chapter XVIXIXV

I've been putting this off for about a year now. I kept lying to myself, hoping things would change, hoping it didn't really happen, hoping I'm not as much of a bad person as she told me I was, hoping it was all a mistake... a misunderstanding. A quick recap: I met this girl when I was single last year, at a party. I had a date with her and fell in love nearly instantly. She was probably one of the best women I've ever met in my life. And I kept it all to myself. You'll notice there are some huge gaps in my bloggery last year. My life hit a ridiculous high point, then spiraled down into depths of emotional shit.

So. I met this girl. This girl, this woman, this savior. Maybe you remember the 'first date' at the Chinese restaurant. Everything started better than I could ever imagine. For a while, I actually considered that this girl was an angel from heaven, sent down to save me from the world (and myself). We were inseparable for nearly two months. We'd talk on the phone every weeknight for about two hours. We'd spend every weekend together. We'd watch movies, play videogames, go on walks, go shopping, go out to eat, try cooking together (we were both terrible), go to the city, do everything. It seemed like those two months lasted a year. We crammed so many good memories (I can barely remember any of them, except for what I captured with my digital camera and camcorder) into such a short amount of time. Oh how I loved my angel. I knew that it was all moving very quickly, and that I'd never felt like this about anyone before (maybe I just finally allowed myself to?) and that there was so much about myself that I was afraid she'd find out and hate and she'd realize what a jerk I was and realize that I'm just a husk of a man, no soul, no real care for anyone in the world, just for myself and my possessions, and .... I tried so hard to change all that. Change for her. And I was changing. I could feel myself becoming a better person. More sensitive, a better listener, more in-touch with myself and with others. But it all turned to shit, and deep deep down, I knew it would all along.

Things started to fall apart after week 7. I can't remember what exactly set it off. I think it was a number of things. I frantically tried to put everything back together, but ultimately failed. I do remember being stressed out about something at work (ironic, because the "old me" usually didn't care enough to get stressed out, but I was trying to care more), and I might have snapped at her, or been rude, or just been distant. We had a couple of fights. We made up, but I feel like I can remember telling her a lot of things that she probably wanted to hear (that might not have really been true). Things about my feelings. I knew that I cared for her a lot, but maybe I could just never be the person she needed me to be, no matter how hard I tried to change myself...no matter how hard I tried to allow her to change me and save me. Things finally came to a head one Friday night, where she told me over the phone that she didn't think we should see each other anymore, that things were becoming too hard, we moved too fast, she didn't know what she was doing and she made a mistake by being with me. I begged her to just let me take her to dinner one last time. She reluctantly accepted after I pleaded to her for a good while, telling her I just wanted a proper goodbye. I know she didn't really want to, but she was such a sweetheart that she decided to do it for me. But I had every intention of saving that relationship. I told her I'd pick her up Saturday evening. I plotted all night and all day, preparing myself for a difficult confrontation, for an argument that I must absolutely win if I was to remain happy. She was too amazing to not fight for. I had to let her know it.

I picked her up the following night, and we sat in an awkard silence as I drove us to the location of our first magical date: my favorite Chinese restaurant. "B, I'm not really in the mood for Chinese food. I have a bit of a stomach ache and I'd rather not eat here." But I somehow convinced her that we should eat there, as I was desperately trying to connect with her and make her remember all the things that she liked about me. The food was excellent, but dinner was horrible. We barely spoke. She didn't eat anything. Just pushed expensive food (that I ordered for her) around her plate with her chopsticks. It looked as if she was witholding tears and didn't know what to say to me. I didn't know what to say either. I kept trying to make jokes and failing. I kept trying to remind her of instances from the previous seven weeks when we had such wonderful times. She would just say "Yeah, I know B...it's just...it's just..." and I'd try to get her to really tell me what was wrong so I could fix it, so I could fix myself and repair our relationship and be perfect for her and save everything and be happy with her and with myself together forever. It wasn't working. It was so painful for both of us. Suddenly, as the waiter brought me the check and a few fortune cookies, I thought I had a brilliant idea. I thought I could surely make her laugh, just as I had on our very first date, at that very same restaurant at the same table (which I requested and made us wait for fifteen minutes for them to clear it). I smiled as I opened the fortune cookies, quietly reading the fortunes in a thick Chinese accent, flipping them over and reading the little "Learn Chinese" translations on the back.

"Haha! Look at this one! Ah, your ah preenceeples mean ah more to youuu than any mahney or ah successs! Hmm. No. Let's learn Chinese! 'Delicious:' Hao-chi. Howwww cheeee! Here's another. You have ah the rayyre abeelity to recognize abeelity in ah othas! What? More translations! 'Chicken:' Ji. Jeeee! Oh my god. This one is 'airplane' and it is Fei-ji. Airplane Chicken? Hahaha! 'Spinach:' Bo-cai. Booow kaaaaaiiiiuh!

I grew panicky as I could see how uncomfortable she was. My voice grew louder and I laughed nervously. I ran out of cookies. "Ahem. Um excuse me? Sir?" I asked, loudly. "B! Stop it!" she begged me, but I just motioned her away, as if to say "Don't worry, I've got it under control baby, I'll get you more cookies and I'll make you laugh and you'll forgive me for whatever it was I did, and everthing will be okay." "Can we have some more fortune cookies please?" I ask. "Ah yes, ahh of course!" He said, bringing me another handful. I continued to open cookie after cookie, reading the fortunes to her, trying too hard to be funny and to make her laugh. God, why wasn't she laughing? Tears started trickling down her cheeks. I opened the last cookie, my hand shaking, slowly reading the Chinese translation in my horrible Chinese accent, and then she interupted me, exploding: "-STOP IT B! Just please fucking STOP IT!" I stared at her, feeling like I'd just been punched in the chest. "What?? I was just trying to make you laugh? What's wrong?" Everyone in the restaurant knew that there was some drama at our table, but pretended to ignore it.

She finally told me what was wrong. With me. She told me I was a selfish jerk, only concerned with myself. Never placing others before me. She told me I was rude. I was cheap. I was stupid and easily confused and sometimes she was suprised that I even went to college. I wasn't nearly as funny as I thought I was. I was out of shape. I was bad in bed. I had problems with intimacy. (This was true. I preferred sex over a computer interface rather than a human one. I was so used to seeing sex on a computer monitor when viewing my horrendous internet porno collection, that I didn't know what to do when I was actually with a real woman. I was actually somewhat terrified of physical intimacy.) I was overly critical and my standards and expectations were too high. I was greedy. I didn't work hard at all for the success that I have had. I didn't appreciate anything. I cared about material things more than I cared about people. And she went on, until we were both sitting there, staring at each other, tears streaming down our faces. She said she's never met anyone like me. She said I needed help, badly. She said she tried to help me, to save me, but she couldn't. She said there's nothing inside me. That I'm not there.

I stared at her, trying so hard not to cry. Trying to hold it all in. It hurt so bad. She hurt me so badly. I felt like my heart had completely stopped beating. There was just this big empty space in my chest, but it was filled with hurt. I tried to speak, but nothing came out. God, it hurt so bad. How could she? I loved her. I tried so hard for her. Slowly, I forced some words out to her. The only words I could speak. "...Fuck you." I said, glaring, "You're not my fucking soulmate." She was gasping quietly as she cried. I looked at the angel once last time. Looked at my missed chance for salvation. I wanted to get on my knees. Beg her to love me. To fix me. But she couldn't help me. There was nothing more that could be done. Nothing could be saved. It didn't matter if we had dated for two months or for ten years. It was over. "I hate you. You're dead to me," I told her. I then stood up, wiped my eyes, threw all of the cash in my wallet onto the table (I'm not sure if it was even enough) and walked away, as she sobbed behind me.

That was a year ago.