I’d put three relationships that I’ve had over the years in the “important” category. There was the end of high school girlfriend, the college/live in girlfriend, and the one before the project. All of them were intense, messy, and brutal. I’d never gotten closure on any of them really. The two most long-standing exes went far, far away after the breakup, and we don’t even talk anymore.
When I found out Kate was going to be in the state, I was anxious to try and see her. I felt bad about how it ended. I said a lot of horrible things I didn’t even mean, and some even more horrible things that I did. It took more than a little to get her to agree to a cup of coffee…and even then it was like pulling teeth to try and maintain a somewhat normal conversation. It was obvious from the get go that she didn’t want to be remotely near me, and the fact of the matter was she’d spent more time looking at her tea than me. Eventually, I hit a wall with trying and told her I’d be right back. I walked out and started to smoke in plain view. Of course, she came out, and started giving me crap about it…to the point of literally taking it out of my mouth and flicking it away.
Dirty habit
Expensive habit, I fired back.
And then she gave me the look that I was, even after eight years, so painfully familiar with. Nobody could quite convey an overall sense of disappointment with a small subtle look like Kate did. She just said four words that really cut to the chase of it.
Where are you going?
Nowhere. Then a beat before I continued with my own four. Want to join me?
And I swear to God she cracked a smile. But her heart didn’t grow, and I didn’t get my Hallmark moment. She just walked away. And you can say what you want about a lack of closure, but I suppose seeing somebody walk away and just not having the words for you, says a whole lot more than any long list of disappointments.
No comments:
Post a Comment