L.Elena

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 11:04:01 GMT

i gave him...so many opportunities to tell me...whatever it was that he had to tell me... because i knew that something was there... something that rose up through his throat, bypassed his lips, and came out through his eyes instead...

so i never came right out and asked... i needed rides from here to there... or i left something in his car... or i asked for a favor... or i called a meeting... or i came up with some little tactic... that may have lead to two seconds alone so that he could say it...

and it's my fault... that i would turn on my defense mechanism...joke around, poke him, tickle him... which, all too often, turned into holding and kissing... because he is way better at kissing than he is at telling the truth...and i became way more receptive to that than hearing the truth... i would forget why we were there... and tend not to care anymore... until the next day, when i cared too much... because we were back to... even further back, than square one...

it was nice to play pretend... because i did need him at that moment... i needed to believe that someone did care... not to say that he didn't, in fact, care... but something more than that... i needed the attention... i needed an outlet... that i had lost somewhere down the line... and sometimes i think that we weren't even talking to each other...just talking out loud to ourselves...

even before the whispering started... i could hear the whispers... because as much as every one seemed to like the idea of us being friends... it was pretty obvious that something was not right... and the closer that i got to the truth, the more that i didn't want to hear it...

i thought that maybe if i liked him enough... not to say that i didn't like him to begin with, even before we started this mess, and even still now.... if i liked him enough... everything would magically fade away... and we could be friends... because he would take for granted that he was or would be forgiven...or, on the other side of it, if i liked him enough... people would notice... and he would be guilt tripped into telling the truth... i never thought he would carry the guilt this long...

denial can do strange things to a person... like every week when i decide that i am not going to care if he ignores me... but i become desperate for the truth... because at least then he would be talking to me... or when i decide that i'll try hating him for a while... that never lasts because i catch myself...or, even better, some one else will point out that i am staring... more specifically, gazing at him sheepishly...

and it's not that i am all "in love"... like i'm sure some people think... it's more like the notion that i got in my head... that we would be friends... i wanted with him what he had with someone else, and what i thought that i once had myself... but we totally fucked it up...

in the past year... i tried to push that notion far, far away... i had tried not to think about it... and convinced myself how very foolish and impossible it would be to have that relationship with him... especially considering...

he said...if someone has a crush on you...you should try to crush back... and i wanted to tell him that that doesn't work because someone always ends up getting hurt... look at us...

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 11:02:48 GMT

he tells me..."don't even think about sucking face with him"...
sucking face?...i don't know where this originates from but i'm sure not fond of the phrase...
kissing him?...so i thought about it...
"why?"...
"because, you make everyone uncomfortable"...
everyone...i guess they took a survey on the subject...

we play this game of "telephone" where sarcastic messages are sent from one end of our line up to the other...until two songs, a 25 minute interlude, and the intro to (technically) song number 3 later, we leave...

i have a dance or two...eventually, i pull up a chair and he says "i thought you had learned your lesson about wearing skirts"...
startled at the fact that he actually directed his attention my way, i stuttered a no...you mean he was actually listening to me?..

several snide comments, a couple of spilled drinks, and a hopeless attempt to analyze an inexplicable phenomenon fill the hours...
the natives grow restless...

in the midst of silent moments and strangely familiar conversation,
he announces "you're my pillow" and rest his head on my shoulder...
i'm stuck...and i realize, this may be the uncomfortableness that he was referring to...
i nonchalantly shrug him off, with a sliver of coldness i imagine, and wonder how i get myself into these situations...

conversation comes and goes...

he stands up as a signal that we are leaving...and i ask for just one more song...
disapprovingly he reprimands in an inebriate decibel, "you are not going to ask him for a ride, you know you're just trying to make-out with him...that's not going to happen"...
somewhere beyond my left shoulder i feel him turn around...

i melt to the ground and mingle with the evaporating puddles of cherry sake sour...

i can't sort out whose side he is on...
is he just being a big brother?...is he looking out for his friend or just trying to keep the other one from doing something stupid?...

i wish he would let me make the same mistakes in hopes that this time it will be different, but he won't...
if he does in fact like me, i wish that he didn't...
i wish that he would offer some insight to what goes on in his little brain, but he doesn't...

it is that silence that comes after a whining child is slapped in a department store...

nothing is said...another song comes on and all feet shuffle toward the door...the open air is sobering...

the corsica makes it home, i say good-bye, and wonder if he wants me to thank him...

Incomplete and left unsaid...

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 11:01:48 GMT

this letter has been months in the making...yet it is not finished...and i don't know how else to get it to you...i can't decide between all my impersonal options so i'll just put it here...
you are right...you are always right about so many things...
i am bad with confrontation...i dread that things may get worse (if that is possible) in any conflict that i may attempt to resolve...
i don't know if it is cowardess, fear of rejection...denial...something...
every day i sit myself down and say...today i will call...but i never call...
every night i try to formulate in my head the perfect conversation...what the hell am i going to say?...what the hell can i say?...and i fall asleep wondering what went wrong with my day...
in some ways we have been here before...so i figured...this is just one of those times of distance...a vacation...and everything will be fine...
and there is no doubt in my mind that everything will be fine...
but...as this wedge of time, distance, silence grows...i find it harder to build a bridge back to where we were or where we will go...
at this point, it may be quite obvious, but generally, i am not good at maintaining a relationship with another female...i don't have many girl friends...call me gender bias...but i can honestly say that you are a divine exception...you are beyond any of my silly notions...you know me...and somewhere in all the ciaos of life, i know that you understand and accept me for all my faults...
i think that you did, in a way, "scare" me away with the word "depressed"...because, as self absorbed as it may sound...i feel that i failed...i feel that i was not there when you needed me...and i can't take that back...i can't take back all the things that i didn't say at that moment when you would have been listening...and i was not listening when you had things to say...and it pisses me off...i was somewhere else...
i don't know that i want to fix you because i wouldn't know how...and i don't think that you are broken to begin with...you are perfect...you are an old soul...you are as you always have been...except now those "hidden" qualities and strengths are surfacing and re-representing themselves...but they were always there...
i do read your journal and think...i am such an asshole...i am missing out on the routine and the growth in your life...and it makes me bitter...not because you are sifting through the ups and downs without me...but, because it was the accumulation of small decisions that i made, eliminating myself from the equation...
i shoot myself in the foot because, under any other circumstance...i would call...i would say...tell me what to do...this time it is not the so-called best guyfriend running away...it is me...what do i say, what can i do to apologize, to mend what i have allowed to fray?...
and i don't know what to say...i am sorry wouldn't hurt...but it's not enough...i know that there is some sequence of words that you could stir that would fit perfectly, i just can't hear them right now...

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:59:04 GMT

Here you are, by my side.
I can’t even look at you
much less talk to you.
How did it happen
to be this way?
There has been no
other way, I recall.
Except when...
You held my hand
once, twice.
I would hold you, kiss you,
keep you close to me like
I would never see you again.
That is where I am now.

I will never see you in the nighttime,
in the moment, in the second that
there is nothing else
but you and me.
I just want to shake you,
wake you up.
I should just pinch myself
and walk away.
I turn to you, make a silly face,
the words never come.
You probably hate how
I rear my sad eyes just when
you think we’ve moved on.

Maybe I can’t move on
because of all the things that
never were and all the things...
I can’t interpret your sigh,
was it contentment?
regret? exhaustion?
I wonder if you felt my smile,
my jubilation.
And this is why you run.
Some how this is my fault,
something you started,
things that you said,
a path that you made.
I want to blame you and
thank you in the same breath.

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:56:51 GMT

So I find

That I may be alone again

Alone...among other friends

But not him
I wonder how I made it through

the nine months without him

A whole summer...a whole semester

Not a weekend...not a movie...not a phone call
Now I don't fit anymore

It has always been three:

One blushing boy crushing on a girl

who is crushing on his friend
I sit here looking at her

Seeing myself...three years ago

With this boy by her side...he just wishes for one chance

As she looks across the table

at the one whose attention she craves

It's like a movie...a fucking movie
That was me

It makes me sick

It makes me sad

It makes me wonder
Why do I do this to myself?

I want to say something

I want to say...why do you do this shit?

Why can't you just be honest?

If you like this girl...tell her

If you don't...let her go

I am still hanging on
I want you to say

That you care about me

That I mean something to you

That I am important

I know...that I must be

But I don't feel it from you

Sometimes

Maybe I do
Because you must know that you hurt me

That I cry because of you

Or because of me

Because I care so much about you

Your friendship

I can't lose that again
I have been counting the days

It's been seven months

I knew that one day

There would be a girl

I would be "dethroned"

Maybe there would be a boy

I would not call as much
But it still hurts

After three days

I feel the distance

I wonder if you will push me away

Because I do love you

Maybe not in love

But love still
I am so afraid

That I can't sit there and watch

I am so jealous

I want you to be happy

That is all that I want

But I know the formula
It hurts so much

To think that you might cast me aside again

That you will have to chose

You won't chose me

That is what pains me
I want to say to this girl

Get out while you still can

Or maybe she will be the one

I know that I am not

I am not stupid
But to not have him in my life

It rips me up inside

I wonder about him sometimes

He can't hug me now

And that is all that I want from him.

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:54:13 GMT

to be posted

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:53:50 GMT

to be posted

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:53:29 GMT

to be posted

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:53:01 GMT

to be posted

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:52:39 GMT

to be posted

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:52:13 GMT

to be posted

cielo — Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:51:31 GMT

to be posted