TBone Reheated

I picked up my phone and stared at it with a bit of incredulity but mostly this feeling of satisfaction and smugness crept in unbidden, delicious but tinged with guilt because a good person wouldn’t be so arrogant. It was TBone.

There I sat, still reeling from Don Juan/Hypocrites and even though it’d been many weeks, I was still pretty torn up.  I had so loved him and thought we could make a beautiful life together and then he was gone like I didn’t matter at all.

TBone on the other hand was asking me to go to dinner with him.  I didn’t answer right away. I didn’t know what to say.  We were more than likely the same two people with the same differences we’d had last time.  I just couldn’t believe he was messaging me. He’d acted like our breakup had been a complete shit storm and I was more than just a little surprised at the contact.

I finally answered and said sure and he seemed really happy. He continued to sporadically text and I answered.  Don Juan had really ripped out my heart and TBone was being nice. Salve as it were. I knew though… way back in that place where you know things.

I went anyway. We had the dinner. He took me to a nice place and I had too many cocktails and he sat across from me staring adoringly.  At one point he said, “You’re so smart and beautiful and NOT crazy. Whatever I was doing that got on your nerves before, I’ll quit doing.”

I smiled at that and told him, “We are still the same people. With the same issues.”

He interrupted me with, “I didn’t have any issues.”

I clamped my lips shut and leaned back in the booth.  I had plenty of them and I wondered since he’d busted my Facebook blog page if he’d actually read the blog and then assumed he must have.   It wasn’t anywhere near complimentary and I felt he must’ve read it by now.

We started the dating. Again.  It was somewhat okay.  At first I was swept up in all the nice, all the feels as it were.  He was still handsome and accommodating and the sex was different.  Like not as bad at first but shockingly quick and he’d developed a habit of yelling out during his crisis in a loud extended way that made me cringe. Every time almost. I found myself frustrated for different reasons than before but still frustrated.  He had eased up on the kitty cat talking but told me he loved me immediately during our first time out.  It was disconcerting but after a while, I fell into it too. It seemed easy. The same shit we did before revisited and again, it was salve.  I didn’t recognize it fully or maybe I just didn’t want to. Don Juan/Hypocrites had just really taken me weeks to feel normal again and this was balm for the wound.  

So it happened that after exchange of love and a few weeks, we decided to go visit my parents, me and TBone and the Girl Child and a camper and his decrepit Bronco.  TBone exhibited nerves at the prospect of meeting my parents and I told him to calm down and relax. They’re regular peeps and they wouldn’t give him a hard time even if they hated him.  Tucker was proof enough of that.

He showed up with the camper and we loaded up.  It wasn’t too bad going up there. He had brought his boys to meet their mother to visit for the 4^th of July.  Most of the visit was okay.  He was trying too hard and I could see that he wasn’t content unless he was sitting still and doing not much and smoking a joint.  I mean, I knew he smoked but it was just so evident that he wasn’t happy at all unless he was high and to hear him tell it, he “never got high”.  Whatever.  So we had a fairly okay time but when we headed home the aforementioned decrepit Bronco started to have some problems.  It was overheating and exhibiting some electrical issues and he proceeded to grab his rosary and rock back and forth as he was driving.  Genuflecting like a lunatic, swinging those beads around with them knocking all over the place.  I am not a believer.  He knows this and I know he’s a Catholic and I accept you have to do what you have to do to get by. Believe what you like and that’s all cool but the display that he put on was discomfiting almost frightening. Even on my most fervent, prayer-filled days, I would not have acted like that in front of anyone for any reason. It bordered on mania that was more than a little unsettling. 

Ironically, though, in between all the reverence to the lord, he was puffing on his one hitter with my kid in the car.  I just looked at him with murder in my eyes and he finally set it down with a look that was disgusted. My daughter was dead silent and bug eyed in the back seat watching everything.

We then drove the 3 ½ almost 4 hours without stopping because he was afraid the truck wouldn’t start back up.  We got home, we piled out stretching and I said, “Wow, thank goodness. I’m dying of thirst.”

Only to be answered by TBone with, “Yeah, well I haven’t had anything to drink since we left your parents’!”

I really couldn’t believe what I’d just heard and all I think was

 Congratulations! You’ve just won the Thirsty Games!!!

But … because I am the person I am and I knew that he was very stressed out even though the worst that could’ve happen was to wait on AAA, I went directly inside and made him a cold drink.  He was sitting on the couch and leaned back as if he’d just gone through complete hell…duuuh-raaahma.

I handed him the drink, and the winner of the Thirsty Games, who had had to go 20 minutes longer than me and the GC without a drink, took it and set it on the coffee table without so much as taking a sip. I stared incredulously as he then said with all the zeal he had in him, “I know you don’t believe it but the Lord got us home.” I felt a snap, an imperceptible hitch in my feelings.  That moment was the beginning of the end.

I thought,  Did the lord also tell you to toke up with my kid in the car so we could make it home?

I turned and grabbed GC and we left to get food. That night, after he’d fallen asleep, I got up and slept on the couch.  I couldn’t bear it.  The GC was on the other side of our sectional and I snoozed until about 9AM and got up and made some coffee. I got back on the couch with my blanky and coffee and snoozed off and on.  About 11:00AM, Tbone got up suddenly as if it were 6AM and he were the motherfucking poster child for early risers and began to bark at us.  I stared blankly while he growled orders, “WE NEED TO GET UP AND GET THIS DONE.” 

I said, “Uh, if you need to go, then go. We’ll figure out how to pick up her car if you’re in a hurry.”

He stopped in his tracks and looked at me. Let the back pedaling and martyrdom commence.

“No, it’s just that I thought we should get this over with and….” I interrupted and repeated myself in a very kind, even tone and he again refused to leave and I said, “Well I’m going to get breakfast and coffee and then call the shop and we’ll figure out when we’re getting it after.”

He went outside, presumably for his wake and bake and the GC and I again left. I called and the guys were at lunch and we couldn’t get the car picked up til 1.   We returned to find him sitting on the steps of his camper in what looked like classic pout pose.  I told him that they wouldn’t be back in the shop until 1PM and he could leave if he wanted and it’d all be fine.

I think he told me no but all I heard was, “Wah.  I’ll stay. Wah.  Poor pitiful me. Wah. Martyr. Martyr. Wah. Can you see my cross? Wah…”

Then…omg…then….

I’m trolling Facebook on the couch, waiting to head out and my son, who is the world’s BEST drama queen had posted:

Tired of no matter what I do it’s not the right thing.

Tbone had liked it and commented:

I know what you mean.

I absolutely lost my shit then and I told him about it.  I confronted him with the fact that you don’t put your shit all over Facebook much less on my SON’S page and what’s more he was relating to and commiserating with an 18 year old kid. Like I said before, that was the beginning of the end. It deteriorated quickly after that. He hadn’t actually read the blog and he did manage it a fit of pique to find it and read it. He sort of figured out what I really thought after that. In the end though, it was not so much a “you’re not good enough for me” judgment as an “I judge you to be too different from me for this to work.”

I have loved and been loved. I have not, however, ever been taken care of so completely that I didn’t feel absolutely alone in my skin at all times.  Normally, I’m okay with that …it’s just those times that you feel like if you have to be in charge of one more motherfucking thing without SOME kind of backup, you’re going to lose your shit in a special way. 

I never had that person there that was my lover and who understood me. I have my friends and I have my daughter and my family but it isn’t the same. It’s not the same as being skin to skin with someone, sharing breath with them and knowing that they cherish more than your body. I want that intangible feeling of having someone to fall back on when I am low.  Someone who will say, “It’s okay that you feel shitty right now because I’m here.  You feel shitty and we’ll take care of this together and you won’t feel shitty anymore and I won’t make you feel even shittier for feeling shitty.”  No scorekeeping, no I did this, so you have to do that.  No guilt.  No obligation. Just love and acceptance. Someone who would be there regardless and wasn’t trying to take advantage of me in any way. Someone I could feel safe loving and giving my heart to and would give theirs right back to me for safekeeping.

I had been very guilty in my younger years of rejecting anyone that seemed like they “loved me too much.” So much self-loathing abounded that I began to reject any club that would have me as a member.  I felt that had happened with Don Juan and his own feelings of self-worth were what got in the way between us.  I hadn’t wanted to be like that and had given people chances they didn’t deserve because I wanted to be sure I wasn’t doing that exact thing, passing something up fundamentally good because I was damaged. Enter TBone and my need to fair and think everything out instead of going with that thing that I know from that place where you store up the shit that you JUST know.

I can handle being by myself. It’s okay. I can do that. I can get through the times when I’m adrift in a sea of chaos and feel like I’m standing stock still in the middle of roaring bedlam.  After all is said and done, the only person I need to worry about being fair to, is myself.

Don Juan

Okay…so…I met him at Schmome Schmeepo.  He was working there as a second job just like I was in order to supplement the old income.  He was technically my subordinate for months but there was just something about him.  I was drawn to him. He is Mexican and swarthy and clean cut but I could see a snippet of a tattoo on his chest when at times a button was undone.  We must name him and one of my besties calls him my Latin Lovah but we’ll call him Don Juan for a myriad of reasons.

I would check the schedule to see if he was my loader for the night.  I would try to chat him up whenever possible and he smelled so fucking good all the time.  I was still dating TBone when he started so it was nothing more than distance flirting at first and then….then I found his profile on OKCupid.

I thought ok, well he’s not seeing anyone then and by that time I was not seeing TBone anymore either so I can sort of hook this up maybe??? Could I? Do I chase men? Not usually, but let’s see how this shit goes. I had gotten his number under the guise of needing it for work but one night when I was not the head cashier and had been sent to garden to cover a break, I texted him. 

I told him he needed to come out so I could smell him.  It was about 3 ½ minutes later that he appeared.  We chit chatted and he asked if I was going to smell him and we leaned toward each other. Goddamn, he smelled so good. He always did.  We were inches from each other as I sniffed his neck and when I glanced up, our eyes met and it was electric and sexy and close and hot and there were a million things said without saying anything…and right then the bitch on break came walking back out.  FUCK!! So we popped apart and headed back into the store talking and grinning.

Later that night, I was manning self-checkout and got my courage up and I texted….”Whattya say we go make out in the parking lot after we close this dump?”

I pressed send with feelings of terror and exhilaration. Then I watched as he came in the store and went back out of the store, pushing carts and laughing with the lumber guys.  No answer.  No eye contact.  So me being me, I tried to lighten the mood with a joke because that’s the sort of idiot I am and texted, “I have gum.”

Still, just nothing.  Omg, he read that and now he thinks I’m a whore and OMG I’m technically his boss most nights and holy shit WTF, he doesn’t even know what to say to me, he won’t look at me, omg, omg, omg, omg.  How can I get out of here without having to talk to him?

Because self-doubt and panic…that’s my jam.  Then I heard him laugh.  Quite loudly.  I looked over and he had his phone in his hand and he was texting back.  My phone beeped and I pulled it out of my pocket to read, “I’m parked right next to you,,,,I’ll see you there.” He puts commas in everything he texts and I decided it was charming.

We got into my truck and started laughing at how ridiculous we were.  Then proceeded to do the whole this is my life talk…for about an hour.  It finally got quiet between us and he said, “When do we get to the kissing part?”

I smiled and pushed the console up and slid over next to him.  It was sublime.  The first kiss can be awkward but it was warm and soft and perfect.  We kissed and talked and kissed until the windows were fogged up.  He told me I was beautiful, that he’d been watching me, that he had wanted me. He told me all sorts of romantic, dashing fabulous things. I started getting sleepy and we realized it was 12:30 in the morning.  We texted each other good night after I got home and I drifted to sleep that night on a cloud.

We repeated the same sort of thing several more times over the next 3 weeks.  It got very heated but he told me there was no way he was taking me in that truck, that he wanted all of me and we would do it right or not at all.  We did more talking and the lay of the land was that he was a year out of a divorce that had left him struggling after he’d made some poor choices.  He lived in a mother in law suite at his aunt’s house and so there was no going back there for us.  I had the girl child at my house and so unless she was out for the night, he wasn’t spending the night with me.   

The Last Love of Don Juan - Daniel C. Chiriac

Third week, lo and behold there was a free night and he could come over…and of course motherfucking shark week shows up.  We talked it over and he was going to come for dinner and we rented a movie.  Just a nice little date and more making out.  I cooked us a casual dinner and did the fun part.  The makeup and hair and the omg we’re not going anywhere so what do I wear and then he was there.  We ate supper, we watched Man of Steel and we made out on my couch like teenagers.  He whipped off his shirt and I almost fainted… there it was, a strong perfect chest with a tattoo of his son’s infant footprints. He kissed the breath out of me and we finally stopped and finished the movie and I sent him home with blue balls. What’s the lady version of blue balls?? Motherfucking shark week.  

It took another week before he didn’t have his son and I had an empty house.  I cooked a meal, I primped and powdered and lotioned and stockings and lingerie and a little black dress.  He showed up smelling and looking so good and we ate dinner but the tension and longing was thick.  We talked and I began to put the dishes in the sink.  He came up behind me and started kissing my neck. I turned and sank into his arms and we made love.  You would think after more than a month of heavy petting and anticipation it would have been animal and it was…a little, but it was more sweet and passionate and wonderful than I’d experienced in a long time.  There was feeling and adoration and he whispered Spanish in my ear.  He could have been telling me directions to the library and I wouldn’t have known or cared. 

The discussions that followed soon after had snippets of things that told of his intentions for a relationship and not just messing about.  I had the same feelings and couldn’t believe I was experiencing them.  We talked about our future plans and he spoke of rebuilding his life and being proud of his choices and I talked of many things and remember him telling me, “Don’t talk like you’ll have to do it all alone.” We fell in love over Christmas. I sewed matching PJ’s for him and his 6 year old.  I bought him presents and made him cookies and we spent every minute that we weren’t working or busy trying to be together.  There was not as much sex as there was kissing and hugging and talking.  It was a real grown up relationship and he treated me like no one has ever treated me.  He called me his Queen.  I felt as if I were floating on air so much of the time. 

The other side of this coin is that he is 21 years clean and sober and attends meetings and counsels others. He takes phone calls at all hours to help people and I loved this about him but this all leads to a lot of self-reflection and all that sensitivity and caring means that though he had a bit of swagger with everyone else…almost a bit of a dickhead sometimes, he was conflicted. A lot.  He was conflicted when things went badly and he got behind with his bills.  He was conflicted about whether he was ready for our commitment. He was conflicted when he was offered a management position. He was conflicted over everything.  All the time.  At first, I felt like a wise calming influence to him. I felt useful and like we were part of a partnership where we were helping each other but I soon realized he could justify anything and talk himself into the choice he wanted in the first place most times. I felt like I was useful and part of something great.  I felt like this big, strong man that no one saw a weak link in needed ME.  I was special enough for him to show his weaknesses and to wise enough for him to bring his burdens. We talked about a home together and our future.

But…those times that we talked and I felt like I’d talked him off the ledge and he would text me later and tell me how grateful he was for me in his life.  I clung to those.  I clung to the moments that we stole kisses in parking lots, the times that we finally got my house to ourselves and had sweet, quiet time together, the times he looked at me and said, “Why are you so beautiful?”

I would find out soon enough though that I should have listened to the voice in my head that said, “Can you spend your whole life supporting and building someone up that needs this much validation? Of course you can. You love him.” I quieted that bitch. She’s a smart bitch, though.

Batter Up!!

TBone did make me realize that I enjoy having a warm body next to me and that I’m at least marginally loveable.  Rationally of course I realize that I am loveable but feeling it in your bones is something else entirely. The absolute best moments of the four months I spent with TBone happened when I got home from work one evening and kicked off my heels and began cooking dinner. TBone was on his way and I was making him a manly meal.  When he came in he looked just as lovely as always and he sat down at the bar to watch me cook. I came around the bar and sat in his lap where we began to make out like teenagers. 

Whatever was on the stove started to bubble and I jumped up to stir it. When I turned around he was standing right behind me and leaned over me and turned off the burner and said, “I’m not hungry for food right now.” He leaned in and kissed me and I felt the swell inside me that is described in every bodice ripping romance novel that my feverish little brain had ever devoured.  That moment made me feel alive. It made me realize my life wasn’t over.  It made me feel and even after all the not so fun stuff during our breaking up; I still want that feeling again.

Oh, there are the odd Murder Tanks about and if all I wanted was a roll in the hay, I could find plenty of FWB’s.  I want more than that but less than an all-consuming involvement. I did go back to that store by the way and he molested me by the Mrs. Baird’s. It was lovely and terrifying and exciting but he’s never going to cuddle up on the couch with pizza and a Shiner and watch a movie with me on a Saturday night.  He’s still so very many years younger and out partying every weekend. Murder Tank is good for feeding the ego but my soul would likely starve.

I stayed off POF because that’s where I met TBone and I didn’t want the cocksucking algorithms telling me he was my soul mate since I had already fucked him off. I thought what better way to boost the old ego than to get on a dating site and have hundreds of men tell me they love me.  Okay, so whatever. I set up the profile on a different site.  It was quirky and adorable and slightly flip.  I wanted to just cast the line without looking like I was on a husband hunt because the only thing I am crystal clear about is that husband #3 almost killed me and I don’t want a #4.

I apparently forgot to change the age settings to post-pubescent because within 30 minutes of posting it, there were about 5 messages from twenty-somethings wanting an older woman.  Most of them said I like an older “women” which made me shudder and dream of braining them with a grammar primer. I told them all I had T-shirts older than them and moved the age to an appropriate range on my profile.

I started an interchange with one gentleman who was very persistent.  His picture didn’t make me swoon or anything but I didn’t throw up in my mouth either.  I thought, you know, you gotta start somewhere, just talk to him. He didn’t offend me and he didn’t make overt sex talk right off the bat so we exchanged numbers and began to text intermittently for several days.

 

No reason except it goes with the whole baseball theme.

Meanwhile, somehow I was still fielding messages from youngsters and I had listed myself as a sapiophile so when I got a message from someone with a PhD in their username I was very pleased although I couldn’t figure out what discipline Thonology was and didn’t stop to Google it because I had a Dr on the line here for fuck’s sake.  We talked and exchanged usernames on Kik.  If you don’t know about how delightful that caca is, you should try it.  We exchanged usernames and I sent a message and it didn’t work.  I sent him a message back on the dating site and he sent, “Oh yeah, I forgot.  Take the PhD off.” When I do this I have the biggest facepalm moment ever.  It wasn’t Thonology he was a doctor in, it was THONGology.  Yeah. I’m a dumbass.  I blocked that shit directly and haven’t heard from the underwear doctor again.

In the interim, I’m still talking to starter date man.  We’re casually texting back and forth and yadda yadda and

I text, “Okay I gotta go to bed. I have to open the store in the morning and be there at 7:30.”

He sends, “I’ll be waiting in the parking lot for you in the morning.”

Me: Um that’s not creepy at all.

SDM: I’m just kidding but I can be there you know if you’ll give me a kiss.

WTF!?!

Me: Well motherfucker, show up with a taco and some hot coffee and we’ll see.

SDM: I’ll be there.

I went to bed fully thinking this man was fully full of shit.

I overslept the next morning and was racing to work when my phone went off.  I picked it up and read…”I’m here. Where are you?”

Ohhhhhhhhh…….fuuuuuudddgggggeeeeee. Only I didn’t say fudge.

I voice texted back that I was late and had to go straight into the store and couldn’t dally in the parking lot.

He sent back, “I’ll wait.”

Terrific.

I went in and opened the store and got all the cashiers lined out and then texted him and told him to meet me by the garden gate. And here he came, carrying coffee and a bag.  He was better looking in person. Still didn’t make me gaga but I thought he was sweet/stalkery/desperate for doing what he did and waiting like he did.  He gave me my breakfast and I apologized for his having to wait.  He leaned in close to me and I knew he was waiting and I kamikaze pecked his mouth and said, “Thanks! I gotta get back to work.”

I ran inside to microwave my coffee and breakfast taco. I had a text before I was through saying he thought I was a hot piece of ass or something equally offensive. I said thanks and he said,

“Well what did you think of me?”

I said, “You’re better looking than your pictures.”

His gentlemanly behavior deteriorated after that. The texting became progressively raunchier and more suggestive and when I just didn’t respond, he sent pouty texts as if I’d made a commitment to him and should answer to him; all of this in the space of about a week.  Long story longer, I was supposed to have a date with him tonight. The thought of it came in way behind a mani/pedi and taking the Girl Child to the mall with one of her friends, which is exactly what I did. My nails look fabulous and my panties and my dignity are still intact.  

Bachelors – 0. M - 1.  

Potpourri for $1,000, Alex.

So we’ve reached the point in our story that I actually started this blog in the first place.  About a month after I moved in to my tiny little house with the Gurl Child, two dogs and a pregnant cat in tow. I was still taking calls from Tucker but less and less frequently and still figuring out the “master plan”.  If you go back to Today, you can see that about a month afterwards, I was still hurting but couldn’t really explain why.

If you see Ripping the Bandaid Off a mere two weeks later, I was ready to be done with him….all the way done, I just hadn’t steeled myself as of yet. By three months further on down the line, I had decided to get the divorce done and you’ll see how that conversation went if you read Sugar Doll.

In the interim, I didn’t do much except work, try to get better jobs and eat. A lot. I’ve since decided to not wallow but dating hasn’t been super kind to me either.  I suppose I must learn my lesson from Starfish and TBone. Starfish was three weeks’ worth of I love you’s from a dude that seemed too good to be true and then turned out to be a batshit crazy motherfucker that had drugs literally mailed to my house.

Sweet, hunh?

We all know the ballad of TBone.  I am still having trouble trying to figure out why that’s bothering me so much except for the fact that I hurt him like I did.  I am a smartass, mouthy bitch but I still don’t like hurting people’s feelings and truthfully, I was still on the edge of “maybe this can work out.”  I was on the brink of “You ain’t getting any younger or better lookin and maybe you should just quit while you’re ahead.”  I’m thinking I would have pulled out of that particular death spiral before I crash landed but my MO usually entails absolutely hating a sumbitch before I get rid of him so… probably not.

I shall keep updates inserted regarding Tucker because I still get them from time to time from random and unexpected sources.  Just today, in fact, a Facebook message from someone long forgotten…

I’ve been talking to Tucker every day and he has been asking me to message and make sure everything is going well and that he loves you.  I understand if you don’t want to talk to him but I am just doing him a favor.

I mean he can sell nuggets to a chicken and get random people to do all kinds of things.  He’s good at it.  I’m sure we’ll hear more and he’s scheduled for release in November so I may be moving, who knows?

In any case, I hope you continue to visit while I sign up for stupid dating sites and go on awkward dates and raise the world’s most awesome Gurl Child.  

T-Bone

I met TBone on a dating site. When we made our date, I had every intention of meeting him for a drink and leaving.  The moment, however, that he rose from the table and towered over me smiling his dazzling smile, I was lost.  He was charming and good looking and that particular night snatched me out of the way seconds before a water leak caved the ceiling in.  He had been my knight in shining armor and we left the bar because he said, “I can afford to take you some place better where the ceiling isn’t going to fall on you.” We spent roughly seven hours together that night, the last of which were spent in my bed.  He was tender and sweet and attentive if not exceptionally skilled. I still thought he was wonderful because you know after all first times aren’t always magical and maybe he was nervous and it’ll be better next time. Boy oh boy did I want there to be a next time. He was just so good looking. I was overwhelmed by merely looking at him and it blinded me to anything else that was there. 

So it began, we dated. He texted, I texted, we Facebooked, we saw each other once a week then twice a week and internally I got crazy about him saying he loved me.  I didn’t give him the indication but I was going nuts inside my head over it.  Looking back, I don’t know what happened to me…the warning bells had already gone off somewhat. He smoked pot and a lot of it.  He lived with his dad and took care of him but the houses he constantly said were his were really his parents’.  His teenaged boys lived with his 80 something year old mother. He is retired and gets a pension from the Navy and he doesn’t have to work. I explained all of it away to good reasons just so I could get someone to treat me like I was worthy. I grew tired of listening to him sing badly to bad music. I hated watching the news every night when I’d already watched it that morning. I hated watching him “train” my cat by biting her on the ear. (Anyone who reads the Facebook knows that's the only pussy he bites.) He knew everything about everything and was more than a little arrogant about it. He literally did the touchdown signal when he was right.  He is a homophobe and turned out to be a bit of a bigot; I had to tell him to stop using the “n” word in front of the Gurl Child. Still, I tried to see the good because there was plenty of good too.  He cleaned my house, he bought dinners and groceries.  He brought me wine in the shower, he took me camping.  He did lots and lots of nice things that made it easier for me to ignore the bad stuff.

The night that I got drunk and unleased all my frustrations on him for the things he’d said and the ways he’d made me feel inadequate, he hung his head.  Defeated.  He put his face in his hands then raised it to me and said, 

“I’m just a stupid, stupid man. I’m so sorry if I hurt you.  I never meant any of that in that way. I love you. I want to spend the next 20 years with you.” I felt so awful for him right then because I knew. I knew that I didn’t want to spend the next 20 years with HIM.  I knew that he was sincere and that he was genuinely sorry that he’d hurt my feelings by mentioning my stretch marks, making cracks about my diet, talking about his ex every second. I knew he felt bad and so I prolonged the inevitable and I let him stay.

Every time he walked through the door and smiled at me I wanted so badly for him to be what I wanted him to be.  You just can’t force it. We had differing views on TV, movies, music, religion; you name it we didn’t match up.  I think we both wanted to feel loved and accepted, Lord knows I pursued him every bit as much as he pursued me. I remember the moment in almost any relationship where the other person does or says something that triggers this skepticism in the back of your brain.  A tiny hitch that gives you pause and makes you think, “Wow, where did that come from? That’s not cool. I don’t like that.” And you quash it and go on about your business because LOVE!!!! Oh my god…LOVE, LUST, ENDORPHINS!!! 

Even if I knew he wasn’t for me, he was a warm body. Even if the sex left me frustrated and irritated, there was still someone there saying that he loved me.  It had been a long time since I had real closeness with anyone and I feared I’d never have it again.  I’ve known for some time that it had to end but didn’t have the balls to say it to him because I knew it would result in that shitty talk that no one wants to have.

Luckily for me, I’m a moron who forgot about his penchant for trolling Facebook in bed before he gets up. 

One of my besties who likes my page liked this status this morning:

Same tongue in cheek crap I always post except I’m really trying to figure out how to break up with this man before he shows up with a ring at Christmas or something. TBone sees that Bestie likes Mediocrates status and sees the word TBone which he knows we call him. He taps on it and then responds with this:

My phone light goes off I see that he’s liked…wait…what? Mediocrates status?! Then I tasted the pennies in my mouth and my hands went numb. I wanted him gone but I didn’t want him to find out this way.  We had some back and forth via text and I apologized for him having to read it on the internet and then nada.  He’s gone.

I really hate that he got hurt more than he should have from my being flippant over the whole thing but it was for the best. We’ll both be better off in the end. I’ll be alone or whatever and he’ll find some nice confederate flag wearing chick that doesn’t mind that his pillow talk sounds the same as when he talks to the cat or that the number of times that he burps, farts and says fuck are numerous and plentiful every day.

I still felt a little like crying because I knew he was hurt and I felt like a giant asshole over it but I didn’t have to have the talk and for that I am truly grateful. I am again all at once relieved and adrift. I had never factored him into my future so he didn’t leave a hole but to him…from now on…I’ll be that chick that had a blog and talked shit on the internet about him to almost a whole thousand people.