Don’t, I told myself. This is really dumb and your dad doesn’t need you to fight his battles. Just let it be.
I kept telling myself stuff, trying to lay out my case and then I thought, is any of this going to make a difference? Is there any way I can stop myself from going and talking to Joanne, even if it won’t do any good, even if it will somehow make things worse?
That really put things in perspective. I definitely couldn’t resist, so I could save myself a lot of mental effort and just go talk to her. Then I got into a different debate with myself, because I at least wanted to say I tried to restrain myself, so how much effort did that require, had I already reached that threshold and—
Then she started to leave, so time was up. Ugh, don’t remind me.
I had been hovering awkwardly in the doorway, and my fight or flight responses kicked in when she grabbed her to go order and started to turn around. Thankfully, my survival instincts picked flight. Even though she wasn’t my favorite person at the moment, I didn’t want to beat up a woman, if I even could.
I ran outside and that protected me for a few nice seconds. Until she was outside too. This hadn’t been a great plan.
As soon as she got outside, I said or yelped a hello and then she jumped because she hadn’t been expecting someone there. I jumped even though I knew she was there because, I don’t know why, maybe to be polite. Yeah, I’d go with that. And then we stared at each other, awkward and unsure.
In this and many other scenarios, I was the one to find my voice first.
“Would it make a difference if I went full on pathetic and held a boombox over my head,” I began, and she seemed a little lost, but that was okay because I was going to keep going. Only… “Dammit,” I muttered. I hadn’t even seen that movie, but now I was drawing a blank for another example. “Uh, or something else I stole from a movie?”
She relaxed and smiled sadly. “No, I’m sorry. This wasn’t what I expected.”
“You kinda did.” I’d already established my lack of filter to her, so she didn’t seem surprised I said that. “You said you were waiting on grandchildren.”
“My oldest has been married for over five years,” she explained, still wearing that sad smile. “My youngest around three. It’s complicated.” The dreadedit’s complicatedcliché. I probably made a face and she laughed at herself for saying that, then continued. “I’ve been waiting for a while. Didn’t know if it would ever happen.”
Correctly sensing that even if that was the end of the story, I didn’t let anything go that easily, Joanne motioned me to follow her towards her car and I did.
Seemed like she was going to put her food in the vehicle, but she couldn’t immediately find her keys in her purse, so she gave up and just put the takeout bag on the roof of the car. That wasn’t another thing we had in common because I didn’t have a purse. If I had a purse, because screw gender norms or because I was a girl, then I would totally never be able to find my keys in my purse too.
I was the one who started this conversation, but at the same I didn’t really want to have it. I spent a second thinking about how it was nice that even if I was a girl I could still date Luke. Bisexuality was great. Well, for some. Like Luke.
Uh oh, if I were a girl, would that mean I’d like women because I’m gay?
A possibility, but I just couldn’t picture myself liking girls.
Okay.
“I just don’t understand,” I said. Both liking girls and that, “Dad seemed to really like you and you really liked him back.”
Joanne displayed a new smile, apologetic, which was just as bad as the sad smile. “I suppose that’s not enough in this case.”
Yeah, that was what I didn’t understand. “Why not? There’s phones and internet. You can talk to someone more than you’d actually see them in person.”
Didn’t look like she believed that. “Your dad doesn’t even have a Facebook,” she reminded me in a true, inconvenient way.
“I’m pretty sure my dad would figure out video chatting for you. Technology is great. And kids get less cute every day, you know that?” Ugh. I took a breath and paced around.
She could go there for a while, and then when the kid was less cute, come back. That wasn’t a great plan. What if she didn’t come back? But it’s not like we could keep her here against her will. Okay, that shouldn’t even be something I need to make clear. My brain is weird.
I kicked at the dirt on the ground and walked back over to her.
We were back to the sad smile as she gently told me, “This seems tough right now, but it will probably get easier very soon. We barely even know each other, and you have such big things ahead of you.”
Hi, sad smile, meet confused frown. “It doesn’t matter that I’m sad?”
“No, I’m saying you won’t be for long.” She opened her purse, making an effort to look for her keys again. “I’ll be a distant memory if anything at all.”
You don’t know me, you don’t know my life, I wanted to protest like a possibly fake guest on a trashy daytime talk show. Joanne made it seem so easy. Making it seem so easy was generally the opposite of Ryan.
I made a helpless noise, trying to say something more better. “But it all feels, I don’t know, right. Isn’t there a part of you that wishes it could work, that wanted it to?”
