Terrible Things

February 6, 2016

I met a man one night in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. And it was a magical evening -- the one stories are told from. Whether he felt the same in those moments for me as I did him, it didn't matter. I was experiencing moments I would never come across again.

I've never met a stranger who could hold a conversation with such poise and confidence. I've known another young man who has been friends with me for two years -- but never had we talked like this stranger and I. Was it like? Love? Lust? It was none listed - just the existence of two people (who had never met before) enjoying a lovely evening in the town.

We danced. We drank. We talked. We laughed. We agreed. We disagreed. We embraced. We said 'goodbye.'

He was strangely everything I couldn't believe existed in one person: attractive features, fearless intelligence, and a strong sense of individuality. Hadn't it been our beliefs or other differences, I would have said "yes" to anything he asked of me. Foolish thinking? No. Just the truth.

What killed me was how comfortable I was to be honest to him. To be an open book. To listen to what he had to say and watch him be interested in what I had to say.

I had never been more free to speak my mind to him than any other of my male companions. Perhaps it was because I was blunt with him from the first message, or maybe it was the buzzing of the evening. Who knows. But whatever it was, for me, it was complete magic.

I don't mind if he wasn't as fond of me as I was of him -- people are different and have different tastes and desires. I respect that and wouldn't ask for them to change for me. I didn't want him to be something he was not and I didn't want him to be afraid to tell me our evening was just one moment in time: never to be repeated.

The next day I was someone different. And I don't know how I got there.  How  strange that in a matter of hours -- I'm someone else.  But a man like him are few and far between, so I must settle on the memories and move forward. Another part of me wishes I had never agreed to meet him, because in doing so, I met someone that was the closest to my hopes, but far from them in the end. I don't want to repeat such an evening again. I should have been content with my small world-- it's much safer there.

I'm a writer. He knows that. I write what matters to me; what's severely important.  What changes me.  In one evening, a stranger was a vision of what I wanted.  What about what I needed? I don't know what that is anymore.

I'll get over him. That's the easy part. It's forgetting that will take one day at a time until he becomes what he was to me before: a stranger.