7days7authors

Sunday - Into The Black (I.) - Will M.

I didn’t think he’d show.

Part of me didn’t want him to show.  He’d left the voicemail on Friday.  He was kind of vague, maybe deliberately so, but I think he was finally getting the picture.  All throughout that weekend, amidst the packing, unpacking, heavy lifting, and the fortunately unremarked upon “fuck” coming from my stereo as my more devout kin helped me move, little flashes of doubt popped into my mind.

Could he have thought I didn’t want anything, at all, romantically from him a month ago?  Was he just a spoiled asshole who wanted me roped into a commited relationship as soon as possible, or could he actually be closer to the opposite of the last boy—the boy who refused, rejected or outright ignored my heart more often than I still care to count.  What if my (sort of) first impressions were right?

So that Sunday I texted him.  It was a casual invite.  Actually it was even less than that: I told him he should invite me, casually.  I know it was casual because I spent twenty minutes going over it and over it.  Ah, the editing process.  And he answered right back.  Quickly.  As I tried to sleep in my new apartment, the ominous closet door too close for my tastes, the lack of fans (compared to the old place) noticeable as a potential problem even though it was winter, more doubt set in.

All those beautiful things he’d said in the desperate email he’d sent me…if he believed them, could he take my invite of an invite—and on a Monday no less—as a sign that I was giving in, or willing to be a girlfriend?  That, snap, just like that, a week later, and several weeks without sex, I was giving in?  Or worse, that since he’d hinted that he loved me, that I felt the same way?

It couldn’t be that last thing.  Whether I felt that or not made no difference.  I’d said it and thought it far too many times with practically snores and yawns in response before to be the first to say it to the new boy.  And I didn’t feel that way…not yet anyway…and he didn’t seem like the type that could take a “maybe” very well.

The girls and I talked it over at work Monday and we figured the safest thing for me was to back out a little.  Instead of me going to his apartment, where we’d spent more of our intimate time and there were many good memories, but also some bad—as well as the memories of the nights I would go there because he didn’t feel like coming to see me, or worse, the nights he’d said he would but instead stayed in, or claimed to; an echo of the previous boy that did nothing to allay my cynicism—we decided that I would email him the alternate plan:  he could come over, see my new apartment (which I’d hoped he’d help me move into) and talk.  No TV, just me, a ton of not-yet-unpacked boxes of books, my little man, and him.  And he could always say no.

He didn’t say no though, and I began to get nervous again.

I ended things through email because I hadn’t been able to do it in person.  And we had almost never been able to talk about the problems we had in person.  Ever.  I told him it was difficult for me a month prior, and he’d said that he was fine, but he was different after that.  We didn’t really talk about it, and too often when we did, it seemed like he resented me, or was unhappy, but he would deny any accusations I made.  There were moments—like when we both worked on our respective books together—that those old butterflies came back.  But they were fleeting and becoming far too rare—outweighed by the leaden silences, and towards the end, thinly veiled accusations from him.  He never said he thought I was seeing someone else behind his back (or as “behind a back” as it can be when we weren’t offically exclusive) but he sure dropped none-to-subtle hints.

In a way, it was me giving him a last chance to be honest with me again.  But there was the catch: to be fair, I’d have to do the same with him.  I’d barely hinted about the problems I’d had with the previous boy, and he didn’t try and bring him up, but if the new Cute Boy brought up my freaking out over our relationship status, I’d have to.

Can it be called cold feet if it’s not related to a marriage?  Whatever you call it, it was the reason I didn’t answer when his phone rang, or when he texted, or called again.  The rationale was that now he was clearly too desperate to be trusted.  My mom would be in town in a few days, my place was a mess—I didn’t have the mental energy leftover to deal with this cute, indecisive, withdrawn boy tonight, and I didn’t think he’d be there.  Maybe he’d nearly given up and saw me pulling in.  If I’d waited just a few more minutes, he would’ve given up, gone home and felt hurt, but it’d be over.  Probably.

But there he was: still cute with his hair as short as our first date, dressed way too nice to be that casual (but his shirt was still in need of a better ironing), in a different car.

And damn it, the smile I gave him when I saw him was genuine, even if I didn’t want it to be.

He was beyond nervous the whole time.  I decided to take things back to familiar ground and give him a tour. 

“I like the fan.”

It was a hideous fan, and it looked like something pulled, kicking and screaming, from a ski lodge built by card-carrying NRA members.  It could only be worse if it had antlers on it.

“Really?”

“Well, I know it doesn’t quite mesh with your lighting here in the kitchen but…” he just trailed off.  I felt a little sorry for him, but I was also pretty sure the decorations in my apartment weren’t really why he came over.  I didn’t want to have that conversation though, at least, I wasn’t about to start it.

The tour moved upstairs, and while I’m sure he noticed I’d moved my bed so it was flush with the closet side, he didn’t say anything right away.

“What’s that?” he pointed at a lampshade-looking thing atop the scary closet.

“No idea. It was here when I moved in.”