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“Amen to that. I want to never have to pay a sewer bill again.”
The person working the counter strides over and takes our order. As we sit there and wait she tells me about the interviews that she went on while she was here. She’s hoping to get a call back to at least one of them but that means making the drive back here when she’s possibly just left. I wait a few more minutes before I broach the subject of Brad.
“Ok. Tell me what you think about everything going on with Brad.”
She lets out a sigh. “I just think you’re asking a lot of him texting you while he studies. I mean if he doesn’t pass he could lose his spot at that firm or he could even get fired. You never know what that work dynamic could be when it’s not the holidays and everyone doesn’t have a drink in their hand.”
I nod because she’s right. I just thought that once Brad and I got together everything would just fall into place, but I can see that’s not the case. Real life, jobs get in the way of that. I guess I was being a little foolish and naïve when I thought we’d spend aton of time together now that he’s back in the state and only two hours away. I hesitate to ask her my next question because I don’t even want to speak it into reality.
“Do you think he just wanted to have sex with me?”
She chokes on the water that she was sipping. I have to slap her on the back to stop the coughing. When she catches her breath she glares at me like it’s my fault I caused her to choke on the water. “Seriously?”
When she sees the look on my face she knows that I am. “I don’t think so. I don’t think he’s like that. I never got that vibe from him back in the day. I mean granted I haven’t seen him since we graduated but I mean he doesn’t look like an asshole in his profile online. And that’s a lot of trouble to go through just to have a one-night stand.”
I nod, hoping that she’s right. Maybe it’s silly to feel abandoned, but the beginning of a relationship is supposed to be easy and exciting. If that’s the case, why do I feel so lonely?
That night I’m laying in bed trying to decide what to say to Brad over messages. I tried calling him earlier but he didn’t answer and sent back a message saying he was at his study group meeting. I know for a fact that ended over an hour ago and he still hasn’t got back to me. I’ve gone from worried that he’s ghosting me to pissed off about feeling ignored in just a few hours after my lunch with Erica.
My fingers type furiously over the phone, sending Brad a long text message about my feelings.
Hey. So I’m trying not to overwhelm you because I know you said you were studying earlier and I don’t want to interrupt. I’m starting to wonder if everything is ok between us. The lasttime you disappeared on me you got another girlfriend and disappeared from my life.
I hit send before I can think too much about it. I’m just being honest with my feelings and how I am feeling. I put my phone down on the bed beside me and flip through the channels trying to decide on something to watch before I go to bed. A few minutes later, I feel my phone vibrate beside my leg. I slide my finger across the screen and open the message.
I told you I had to study tonight. You know that I have to pass the bar. This is a really stressful time and I need you to be patient and understand that I can’t put you first right now even if I wanted to.
I sit there and re-read the text message several times. There’s so much left open to interpretation in that text I don’t even want to try to decipher it.Why couldn’t he just tell me outright that’s not gonna happen?Before I respond, I need someone else to read it because maybe I’m coming from a place of annoyance and it’s coloring it in a bad light.Does he not want to put me first even if he wanted to?I take a screenshot of my text and his reply and send it over to Erica.
It only takes a second for my phone to ring. I answer it and put it on speakerphone so I can still look at the text message.
“I take it you read the text?” I ask her.
“Yeah. What the hell? I’m so confused by him right now. Even I don’t get him. He could be busy though—and tired. My brain would hurt from studying that long.”
I mumble into the phone. “Yeah, maybe.”
She huffs into the phone. “Nikki, are you happy right now?”
Right now at this exact moment? No. Am I happy overall? I have been. Could there be things in my life that are better? Yeah, but overall I have way more good days than bad. “Yeah?”
She makes a buzzer sound. “Wrong answer. You took way too long to decide if you were happy. I held off today but I’m just going to tell you since he sent that text. Do you think maybe you liked the idea of being with him more than actually being with him?”
I think about it for a second and I know my answer. “No. I really want to be with him.”
“Nikki you’re my best friend so I’m going to tell you straight. That text,” she pauses, “that text sounds just like how he sounded in college and he strung you along back then and then totally cut you off. History is repeating itself.”
Suddenly, I feel incredibly sad—she’s right. This does feel a lot like college when I would have to wait around hoping to hear from him. The only thing that’s different now is that we are older and I think I’m a little wiser. “I can’t live my life like that again, obsessing and wondering and worrying. That almost gave me an ulcer and then I felt like garbage that he was choosing to do that to me. Yeah I did some shit, and we probably should have handled it differently, but we were twenty-two and now we aren’t. We’re supposed to be better now.”
She’s quiet for a minute. “I think you know what you want to do. You don’t need to get my blessing or opinion. You need to decide what’s best for you. I’ll be here either way.”
I nod my head and then remember she can’t see me. “I know.”
“Promise me you’ll get some sleep and not obsess.” I can hear the worry in her voice. She and Meg were there for all of it and understand how heartbroken I was the first two times it didn’t work out. I don’t want any of us to endure it again.
“I promise I won’t. Get some rest. Let me know when you make it home tomorrow.”
“Laters, babe.” She hangs up the phone and I think about everything. It only takes me a minute this time to decide what Iwant to do. I refuse to play second fiddle to anything, including a test. If I was so important to him, he would make time for me. I don’t want him to think he can just put me on the backburner whenever the timing isn’t right or he has work or something else he “needs” to do. Maybe I’m selfish, but I want him to want to be with me—really be with me—not the idea of me.
