I wouldn’t call myself shy, but I didn’t like to talk to people. I still don’t. It’s easier for me to listen to people. I learn more about them, and who and what they really are. I knew that if I were to tell her anything it would have to be written. It actually worked out quite nicely for me in that respect. I created stories, poems, mazes and drawings like that anyway. Anything that made me feel better or passed time quicker. She used to read them. She went as far as stealing my red-covered notebook to see if there was anything new scribbled in it.

I slept poorly that night.

One of the worst decisions I’ve ever made was made that following week. It’s more deviant and dastardly than I’ve ever been in my life. I made the worst mistake I could have made.

I told her the truth.

I told everything in pretty good detail. How I got the scars. Why I was melancholy. I didn’t leave much out.

I cannot go into detail. Actually that’s inaccurate, I won’t go into detail. It hurts too much thinking about it and I’m still too ashamed to admit it. What I will tell you is the look on her face was more than I could stand. I can still see it plain as day. It was like she had seen a ghost… or a person kill themselves.

There was not much contact after that. The occasional exchange of hello’s in passing. A glance at each other at lunch or other gatherings. Everything was different and it was my fault.
I actually forgot about her for a while. It was as if I had moved to a different town and left her behind. I don’t know if I purposefully or subconsciously avoided her, but it happened just the same. The shame that I felt was almost equal to the shame I felt constantly anyway, the shame I still feel now. I still had her in the back of my mind at times. I would reminisce about the times I made her laugh. How we worked off each other to make a boring class end all the more timely.

I didn’t expect to see her again. To tell the truth, I didn’t even remember her until I was reminded. I walked into my college credited English class and quickly surveyed it. I saw much the same type of class I saw in my old Chemistry days. This time it was not so much the sporty and athletic people, but the true preps of the school. People irritating beyond belief. I sat at the table nearest the door and expected to be alone again.

By my senior year it was like the people I didn’t like and I had an understanding. They sat away from me not because I was uncool, but because they knew I did not want to sit with them. It was a nice relationship we had built up and I was not about to cross the lines.

I was in the middle of unpacking my things when she walked into the room. It struck me as odd that she didn’t make eye contact with anyone until she got to the back where she would sit with a friend, “the talker”. I would imagine it was much the same way I walked into the room. Scanning the occupants with an unmoving eye. Summing up their potential between steps.
Time went on. Class continued unabated by my own worries and inhibitions about myself and how I was feeling. I let it move on. I did not say much to or for the class. I had learned earlier from that teacher that my kind of opinion was not always appreciated, so I sat, alone. Alone with my thoughts. Alone with my needs.

It was about two months into the class that I realized what I had already known, but could not allow myself to understand.

As I sat, alone, watching the class proceed, I scanned the room. Some paying attention. one was asleep. Some in their own world and one who was doing much the same as I was. I saw that she was looking at the teacher, but I knew that she was not paying attention. Many people you can just look at and know that they are physically there but are not mentally. Mentally they are off in their own world, solving their own problems, putting an order to things that they had been told throughout the day. It was at that moment, looking into her eyes, that I realized how I had felt.

I could not allow myself to know for several reasons. The first of which, and the most important, was that I did not think enough of myself to imagine that someone else would take any interest in me. It simply would not have entered my mind. I could not find something in myself that I liked so I could not imagine anyone else finding something there either. You cannot get water if the well is dried up.

The second reason is very easy to explain but hard to understand. Everyone has something that they excel at. No matter how bad you think you are or how pathetic you may feel, there is something that you can do better than some of the rest of the world. Her attribute was acting. She was very good at it. So good in fact that I had my doubts if she was really the person she presented to the world. When does an actor stop acting if the performance of their life is their life?

Nothing really happened. Class still proceeded. Eventually my sitting arrangements were changed so that someone sat with me. Sometimes it was the person I wanted to sit with and sometimes not. Days went by. Weeks. Months. All the while I was wondering if I should tell her… and how. My chance came.

Later in the year we had a field trip to a local college. There was only one reason I wanted to go. We had to leave fairly early in the morning. Everyone brought along their pillows and blankets. I brought only my school bag and a CD player. I knew that I would never actually fall asleep on the bus, but I knew that I also needed something to keep my mind on. I am one of the lucky people who is afflicted with motion sickness. It’s one of the more embarrassing diseases, especially during class field trips and family outings. I knew that if I kept my mind on the music and did not think about the road or movement that I would be fine. It worked out quite nicely because no one sat with me or near enough to talk to me since we had used the large bus and there were more seats than people.

My mind was racing with thoughts of what the day may hold. I had an aching feeling in my stomach. I thought that if any day would be the day that I would be able to tell her how I felt, it would have to be this one. That scared me. Possibly scaring me more than I had ever been scared in my life. It was a very big step for me. If I had a psychiatrist they might have explained to me that I was going for what I wanted. Leaving myself vulnerable for very severe hurt, which, for some reason, is a very good thing when it comes to psychiatrists. Probably why I didn’t have one.

Upon reaching our destination everyone filed off the bus and went to where they hoped information may be hiding. I searched for about 15 minutes finding out that every book I wanted was out. I ended up looking for information for another class. After copying about five pages out of old smelling books I was too depressed to continue. I cannot really explain why I was depressed. I think it was the fact that I was alone. I’ve said before that I liked being alone, but there are times when a person needs another for comfort. Everyone I knew had their own clique within the class but me. That made me feel all the more alone and different. I went downstairs and sat in a very comfortable chair that was bathed in the afternoon sun and began to read a book. [u]Catch 22[/u] as I remember.

I was there probably an hour, sitting and waiting. Waiting for what I was not sure but I feared and hoped that it involved her. At that moment in time, I did not want to see her. Or rather, I did not want her to see me. I probably looked pretty pathetic, sitting in the sun and sweating. Reading a book and being alone. Trying to look relaxed and comfortable, but obviously in inner pain. It was actually a blessing that someone else from the class came over and sat by me. The talker wanted to talk (like always) and wanted someone to listen (which usually ended up being me). The talker had said that she was waiting to go out to eat with some people. This did not help me any because I had forgotten that I was supposed to go out and eat and realized that I would be doing that alone as well. The talker then asked if I would like to join them. Seeing as how it was the people who usually sat with me in class anyway. Knowing that the alternative would not come out to a good end, I accepted. I turned out accepting to go out to lunch with about five people. That included her.

We had lunch. I made jokes and embarrassed myself more than I have ever been embarrassed in my life. Normally that would have put me into a very bad downward spiral, but it really did not matter much because she was there. After lunch we all went out shopping. It really was not shopping because none of us had any money. It was still something we all did together. It was also a pivotal moment in my life.

In the store we broke apart. For reasons that I still do not understand it ended up that it was myself and her. I made no movement or gesture to say that I wanted it to be that way, but it ended up that way. I actually stood there, sweating, and my mind was ripping itself in half. What was I going to say? What was I going to do? If I did what I knew I should, how would it effect the rest of the day? I ended up not saying anything for the longest time. Simply standing there looking at programs that I was interested in, but I could not tell you what they were because my mind was using up so much power that it did not allow me to comprehend what I was looking at. She stepped over closer to me.

“Are you going to buy that,” she asked.

“Buy it? I barely have enough money to look at it,” I responded. One of my very few moments of brilliance.

Another awkward silence. The others from our group had gone to the other side of the store while I was frozen in my spot. I knew what I should have done. I knew what my heart wanted me to do. I knew what my soul wanted me to do, but my brain kept me from doing it. I couldn’t even look at her.

I can blame the fact that I didn’t do what I set out to do because I was afraid it would hurt a possibly nonexistent or fake friendship, or tell you that I was afraid it would make the rest of the day more awkward, but the truth is that I was afraid. I could not do it. If I were in the same position now I still could not do it. I said before that everyone has something that they can do better than someone else. Mine is not speaking my mind or heart to someone.
The day went on. I agonized over not telling her. I knew that was my one shot and I had dropped the ball. The group spent the rest of the day just sitting in the grass in the courtyard and talking. I took out my hackey sack and began to just roll it around in my hands. A typical thing for me to do when I’m stressed. It’s like my cheap substitute for those metal stress balls. One person in the group said that I should play hackey sack and that she should join me. I think it was so that they could laugh at us. I saw it as an opportunity to do what I wanted to do, but did not have to initiate the game. So we did.

I remember that day went faster than I had hoped. We had a lot of fun doing absolutely nothing, but we did nothing together and that made all the difference. Getting on the bus was a very bad ending to a very bad day. I like to remember it as one of the happiest days of my life, but it was also one of the most disappointing.

It’s ironic how the brain works. Our memory is a fragile thing. We can lose it by injury or psychological damage. I have lost about half of my life through the latter, but I can remember that day like it was yesterday. I can remember the sensations I felt. The worry that was in my gut. The excitement and joy when I was with her. Also the depression, loneliness, embarrassment, and heart ache that accompanied it. That is actually part of the reason I skip years or months. Time actually has a very deranged meaning for me. It’s hard going through life when you cannot remember half of it. You cannot remember who your third grade teacher was, but you can remember in perfect clarity insignificant moments.

Time passed again. Things happened. Senior pictures were exchanged. Life remained a constant. The only notable time was when I saw her being out of character. She was mad and didn’t want to have anything to do with anyone. I had never seen her like that, but it actually made her more human to me. She was more real when I saw her like that. I knew that no one could be happy all the time. I had a nagging feeling that she was more like me than either of us would care to admit.

I wish that I had kept a copy of what I wrote to her on the back of my picture. I have hers. It’s in my wallet right now. It was actually the reason I bought a new wallet. My first wallet had the plastic picture holder taken out and I could not find one. I take the picture out sometimes and just look at her. It’s nothing perverse or anything like that. But I feel that it is very symbolic of how I think she lives her life. When someone points a camera at you, you are supposed to smile. It is a common thing – like my list of answers to “how are you” – and when I look at her, look into her eyes, I know she is not smiling.

The writing on the back of that picture and the meaning it holds has been debated for some time. It didn’t have any of the prefabricated senior picture quotes like “x class was fun” or “good luck with your future,” or if it did they were very good responses. I never really knew what she meant or how she wanted me to take what she knew I would read. We traded pictures before the field trip. It told me to look for tickets to Broadway in about ten years because she would want me there. I would not want to go. I don’t think I would have to go see her act when I was pretty sure I saw her acting all the time.

I do have a theory about acting. I think that someone cannot act something that they have not experienced before. At least they could not do it well. I think that acting is merely what poets and writers do to the truth. The truth is still there, but it is exaggerated to the point of being ridiculous sometimes. I took heart in believing this, because it told me that even if she was acting, the intention was still there.

The tickets did come in the mail. I did go to see her. She was very good. She stole the show in fact. Acting out a whole gamut of emotions for thousands of adoring on-lookers. It was quite a site to see.

I had hoped to leave without her seeing me. After watching the audience give a standing ovation I deftly made my way to my car in the parking lot. Just as I was about to unlock my car, I heard clicking behind me like someone running towards me in heels. I turned to see her, still in costume, coming towards me very quickly. I was afraid that she would turn her ankle in a pothole or something, so I walked towards her with keys in hand. She had a smile on her face. We stopped about two feet away from each other like each of us had run into a wall. Her smile disappeared slowly and she grew very serious.

“What did you think?”

“I…” was all I was able to sputter out before I stopped myself. The truth? The truth was that she was truly stunning. She captivated the audience with her portrayal. But the truth also was that it hurt me to go see her. It hurt to bring back all the memories that I had long pushed behind me. That I had pushed into my wallet. My mind jumped from the answer that was the truth to a prefabricated answer. I looked at my keys for a moment. When I raised my head back up to hers I saw the same thing that I had seen time and time again. She wanted to know. She wanted me to tell her the truth. The question was if I was strong enough to do it. Two times before my soul had failed me. I didn’t have the power to do it. Once I did tell her and had felt horrible since. Once I had lost my only chance at giving myself what I wanted.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, opening my eyes as I released the air. I rubbed my hands on my tuxedo. Partly to straighten it up and partly to wipe the perspiration off of them. I straightened my back and stood with perfect posture. I must have looked like I was about to salute her. She looked expectantly at me.

“You were great.”