ROMEO'S HEART

Ethan - Changing Seasons

I'm sitting cross-legged on the floor. I seem to be doing this a lot recently. I've learned I have to meditate sitting up or I fall asleep. It's relaxing, sure, but not very helpful. Reading self-help books is embarrassing enough. Falling asleep instead of self-helping is fucking mortifying.

My latest book is trying to teach me how to diffuse tension. Apparently I need to find the triggers for my self-destructive anxiety and train myself to react differently.

Sounds easy, right?

Wrong.

Hardest goddamn thing I've ever done, and that's coming from the man who sat through fourteen performances of a four hour version of Hamlet on Broadway.

The assignment the book is challenging me to achieve is this: "Think about something you find upsetting."

This part is easy.

I think back to lunch today. Cassie was talking to Connor. Not flirting or even touching. Just talking. I was so angry, I felt like a cartoon character. The jealousy started like a ball of napalm in my stomach and flared up my torso. It spread up my neck and burned in my cheeks. I swear to God, if people looked hard enough, they would have seen steam coming from my ears.

I hate getting that jealous over nothing, but this is what I am. And what I am is why I'm doing this. Cassie deserves better, and I aim to give it to her.

I close my eyes and bring up an image of Cassie and Connor. They're talking. My jealousy flares. I try to turn the negative emotion into something positive.

In my mind, Cassie smiles at me.

Okay, that's good.

Then she returns to Connor and he touches her face.

I grind my teeth and try to stay positive.

"Modify your reaction," I remind myself. "Break the pattern of negativity and self-sabotage."

Cassie kisses Connor. She leans in to him and unbuttons his shirt.

Fucking fuck.

I keep breathing. Keep it together, Ethan.

Cassie morphs into Vanessa and Connor becomes Matt and suddenly I'm standing there like an imbecile as my girlfriend and best friend fuck in Matt's bed.

"Fucking shit!"

I throw the book across the room and rub my face.

I suck at this. Big time.

I want to talk to Cassie. Tell her what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. But then my stomach drops because I think she'll tell me not to bother, and that would kill me.

I lean back against the wall and sigh.

Nothing worth doing is ever easy, right?

I close my eyes and try again.

Approximately two minutes later, I put my fist through the wall.

<<<>>>

I've been staring at her all day. Fantasizing. She did Lady MacBeth's monologue in acting class today and was fucking magnificent. Her talent. Her heart. All of it turns me on.

I sit and watch her as she laughs with Phoebe about something. I've lost track of the conversation because I keep getting distracted by her mouth, or fingers, or eyes, or smile. And as I watch her being so easy and open with our friends, a different type of jealousy builds inside me and it has nothing to do with being afraid of losing her, and everything to do with being fucking terrified of never really having her.