Post Love

I left my wife three years ago.
I write about the women that fill up the void.

Post Love Forty Three

I kept in touch with Celine. She was fun. Part of me started to think that maybe she was what I needed, for a while. Nothing too difficult or serious. Just a simple enjoyment of eachother. It was easy for us to get along. We made eachother laugh, liked the same surface things, had some of the same friends but not too many. I asked Celine if she wanted to hang out again. She said yes immediately. We met back at the park again, in the subtle spring  breeze. We sat on a bench and talked, rolled a joint, walked to the corner for beers. Simple enjoyment. We walked around the park laughing and talking until silence set in at last. Then her face grew serious. Did you tell anyone about us? I told her I hadn’t. It was mostly true. I hadn’t told anyone, but I had confirmed with some that asked. My boyfriend broke up with me. I was less surprised than she was. She asked me again. I said no again. She said she slept with Sam, too, and the boyfriend found out. Celine didn’t seem very upset. The expression on her face reflected perhaps the loss of a nice scarf, or a rip in an old pair of favorite jeans. There was no real remorse. There was meaningless teenage love, dead. To myself, the news mattered little. If anything, it was good news. The guilt of the boyfriend was gone, the sneaking around was gone, and she’d fucked my friend Sam, eliminating any concern of a real commitment towards her. She fucked him and then came back to me. That was fine by me. 

We walked around, smoked the joint, and settled on a bench by the water. It was now completely dark out. Less people, less commotion, less lights, the breeze rippling the black lake past midnight, we had been there for over an hour and we hadn’t kissed. 

There was a hint of distance in her body language that night. There were no extended looks into my eyes, no real contact. There was a question growing in the back of my mind, slowly seeping into my consciousness. What was going on? Why hadn’t we kissed? Was she being different? These types of questions would have ruined me any other night with any other girl. But this was Celine. I’d already kissed Celine. I’d fucked her. And we were spending time together again. This was nice. Why wasn’t she welcoming this? I decided that I was just being insecure. She was a young girl waiting on the move. My move. There was nothing to worry about. I leaned in and kissed her cheek.

She didn’t move. No smile washed over her face. She tensed up and turned to me. I was already gone. Buried deep in endless anxiety, burning up my nerves. You thought this was a date, she said. I don’t remember what I said. I don’t know what anyone would say to that. But it seemed like a revelation to her. To Celine, the idiot. I thought we were just… you know… hanging out. I told her we were. She paused. I’m dating Sam. I was baffled. Then why are we here, I asked her. I don’t know… I thought we were friends. I didn’t bother. The silence got to her more than anything I could have said. She blurted it out. Okay I’m not dating Sam. She paused again. But I want to date him.

Celine wasn’t an idiot. Celine was crazy. She was full of shit. And I was too dumbfounded to care. I was still fumbling with the denial. She had done it again. Woman in all her terrifying might had cast her dull blade into me again, deep enough to set loose all the hurt again, all of the denial I’d been building up inside for all these years. Celine started to apologize. She felt bad. I felt worse. She kept talking, asking questions, and I was sinking fast. I must have looked like a sad old dog. She asked me what I thought was going to happen between us. Drained and hopeless, I gave up. I answered her without question, without filter, without caution. I don’t know. I just wanted to kiss you. 

She smiled. Okay, she said, and kissed me. What was wrong with her? I was beyond lost trying to make sense of her, sense of myself, sense of anything. I kissed her back and I hated myself for it. There is nothing more miserable than a pity kiss after being rejected something you didn’t even care for, something you’d already had, something you just needed to get through the week. When even those bare minimum expectations fall out of your hands, when they are replaced with sad, cold lips touching, you can feel in your sorry sore bones that you’re truly at the bottom of the love barrel. 

I told her I was leaving. She said she was, too, and started to walk with me. She still didn’t get it. She still needed to prolong the torture. I had depleted any sense of pride, any manhood, anything that would have made me tell her off, would have allowed me to walk away and walk away alone. Instead, I walked her to the subway like the gentleman, like the sucker, like the guy that gets trampled and apologizes for being in the way. I said goodbye without looking up and finally walked away. I walked all the way home, miserably alone, drained of everything but that old familiar feeling.

The next time I saw Celine, she was with Sam. She ignored me completely as I spoke to Sam and wondered if he knew. I caught her online a few days later and told her that I wasn’t mad at her, that there was no need to ignore eachother, that we can be civil. She seemed to appreciate the gesture and told me that her and Sam were dating. He knew we’d slept together, but he didn’t mind. Relief finally set in. Everything was going to be alright.

I’ve seen Sam and Celine a handful of times since. She hasn’t acknowledged me. We’ve stood beside eachother at parties, we’ve both been part of the same conversations, but we haven’t spoken. We’ve been cold ghosts. I don’t know why. I don’t think I ever will.

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