Let There Be Light

I came home last night to an im from the BND alerting me that he'd finally gotten around to responding to my email. This cheered me up a bit, as I'd been experiencing quite a bit of loneliness. I scanned the email quickly at first and then went over it again more carefully. And hold on a minute, what's that line....

"I miss things about the floor too, and things that i wouldn't have even expected to as much and i feel like i might have missed something i should have pusued and it would have been so easy to do so (and no, you do not know anything that i am refferring to there). "

1. I can't even imagine that he could think I wouldn't take it that way.
2. Boy knows I'm an English major. Proofreading would be nice.

I replied with a, "wtf, mate?" and got:

"And when I wrote that I was just thinking and writing and then once it was written I realized it may have been misleading so I cleared it up a little, but bot enough that you would know what I was talking about."

So here are the options I'm thinking of:

1. This was an admission gone awry and the parenthetical part was an attempt at sarcasm. (not very likely)
2. He was simply trying to get a reaction out of me. Jerk. (perhaps a bit more likely?)
3. He really was just being careless and insensitive. (most likely)

If option 3 really is the truth, that leaves me wondering just to what exactly he was referring. I have racked my brains and really do not know. It's probably some sort of robotics shit or some such.

I hated myself for the little jolt of golden hope that coursed through my veins upon reading those words in the first email. I am supposed to be getting over this, right? And the BND, knowing this, would be careless enough to say something like that? He had to have known how that would affect me. It's just cruel, really.

While I was reading that first email last night, the bulb popped out suddenly in the only lamp that was lit. I was plunged into semi-darkness, with only the glow from my inbox. I sighed, got up and took the bulb out and navigated my way through the dark to the kitchen. I flicked on the kitchen switch and looked at the bulb curiously. It looked unfamiliar, a different brand than I buy. And then I remembered. He gave me this bulb at school the last time I was plunged into sudden darkness.

Then, today, I was at the store when his favorite song came on over the radio.

Can you really get over something that didn't ever amount to anything?

That was then, this is now

Being at home (and unemployed) has left me with copious amounts of time to think. This is dangerous. It's a good thing I start work in June or else I'd probably be institutionalized come August.
So, during all this thinking, I started to reflect upon how I've changed over the past year. The old me was less neurotic, less jealous and paranoid, more focused and self-assured. The old me most certainly would not have Facebook-stalked my way through an entire relationship of wall posts. I am pathetic.
I don't know why I did it, the Facebook-stalking, I mean. I knew it would make me unhappy. Unhappy to see that they were happy. How utterly terrible is that?

I feel as if I was robbed of the happy part. The BND and I went straight from friends to the awkward "i like you" stage to bickering break-up without any of the good stuff in between. I want the "I-can't-wait-to-see-you-hey-I-miss-you-call-me-later" stage. I want the part where I wake up with a smile on my face. I want to know that someone is as happy to be with me as I am with them.

And all this, I think, has been the hardest part. Her lingering traces and evidence of his past affection serve to twist the knife. My inadequacies taunt me from the corners. Why isn't everything that I see enough? Have I imagined the emotional and intellectual connection that I thought I felt? The ties that bound us together turned out to be made of gossamer thread: hard to see and even harder to hold onto.

He told me once that with me he felt a new hesitation, one he didn't feel before he dated either of his exes. I should have known then that it wasn't going to happen.

I wish I hadn't stuck around to become the one who didn't measure up.

And that's the thing. The old me would not have cared about that. The old me would've said fuck that. I don't care how I measure... up or otherwise.

New me needs a life beyond the hypothetical and the wishes and the could have beens. I'll put that on the list of things I'm not going to accomplish this summer.


(P to the S, resolution: no more complaining about the same old stupid boy things. I will find new subjects to write about. Well, we'll see how long this lasts...)

Home Again

I'm back home sitting on my tiny twin bed, facing my "artwork" from 8th grade and my stuffed animals in the corner. Mom and Dad are sleeping across the hall and I have to get up for church in the morning. It's weird.



The last week of school proved itself to be emotional. I was sick and stressed. I would wake up nauseous about the fact that I was on track to fail my math class (which I did). I was in an unpleasant haze, chock full of denial. Denial about my grades, denial about leaving my friends, and the biggest denial of all: the fact that I was leaving the BND.

I'm not sure what kind of conclusion we came to when all was said and done.

"I just hate to think that I had false hope all along," I told him.

"Well, I had real hope," he said.

"It's just... we are half a step away from a relationship!" I said, "Are you really that disinterested? Are you disinterested in what we have now?"

"No, no I am not," he replied, "Ok, let me put it this way. While the majority of me wants this, there's still a part of me that isn't ready for this. And if I'm not whole heartedly in this, it's not really anything, is it?"

It sucks to be the one who is whole heartedly in it. I mean, I've read Jane Austen and everything, but I had no idea how much unrequited love bites. At least there aren't any corsets involved.

The part of the last week of school that I hated most was the night the BND left. I kept him company through most of the afternoon while he packed and cleaned. When his mom arrived, he told me he'd come back and say bye before he left. By the time he got around to leaving, everyone was out on the balcony, crowded around his door, and there was really no un-awkward way for the two of us to say a proper goodbye. He knew it, I knew it. He said goodbye to everyone. He looked right at me as I tried not to break down.

I went into Katrina's room and heard everyone shout goodbye from the balcony. That's when I started to sob.

But, even in the absence of a satisfying conclusion, life went on. I packed up, said goodbye to all that, and came home.

So here I am, sitting in my tiny twin at home, left with a handful of credits and a broken heart. It doesn't even seem like everything that happened with the BND was real. It seems faraway, in a different plane of existence, lived by some alter-ego Laurel who could stay out until 2:30 in the morning and not be relentlessly questioned by her mother the subsequent afternoon.

School is like the crazy LOST island, where time moves differently.

We've got to go back, Kate.