E and I are back together! You may barf or applaud as you see fit.

I used to think that if I had a boyfriend again, the relationship stories on here would get ridiculously boring. Somehow, in this situation, I don’t think that will be the case.

Oh, and I totally take back what I said about missing how he snores and sleeps like a big starfish on my bed. I don’t know what I was smoking when I wrote that. Replace it with me missing his freckles and the fact that he gives awesome footrubs.

We always used to call ourselves a good team, and we really were. Aside from those few very crucial issues, we always worked well together and our strengths and weaknesses balanced one another. E pointed out that the best team is together again in time for fantasy football.

That guy. )

I always wished that the makers of the “–for Dummies” and “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to –” would do something about those obnoxious and easily recognizable covers. Don’t they know that someone who has been blogging for three-plus years FEELS like a dummy just holding “Wordpress for Dummies” when standing in the checkline at Borders? Those yellow and black covers with their little “a reference for the rest of us!” subtitles will make you feel like a dummy just by touching them. Anyone looking at you will assume that you are not one of “the rest of us,” but that you are, in fact, so dangerously daft that you need a book colored like caution tape to warn people out of your path. Yes, it shows through the white plastic Borders bag.

That being said, “Wordpress for Dummies” helped a great deal and I do recommend it if you’re starting off on Wordpress.org and you think that a plugin is the thing at the end of the laptop-charging cord. These books should come in nice, faux-leather covers with a ribbon bookmark, like Bibles.

But welcome! Have a cookie! I’m not sure about this design yet, but I always wanted to do something with that picture of the redhead over there, and she seemed to fit with the yellows and pinks and brighten things up here. I need to sort out how to give this thing a custom header, I think. Due to a very unfortunate cash flow problem (almost-dead laptop, ornery major appliances), the professional design from Delicious Design Studio must be delayed. I like yellow, and now that I’ve figured out this FTP crap, I’m feeling invincible with my shiny NEW laptop. This will work. At the very least, I’ve passed a mostly pleasant sober Saturday night.

Baggage Update:

I don’t think that I mentioned that Kayak was an SGB reader for many months. When we first started hanging out a few weeks ago, he told me he’d stop reading if it made me uncomfortable. I told him that would be good, and he agreed to stop. Our time spent together and even just in conversation has tapered off considerably this week, which is probably just due to the fact that I am sour on everything right now and not afraid to share the fact – but a tiny part of me wonders if he read those posts about E. He’s probably just giving me space, though. Probably.

E and I spent some time on the phone on Wednesday night, and we have plans to hang out Sunday evening. I need to spend some time with the boy in a less emotionally-charged situation than we had on Monday. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him. Of course, I haven’t really tried.

I spoke with Ben on Tuesday night and he’s completely messed up; he can’t understand what happened and where it all went wrong. Of course, having spent a considerable amount of time listening to Mel that day, I knew exactly what was going on with her and why.

But of course I can’t tell him that. That’s her place to make him understand as best she can. The only reason I get it at all is because I’ve been in such a similar situation. I’ll have to tell that story another time. Of course I love Ben and want to give him all the support I can during a time like this – they are going to do a sort of trial separation – but I’m afraid to give him any remark or comfort resembling hope. It’s not that I don’t believe something could change in Mel’s heart, but I can’t offer hope of that and I know it’s what he wants to hear.

I can hardly even think of it without wondering, wondering, wondering. So I have to think about something else.

I mentioned briefly in my last post that I had started dating a guy from work a few weeks ago. I can’t name this one after his job like I do so many others, because “Talent Acquisition Specialist” doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue (or the keyboard) nicely. So I’ll call him Kayak because he has one and I dig that. We have similar interests in outdoorsy things and taste in films. He lived in France for a year and will watch subtitled Audrey Tautou movies with me, and not just “Amelie.” He’s affectionate and will hold my hand while we walk to dinner and cuddle me when we watch movies. He’s cute and has admitted to having a crush on me for some time. It’s been about 2 ½ weeks now and Kayak and I have seen each other a lot – it’s been moving rather quickly, but it’s been nice. Captain, schmaptain.

And then E.

He texted me over the weekend, saying he really wants to talk to me, thinks of me all the time, and that at his Metro stop near my work he’s gotten off and looked for my car in the parking lot to leave me a note because he was too nervous to tell me what he had to say. He never did leave that note, and I texted back that if he wants to talk, he should call me. He did, and we talked for about 45 minutes on Saturday afternoon. It was the first time I’d heard his voice since the day I gave him all of his stuff back in early June. He apologized over and over for the way he’d treated me, and I have to confess that although I accepted his apologies, I did light into him about WHY what he did was wrong.

“You LIED when you said you didn’t love me?” I said incredulously. “You lied. About that.”

“Yes. I’m still in love with you, I never stopped.”

“Why, of all things, would you lie about loving me?” I practically yelled. “You ripped my heart out when you said that!”

“Look, I was scared, and it was the stupidest thing to be scared of and it was the stupidest thing to lie about and I’ve regretted it ever since. I acted for the dumbest reasons and felt pressure from other people–“

“Which is a FINE reason for making decisions about our relationship, really. I love when you use that as an excuse.”

“I’m so sorry, I can’t even tell you how sorry I am. I know you don’t trust me, but I really am.”

“Well,” I said evenly, “for future reference, when you want to know what a girl wants from you and from your relationship, you should ask HER. No one else. And when you let other people’s pressure to get married or not get married or whatever make decisions for you, then you’re not a man about it.”

He was silent. I was seething. “Say something,” I demanded.

“I need to see you. I need to see you to talk about this.”

“We can do that,” I sighed.

“I’ll call you later this week when I get my work schedule,” he said quickly. “We’ll go get coffee, something. I promise I will call you.”

“Okay.”

Then came Monday night and everything with Mel and Ben, and I needed him more desperately than I ever had before. We’d had arguments before about how I felt he was dismissive sometimes when I was upset, but on Monday when I called him, he dropped everything and came over. Some of that is documented in my last post. Some of it is here.

When my tears for Mel and Ben were spent for the time being, the conversation turned back to our own breakup. “I’ve been seeing someone,” I said abruptly as we sat on the porch in silence.

“Really.”

“Just for a little while. It’s nothing serious.”

“Why isn’t he here with you tonight?”

“Because I needed you,” I said simply.

“It’s so weird that this all happened tonight of all nights,” he said.

“Why?”

“I talked to my dad today.” E’s dad has had two failed marriages and is a bitter, cynical old man. He warns his sons that women poke holes in condoms to get pregnant and demand shotgun weddings. He’s never minded me but I am a woman and therefore not to be trusted with his son.

“And?”

“He was glad about the changes I’m making in my life, of course.” E finally, FINALLY left The Restaurant and got another job. He’s still in the restaurant industry and working as a line cook and not as the big-cheese chef anymore, which of course is not ideal, but at least now he’s at the Four Seasons, making more money and not in that shitbox working for those idiot owners. E is also moving out of the apartment he’s shared with the stoner roommate and getting his own place. He is making positive changes, the kind he’d always talked about making and never did.

“I’m glad too,” I said. “You needed those things.”

“And so you know my dad, all business,” he said slowly. “He asked me if I had a five-year plan.” I raised my eyebrows at him. “And I do. I want it to be with you. I want you to give me another chance. I want to be with you and move our relationship forward, to build a life with you, to raise a family.” E got down on his knees in front of me and had both my hands in his and for a terrified nanosecond I thought he was going to propose or say something equally stupid. The words just spilled out of his mouth. “I know I’ve fucked up and I haven’t been a man. But I want to be. I’ve been trying, I’ve been making changes and I want to make more. And I need you, I want to do this with you.” He cupped my face in his hands and leaned his forehead against mine.

I closed my eyes.

“You told me the other day that if I want something from a woman I should ask her and no one else,” he continued. “And my dad thought I was an idiot until I looked him in the eye today and said ‘Dad, I love her.’ He shook his head at me and said I should do whatever I want if I’m that sure of myself. And I am. I don’t care if he still thinks I’m an idiot or if he approves and just isn’t telling me. I don’t care. So I’m asking you, only you, to give this another chance.”

“E… I don’t know… I can’t even think…”

“You don’t have to say anything now. I know this is an awful time to ask you to make a decision. But I had to tell you this and when you can make a decision, then make it.”

“Everything is falling apart.” I leaned back in my chair and looked in his eyes. “And now you want everything you said you didn’t want. Do you really mean all this?”

I dropped a tear and he brushed it off my cheek with his thumb. “I’m done lying,” he said.

“I can’t think.”

“Then don’t. Not just yet.”

He stayed with me all night. I lay awake in his arms and didn’t sleep. God, I’d missed those arms. I missed how the shape of his body fit the shape of mine when we lay in bed together. I missed his little beer belly because it made for such good hugs and snuggles and tickles. I missed the smell of him and the way he tangled his hands in my hair when he kissed me, and that he always knew exactly how to kiss me. I missed the way he rolled over in the middle of the night and grabbed me close, buried his head in my neck and made growly noises while he tickled my neck with his tongue. I missed his touch, his voice, his snores, the way he spreads out like a starfish on my bed and I have to shove him at least once a night. I missed playing with his hair in the morning and making the curls fluff out.

I’d missed him like crazy.

Everything he said to me that night was beautiful, and it’s hard for me to believe that he would say those things just because they’re what he thinks I want to hear. I say that because E has really never been that great at knowing what I wanted to hear. There were times I couldn’t shut him up spouting off his own opinions about a subject we’d beaten to a pulp, times when all I ever needed was for him to apologize for something and instead he’d get defensive. So when he said these things – I want to believe him. I want to trust him. But I don’t know how yet.

I don’t want to go back to E just to have affection and companionship again. I could have Kayak for that – things are going well and could be very promising. I could take that chance and not worry every day about being betrayed by E again. Kayak is an unknown. He could lie to me, hurt me or break my heart just as easily as E could. And chances are it would hurt a little less than the pain and indignity of being hurt by E a second time.

So I’m freaking terrified.

My bedroom is painted a medium-deep blue color, and has room-darkening fabric shades and navy curtains. It gets no sun until the late afternoon when the light hits the west window. On Tuesday morning, E and I lay there together, holding one another and sharing pillows and covers in what we always called our cocoon. Wrapped up with him in the isolated, darkened room, I felt a small peace. Outside the door there were choices and changes, inside the room I was protected by the arms of a man who loved me and wanted me to love him again. I don’t know if it was fear of the choices and changes outside or my love for that man inside that made me want to stay in there forever.

I wrote this some time ago, just for the heck of it. The events are real, the dialogue is as accurate as I can remember. It’s rather profane – but then, the circumstances of the day made profanity not only warranted but necessary. Actual events occurred in January 2007. Enjoy.

————–

I wake up and squint. I’d forgotten that his room gets so bright in the morning, and out of habit I roll over to bury my face in his shoulder, but he’s not there. And in my squinty stupor, I’m confused and don’t remember what I’m doing in his bed alone.

Mike is talking from the doorway; it’s not Tim snoring and making grumbly noises in his sleep. “Becky, wake up.”

“I’m ‘wake,” I mumble, grabbing my cell phone to check the clock. It’s only eight, and we’re supposed to be at the airport to get him at one-thirty.

“You’re not gonna be happy about this.” I sit up straight, pulling my t-shirt down to make sure I’m not flashing my boyfriend’s brother, and look at the face he’s making. All five of the brothers do this, the half-smirk I-can’t-believe-this-is-happening-but-boy-am-I-pissed look. When two of them start eyeing each other like this, it’s best to duck and cover.

“What happened?”

“He and his guys got smashed last night in Baltimore and missed their plane because they were all hungover and didn’t hear their damn alarms.”

“You’re kidding. You must be kidding.” He shakes his head. “Do they have a later flight?”

“On standby for a nine o’clock. And he is fucking DEAD when he gets back. He’s highest ranked so he’s responsible for all of it.”

When your boyfriend is deployed to the Middle East, you don’t want to hear anything about him with the word “dead” in the same sentence. Even though I know he’s perfectly safe and back on American soil, I shiver involuntarily.

“What will happen?” I ask in a small voice.

“He’ll get his ass handed to him. They’ll probably threaten to revoke his promotion.”

“They wouldn’t actually do it, would they?”

“They might.”

He is military too, so I believe him. I narrow my eyes and a thought occurs to me. “Why didn’t he call me?”

“Because he’s a pussy and was afraid you’d be pissed at him, so he let me do the dirty work.”

I point out that I can be pissed at him no matter who tells me that he screwed up. Mike looks madder than I feel though, and I’m a little grateful for that because it will make me look like a good girlfriend.

“What about your parents?” I ask. They got into Kansas City last night like we did and are staying at a hotel in town.

“I’m gonna call them now. They’re gonna be so pissed. This is just like him. Oh, his ass is DEAD.”

Small shiver again.

I make up my mind that I will be the best girlfriend ever today and I will be the only one who does not get mad at him. Mike leaves the room, still shaking his head and grumbling, and I flop back down onto the pillows. If a seven o’clock flight becomes a nine o’clock flight, then we’ll pick him up at three instead of at one. That’s okay. Nothing to worry about.

My phone rings at nine-thirty.

“Hi babe.”

“Baby,” he says weakly. “I can’t fucking believe this.”

I politely refrain from making an it’s-your-own-damn-fault comment. “You didn’t get the nine o’clock flight, I guess?” I’m hoping he’s on the tarmac and departure was delayed.

“We’ll be on the ten-thirty. To Cleveland.”

“To Cleveland.”

“Yeah.”

“And then?”

“There’s a one o’clock to Kansas City.”

“That’s cutting it close, isn’t it?”

“I guess. Not like we have much choice.”

We’re silent for a minute and it’s as though we’re staring at each other, face to face, trying to read each other’s eyes. “Are you okay?” I ask.

“I’m pretty much dead, you know that.” Everyone, stop saying that! “Everybody is gonna be so pissed, I know Mike is and my parents and you are and –“

“I never said I was pissed at you.” Because I am a good girlfriend.

“And when I go to the base for in-processing tomorrow I am gonna get reamed. You have no idea.”

“Mike told me about it.” I pause. “But you’re almost home. You’ll be home tonight. And yeah, you did a stupid thing this morning and you’re gonna take some shit for it but I’m still so glad you’re coming back and I can’t wait to see you.” That should do it.

And it does. “I can’t wait to see you either, babe.”

“It’ll be okay, you know that. You’ll be home safe, that’s all that matters to me.”

“I’m really sorry about this.”

We talk for a few more minutes and I get a few laughs out of him when he tells me about going out with the guys in Baltimore last night, their first real drinking expedition in four months. He still sounds so hungover and it’s almost funny to both of us by the time we hang up.

I deliver the update to Mike, he calls his parents again, and we wait. It starts to snow again and we watch the weather on TV, checking out Baltimore and Cleveland especially.

Mike gets the call at ten-twenty that Tim is sitting on the plane bound for Cleveland, and I am happy. Still irritated by the situation, Mike flips wildly through the channels in no particular order while I’m bouncing off the walls. Every time I’ve visited Tim I’ve had my car with me and I’m getting anxious, wanting out of the house so I can kill time anywhere but here with my fingers tapping.

I ask Mike if I can borrow his car – he drove us out here – and he says no: it’s too old and has a weird brake and I shouldn’t drive it in the snow. I offer to bring him Taco Bell and he just grumbles.

My phone rings at one-thirty. “Not gonn’ believe this,” Tim slurs.

“You’re supposed to be in the air right now,” I say flatly.

“We had a delayed landing in Cleveland and just missed the flight to Kansas City. They wouldn’t hold it for us because they wanted to got out ahead of the weather. More snow coming.” His tongue sounds furry.

I smack my head in frustration and Mike is mouthing “What?” at me across the room, over and over. Covering the phone with my hand, I tell him what’s happened and he stomps down the hall. “Tell him I’m calling Mom and Dad!” he yells from the kitchen.

“I heard him,” Tim says.

“So what happens now?”

“I’m in the airport bar. Having a beer with the guys.”

“No, I mean when are you going to get here?” I’m starting to sound ticked-off and I take a few deep breaths. It doesn’t sound like his first beer of the day and I doubt it’s going to be his last.

If your dumb ass misses another plane because you’ve been drinking…

He laughs wryly. “Well, it’s funny, I could get on a plane to Saint Louis in an hour.”

I perk up. “Can we just come meet you there? We’ll drive back!”

“I can’t leave without the guys and I have to be at the base at eight tomorrow morning.”

“So it’s not actually funny then.” I sound cranky again. Must. Stop. Must be good girlfriend. “When is the next flight to Kansas City?”

“Seven-thirty.” He pauses. “Yeah. I’m pretty much dead.” I don’t say anything, thinking of how I’m doing the dirty work now, having to tell Mike. “See, you ARE pissed at me now,” he says. “I’m supposed to be with you and with my family right now and I’m not and it’s all my fault.”

“Look, you screwed up, but I’m not mad at you,” I say carefully. “When do you land here, then?”

“Ten.”

“So you’ll be drinking in the airport bar for the next six hours?” I tease, trying to lighten up. I am SUCH a good girlfriend, the only person not mad at him today! “You’ve never had a problem killing time in a bar, babe. But don’t spend all your combat pay, I’m counting on a few nice dinners at least.” He laughs and promises to call me in a few hours with an update. We hang up.

And if you miss that damn plane… I take a deep breath.

“GODDAMMIT!” I scream, throwing the phone into the couch. “THAT IDIOT!”

“Knew you’d get pissed,” Mike says from the kitchen, and I walk in to tell him the news.

“Goddammit indeed.” He cracks open a beer and smirks.

And we wait.

Got my headlights shining
Down an old dirt road
Smoke my cigarettes, I should quit I know

I’m not a smoker, really, in the sense that I’ve never said “Damn, I need a smoke.” I went to a hookah bar a couple of times when I had friends that liked the hummus and pita there. Once in awhile, my then-boyfriend Alan and I used to sit out on his porch, thread our legs through the rungs of the railing and share a cigar on a nice night. I don’t particularly care for cigars, but on the nights when he’d have a feel for one, those were always the nights to relax. They were so few and far between for us.

The radio’s playing
Old country songs
Someone’s leavin’, someone’s cheatin’, on and on

Tim secretly wanted to be a cowboy and he still refuses to admit it. He owns a Stetson that he won’t ever wear because it’s too precious, and he smoked like the Marlboro man. His ringtone is Big and Rich’s “Save a Horse, Ride A Cowboy,” but he probably hasn’t ridden a horse since he was a kid visiting an apple farm with tame pony rides for a dollar. Tim is also the one who got me started on country music. I joke sometimes that it’s the one good thing he left me out of that relationship. We listened to it on the radio the night we met, when I ended up riding with him to the next bar the group was hitting. As we began to see each other more I really didn’t mind it, but I know it didn’t escape his notice that I, a loud-and-proud car singer, didn’t know any of the words and never had any on when I drove. Until, that is, I started singing along with Rascal Flatts’ “Life is a Highway” in his truck one day.

“When did you start singing with country?” he asked incredulously.

“Come on,” I said. “Everyone knows this song. Tom Cochrane. Sixth grade.”

But then I sang with The Wreckers on “Leave the Pieces.” And then Montgomery Gentry. And Sugarland. And Toby Keith. When I next plugged the iPod into the car stereo, I surprised him Rascal Flatts’ “Me and My Gang,” which made him smile while he blew his cigarette smoke out the window.

I think I might like
The quiet nights
Of this empty life

After Tim and I broke up, I couldn’t listen to country music for a little while. Everything was a song we sang with, especially the song on my phone that served as his ringtone: Kenny Chesney’s “Summertime,” which was the perfect song to describe that summer we were together, bare feet on the dashboard and young love in an old Ford. He was the first guy I dated who was a real smoker, and it surprised me a bit that it really wasn’t such a bone of contention as I had thought. Never in the house, of course, and the military had made him quite fastidious about his hygiene, so he never smelled like it. I swear, the guy showered three times a day. But ever after, whenever I went into a bar and smelled cigarettes, I smelled him. He always said he was going to quit.

Someday, maybe somebody will love me like I need
And someday, I won’t have to prove this, somebody will see
All my worth, but until then I’ll do just fine on my own
With my cigarettes and this old dirt road

Melissa – also not a smoker – and I used to duck out of work and take smoke breaks. We called them Mental Health Breaks, figuring that if smokers got to leave the building and indulge a vice, we shouldn’t be denied that fifteen-minute break just because we didn’t. But once in awhile, on a really bad day, we would bum cigarettes from people in the smoking area and pause for a little slow-down to offset whatever stress was driving us crazy that day. After Tim, I was stressed a lot and used those Marlboro Ultra Lights on the days when the Klonopin wasn’t enough.

“Is someone SMOKING in here?” asked one of the directors when we walked back to the department one day.

“Um, no, that’s us,” we said, not making eye contact. “We were just outside.”

“You guys SMOKE?”

“It’s been a rough day,” I said, “and it’s legal for us to step outside to inhale a few carcinogens. We have to do that since we’re not allowed to drink at work.”

See I left another
Good man tonight
I wonder if he’ll miss me, lord knows I tried

E is a smoker. When I worked at The Restaurant, we waitresses knew we could always find him out back if we had new tickets and he wasn’t in the kitchen. I never smoked at work there because I figured it wouldn’t be good for tips if I went up to my customers in a non-smoking restaurant reeking of cigarettes. The first night that E and I hung out after work, we walked down the street to a bar and he lit up after ordering our drinks. I made the “gimme” motion with my hand and he looked at me strangely.

“You smoke?” He gave me the eyebrow.

“Not usually. But it’s been a long day,” I said. He lit one for me with a pull on his own, and handed it over.

“You’re cooler than I thought,” he said while I sent a puff into the air.

A few months later, I backed up into him when he was holding a cigarette, and I accidentally burned my hand. The triangle-shaped burn settled into a heart-shaped scar that I still have today.

But I think that maybe
The thing that I did wrong
Was put up with his bullshit for far too long

In a candid picture from his friend’s wedding, E is behind the bride and groom, holding a cigarette and a pint of Guinness. This pretty much explains him. Most nights I would find E on the porch at some point, smoking a Marlboro Light, checking his voicemails and returning calls. If he wasn’t on the phone, I would sometimes join him but rarely have a smoke myself. I could tell by the way he was smoking if something – the voicemails, work, even me – was pissing him off. I always found him out on the porch after those last fights we had, either angrily sucking down the smoke or staring at the ash thoughtfully as it burned down. Always, he would flick the end of his cigarette off the porch and over my fence into the street with the practiced motion of one who had been doing it since he was fifteen.

I think I might like
The quiet nights
Of this empty life

A few nights ago at home, I sat on the porch and angrily blew smoke at the lantern lights I had put up to make it more romantic out there.

Someday, maybe somebody will love me like I need
And someday, I won’t have to prove this, somebody will see

Things fell apart with E right around the time Tim got his discharge from the Air Force and moved back here. He started coming over again. It’s usually after he’s been drinking; he’ll call me on his way home from wherever in the middle of the night, half thinking about a booty call and half just wanting someone to listen to him whine about how his life sucks.

“You’re still the only person who gets me,” he says.

“I know.”

We sit in silence for a minute while he half-heartedly tries to rub my leg seductively. When I don’t respond, he sighs and puts his arm around me, and I rest my head on his shoulder.

“Do you have a smoke?”

“You said you quit,” I say accusingly.

“I did. I just smoke when I’ve been drinking sometimes.”

I walk into the kitchen. “Here.”

“You don’t smoke Lights.”

“They’re E’s. He left them.”

“Have one with me?”

“I don’t really want one.” I let him go out to the porch alone.

All my worth, but until then I’ll do just fine on my own
With my cigarettes and this old dirt road

He lights up in the bar on Friday night; we’re there with Ben and Melissa just like old times. “Want one?” he asks.

“No, thanks.”

I drive him to the next bar, then back to his truck two hours later. When he gets out, I can smell the bar smoke that clings to both of us, in our hair and on our skin.

I don’t wanna sleep
I don’t wanna dream
About the things that I used to need
And I ain’t gonna cry
Or gonna live the lies
I’m just gonna drive

There’s a pack of Marlboro Ultras buried in the Jeep’s center console, and I fumble for them at a stoplight. I find them just before the green arrow, and pluck the matches I snitched from the bar out of my bag. It’s hard to light up with a match while I’m driving, and I wait until the next stop. I can see his headlights in my rearview mirror and I squint, forgetting the cigarette. The light turns green and I drive on while he follows me.

‘Cause someday, maybe somebody will love me
And someday, I won’t have to prove
All my worth, but until then I’ll do just fine on my own
With my cigarettes
Oh, and this old dirt road

————————————-
Song lyrics from “Cigarettes”

The Wreckers, Stand Still, Look Pretty