Chapter Three: Never Date A Heterosexual Part Two

Shit.  Shit.  Shit.  Shit.  Just my luck, I find this AMAZING guy and he has a girlfriend.  It takes me awhile to respond, and all that I can seem to muster is…”Oh...uh…I don’t care.”  We kiss again.  This time it’s for a longer period of time.  He again pulls away and says, “No I’m sorry, I’m sorry…I can’t.” Damn.  But just to get off the topic of said girlfriend, I suggest we get out of the car to meet the girls.  As we are walking he says to me “You have a strong back.”  Wait…What? I respond with a confused “Thank you?...” and he says, “well when we were kissing, I felt your back and you have a really strong one.”…Yeah I know, what the hell do you say to that?  I mean is that a compliment?  I think it is.  If it is, he sure knows how to win my heart.  “You have a strong back.”  That’s like saying my elbow gives him heart palpitations.  Ok, maybe not as bad, but equally not as flattering.

            We meet up with the girls, which surprisingly, doesn’t last long, and decide to call it a night.  As I drove him back to the Gunther Toody’s parking lot, I can’t help thinking “Now what?”  And just as I make the executive decision to not let this thing go past tonight, he does something that completely surprised me.  As I was driving, he grabbed my hand and held it.  This I found to be very odd because one, he had a girlfriend, and two because I was driving a stick shift and that turns into a complicated mess in the hand holding department.  But regardless of my constant change of gears (and his) we held hands all the way to his car.  Now just as he was about to get out of the car he turned to me and surprised me more than a simple hold of the hand.  He said, “Let me kiss you.  Don’t kiss me back, but just let me kiss you on my own.”  And he did.  And then he walked out of the car to his truck.

            Well wasn’t I in a pickle.  Here I was thinking that it wasn’t going to go past that night, and he leaves me with that.  Of all things!  Couldn’t he have just said, “See you pal.”? Like any other straight male?!  Is that what the straight guys are saying nowadays? I don’t understand their language.  But I mean, damn, why did he have to end the night like that.  I was hooked, and it wasn’t a good thing. 

Over the course of the next couple weeks, I constantly had this guy on my mind.  What was I going to do?  How was I going to do it? (Ugh. Boys).  Josh and I would text or call each other almost every day, but our conversations never really went anywhere.  I think it was because neither him nor I knew what to do with this situation.  So we just talked with each other.  We hung out a couple times (always in a group) and things just got more and more confusing.  He would do random things like grab my leg under a table, or kiss me when I least expected it.  Once while watching a movie, he fell asleep with his head on my lap as I stroked his hair.  I know, barf right? All of this was great, but not very helpful at untangling my confusion and my emotions.

            Weeks after Josh and I met, came a party.  Now don’t judge me, but in high school I liked to party, which turned out to be good for me because I don’t really do much of it anymore.  But there came a party that Ana and I were going to (or throwing but I’m not admitting to anything) and I decided to invite Josh along.  After much pleading, he decided to come.  Now usually with these parties, we would all stay the whole night at personwhoshallnotbenamed ‘s house, so I was kind of nervous to see what was going to happen.  But Lord only knows what Jeremy will do when filled with Bacardi Raz.  Now I was plenty tipsy by the time Josh arrived but I remember it very clearly.  He walked in wearing faded blue jeans, a plaid shirt, and a plaid hat.  Before I knew it, the butterflies arrived.  All through the night was endless flirting between the two of us, and suddenly Josh and I and two other girls (who were so not important in my life that I cannot remember their names) were in a bedroom alone together.  We were all pretty drunk when Josh kissed me, very long and very passionately.  But then to my dismay, he stopped and turned and kissed one of the girls, and then the other.  Because I was too drunk to really notice, this situation kept happening over and over again, and I really didn’t know how to feel about it.  I mean I felt hurt, but I also felt excited because Josh always included me.  Always kissed me the longest, but still I felt emotional.  As the night died down, Josh fell asleep on the bed, and the two girls fell asleep in another room.  He told me to lay down with him, so I did and then we fell asleep.  Two hours later, I woke up alone.  I got up, walked out of the room and into the next and found Josh kissing one of the two girls.  I was stunned.  I didn’t know what to do.  Josh turned, saw me, and came right up and kissed me, but this time I pulled away.  I walked straight down the hallway, out the door and began walking.  I had no clue where I was going or what I was going to do when I got there.   I was so angry, so hurt, so confused but had no understanding on why.  I mean did I really expect to have something with Josh? And as I walked I began to cry.  I cried because I was confused.  I didn’t want to feel this way.  I didn’t want to feel betrayed or feel like someone had that much control of my emotions, but that is exactly what was happening.  I walked for about two blocks (at this point it was about 5am) and suddenly a truck came up beside me and there he was.  Josh had followed me and told me to get in the truck.  Obviously at this point I had wiped all the tears away to cover my tracks of emotion, and he grabbed my hand and asked very sweetly “Hey, what’s wrong?”  I know, I know, how stupid can this guy get to ask me that question?  I just turned to him and said, “Listen, you have to understand that I like you, a lot.  And I know you are confused about a lot of things but you need to realize at the end of the day, that I have feelings.  I’m not just someone you can toy around with.  And it’s not ok to put me or your girlfriend through this, so you need to make a decision.”  He responded with, “I’m sorry, you know I like you, but I’m still so confused.  Please just give me another chance to figure things out.” Though I shouldn’t have, I agreed and he drove me back and slept with me all night and held me.  I never went to bed.  I stared at the wall until morning broke through the window.

            The next morning we said our goodbyes with a kiss, but I still had this horrible feeling in my stomach.  Turns out Josh, Ana, and Elle were all working the morning shifts that day and so we agreed to all meet up afterwards.  I had the whole day off to recap my feelings of the night before with a sober attitude.  Then something came to my mind.  What about his girlfriend?  Beth I think her name was.  I mean, how would she feel about what had been going on with Josh?  She would be heartbroken.   For the first time, I really truly thought about her, and felt bad for her.  Felt bad that she didn’t and probably never would know what had been happening behind her back.  I felt awful. 

            Later that day, we stuck to the plan and all met up to go to the park.  I was truly blinded by Josh’s charm.  I mean it was so hard for me to be upset with him, when he knew exactly what to say or do to give me such a feeling in my stomach.  I think a part of it was that I loved the attention.  I was so dumbfounded that someone so good looking and so out of every other gay mans reach was interested in me.  It made me finally feel special, even if it was in the wrong way.  We were walking to the park with the girls a couple yards ahead of us (out of ear shot) and I decided to ask Josh to hang out, just the two of us, so I could see what all this was about.  His response, “ Oh I’m sorry I can’t I have plans tonight.  I’m taking my girlfriend out for our anniversary.”  Ouch.  That one stung deep.  What was worse was the way he said it, like it was no big deal.  I became very quiet and pretty unsocial, and because the lesbians started to fight like two cats fighting over the last bite of tuna, we headed to the nearest house.  Mine.

            While the two girls were ranting in a room, I decided to get to the bottom of this.  I simply asked, “Josh, why are you doing this?  I mean why are you leading me and your girlfriend on?”  He responded with “I’m not trying to, I mean I like you I really do, I love spending time with you, but…I love my girlfriend and I know I’m going to marry her.” Double Ouch. “…But I do like you and I do want to continue on with what we have.”  He then kissed me, the way he always did.  Slow, passionate and full of so much meaning.  He said, “ You really are so special to me.”  And he kissed me again.  We sat for along time on the couch with my head on his chest.  I didn’t know what I was going to do.  I was so confused.  I wanted him so badly but he basically told me I would never have him.  I had no clue on how to handle this situation until he spoke next by saying, “Well, I have to go.  Beth is waiting.”  As I walked him to the door, I took him, kissed him and said “Goodbye” and closed to the door.  To him I was just walking him out, but to me I really was “closing the door”.  I locked it and I cried.  I never called him again.  The worst part of it is…he never tried to call me either.

            Weeks went on, and after hours of watching "The Notebook" and crying, I put Josh in the back of my mind and kept him there.  Funny thing is, when Steve found out about Josh and I (meaning when he found out we were dating) he stopped talking to me.  And when I stopped calling Josh, suddenly Steve and Josh became best friends.  So I had lost a good friend and a guy.  Great.  The last time I saw Josh was at a party of a mutual friends.  He came in, and said “Hello” and I gave him a polite “Hello” back.  All night he kept on trying to start up conversations with me, but I simply ignored him.  I could see that I hurt him, but I didn’t care.  The next day I received a phone call from Josh, but I didn’t answer it.  He did leave a message that said, “Hey Jer, um…I don’t know what to say, but I’m sorry.  I don’t know what happened, one minute we were great, and the next you stopped calling me.  It really upset me.  I didn’t know what to do.  Just know that I care about you ok?  Yeah, I guess that’s it…bye.”  I never called him back and I never spoke to him again.

            Life went on, as it always seems to, but I never forgot about Josh.  I probably never will.  I even tried once to contact him via MySpace (yep I’m old) but because I had an overprotective boyfriend at the time and Josh really didn’t have anything to say to me, I never heard from him.  He is a big disappointment in my life though, not because of what he put me through but really because how it ended.  I still feel bad because nothing was ever really resolved.  I mean, I never really ended it with him; it just kind of ended itself.  I still think about him sometimes.  Not in the way I did back then, but with the fact that I wish I could talk to him now to close that chapter, to let him know that I am fine and to find out if he is fine also.  I want him to know that I don’t hate him.  I was young and fell head over heels but I don’t hate him. I don’t know how I will ever do that, hell, I don’t even know if he will even admit to knowing me, or really even caring that he had known me.  But I do know one thing.  He made an impact on my life, he taught me that there are people out there who will hurt you, but it’s always important to know that you are worth more than you give yourself credit for.  Be true to yourself and don’t get walked all over.  If he ever reads this, he will know it’s about him, and if you ever do Josh, I have one thing to say to you.  I don’t hate you.