After George I had a good year lull of reflection where I had minor flings and fleeting moments.
I began a couple of jobs in 2001 which is when I met Tara Hansen a quirky goth-metal enthusiast with a desire for tattoos and Davie Havoc. Her manners screamed Hot Topic corporate office, but I thought she was fun and awkwardly full of drama. We spent a great deal of our summer nights driving around Bellingham, being those kids you hate with the blaring music and no real destination, but out of the house.
With our cruising ammo blaring and my small 1996 periwinkle Ford Aspire we were set to paint the town if not red, a similar color, fuschia. We had odd run-ins with brief characters at the Ranch Room and the movie theater. We went to the midnight showing of "A Clockwork Orange," at the Pickford. It was that night that I met the boy that would haunt me for four years.
Matt wasn't your typical boy he had baggy pants, blue spiked hair, multiple piercings, and was instantly smitten with me. At the time I thought I was rebellious and punk! I had a deep obsession with blue hair and thought that it was the most aesthetically pleasing feature a boy could have. It was just about the only thing that could really turn my head and he was rocking it with confidence and just enough piercings to come off not as trendy.
When I kissed his earlobes my mouth would be full of four to five different metallic objects. He was infatuated with the type of music I couldn't stand, nu metal. We would stand in line at the grocery story and he'd start belting out lines from Slipknot and I'd bury my head deep into my shirt out of embarrassment. This would sometimes enforce his singing to greater volumes.
He was in high school while I was in college and with the two of living at home when I was on school vacations we couldn't always crash at each other's houses. My small vehicle acted as a portable room. We would sleep by the railroad tracks close to the bay in my car, cuddled up with sometimes just a jacket or two to cover us. The windows would fog up as we laid in the cold. The trains would act as a morning alarm clock (this was during the years before I had a cell phone).
It's true that with absence the heart grows founder and with months between us and hours of distance I found myself becoming more and more intimate with him. He'd visit when he could via bus to my dorm room. These were the times that I craved. No cold car rides, just him and me and an empty room.
There was no way that it would have lasted though because we were three years a part and he was still in high school. I thought that it was wrong for me to even be with him because of this and I told him that I didn't want to take away from his experiences. He told me that none of that mattered to him, but I insisted and with that I broke up my relationship with Matt. It was gut wrenching to find out that after we broke up to further prove his point he enrolled in running start to show how uninterested he was in the follies of high school.
We lost touch for a couple of years, but I still thought about him frequently. I would later come to realize that he had been doing the same thing. We reconnected in 2005 in Seattle. I had just graduated from college and moved to the Greenwood area. He was up for the first time in years from San Diego where he moved to be with a long term girlfriend, the same girl that he started dating after we broke up. He met her in Hawaii while on vacation and they instantly connected a the time and delighted in the fact that they were both bisexual, something I didn't realize about myself until years after.
I picked him up in Ballard outside of Archie McPhee's and from there we went to the EMP and hung out in my apartment reminiscing. The next night I picked him up from Pike Place and we again spent a great deal of time talking. I looked at him and told him how I felt and that I was sorry to inform him. He looked right through me and said, "I'm still in love with you and have been this whole time." He then went on about how he wasn't in love with his girlfriend and that he had been interested in me for years. He said that his current relationship was like a strong friendship, but that was it.
With that unveiling we did the worst thing two people could do when one is in a relationship. He cheated on his girlfriend that night and told me that he was going to move to Seattle to start over and that we would be able to see each other again. I felt horrible and excited at the same time, this was what I was dreaming about for years. I had been playing the "what if" game for so long and finally I had an answer.
Suddenly he began ignoring my calls, things started to get weird and distant. I received a message from his girlfriend telling me to stop all contact with Matt. I never wanted to hurt her so I begrudgingly respected her wishes. I had never engaged in anything like that before and since haven't, but through it all I felt horrible for what he and I did to her.
He would late write me a letter that read, "I've been playing the what if game for so long as well, but I can't have it both ways. If closure is what you need, consider this it." I needed it, I needed to let go of the idea of what he was to me. He wasn't that boy anymore and he wouldn't ever be. What he did to her and how he treated me made that clear.
For awhile though he was a wonderful mistake.
I began a couple of jobs in 2001 which is when I met Tara Hansen a quirky goth-metal enthusiast with a desire for tattoos and Davie Havoc. Her manners screamed Hot Topic corporate office, but I thought she was fun and awkwardly full of drama. We spent a great deal of our summer nights driving around Bellingham, being those kids you hate with the blaring music and no real destination, but out of the house.
With our cruising ammo blaring and my small 1996 periwinkle Ford Aspire we were set to paint the town if not red, a similar color, fuschia. We had odd run-ins with brief characters at the Ranch Room and the movie theater. We went to the midnight showing of "A Clockwork Orange," at the Pickford. It was that night that I met the boy that would haunt me for four years.
Matt wasn't your typical boy he had baggy pants, blue spiked hair, multiple piercings, and was instantly smitten with me. At the time I thought I was rebellious and punk! I had a deep obsession with blue hair and thought that it was the most aesthetically pleasing feature a boy could have. It was just about the only thing that could really turn my head and he was rocking it with confidence and just enough piercings to come off not as trendy.
When I kissed his earlobes my mouth would be full of four to five different metallic objects. He was infatuated with the type of music I couldn't stand, nu metal. We would stand in line at the grocery story and he'd start belting out lines from Slipknot and I'd bury my head deep into my shirt out of embarrassment. This would sometimes enforce his singing to greater volumes.
He was in high school while I was in college and with the two of living at home when I was on school vacations we couldn't always crash at each other's houses. My small vehicle acted as a portable room. We would sleep by the railroad tracks close to the bay in my car, cuddled up with sometimes just a jacket or two to cover us. The windows would fog up as we laid in the cold. The trains would act as a morning alarm clock (this was during the years before I had a cell phone).
It's true that with absence the heart grows founder and with months between us and hours of distance I found myself becoming more and more intimate with him. He'd visit when he could via bus to my dorm room. These were the times that I craved. No cold car rides, just him and me and an empty room.
There was no way that it would have lasted though because we were three years a part and he was still in high school. I thought that it was wrong for me to even be with him because of this and I told him that I didn't want to take away from his experiences. He told me that none of that mattered to him, but I insisted and with that I broke up my relationship with Matt. It was gut wrenching to find out that after we broke up to further prove his point he enrolled in running start to show how uninterested he was in the follies of high school.
We lost touch for a couple of years, but I still thought about him frequently. I would later come to realize that he had been doing the same thing. We reconnected in 2005 in Seattle. I had just graduated from college and moved to the Greenwood area. He was up for the first time in years from San Diego where he moved to be with a long term girlfriend, the same girl that he started dating after we broke up. He met her in Hawaii while on vacation and they instantly connected a the time and delighted in the fact that they were both bisexual, something I didn't realize about myself until years after.
I picked him up in Ballard outside of Archie McPhee's and from there we went to the EMP and hung out in my apartment reminiscing. The next night I picked him up from Pike Place and we again spent a great deal of time talking. I looked at him and told him how I felt and that I was sorry to inform him. He looked right through me and said, "I'm still in love with you and have been this whole time." He then went on about how he wasn't in love with his girlfriend and that he had been interested in me for years. He said that his current relationship was like a strong friendship, but that was it.
With that unveiling we did the worst thing two people could do when one is in a relationship. He cheated on his girlfriend that night and told me that he was going to move to Seattle to start over and that we would be able to see each other again. I felt horrible and excited at the same time, this was what I was dreaming about for years. I had been playing the "what if" game for so long and finally I had an answer.
Suddenly he began ignoring my calls, things started to get weird and distant. I received a message from his girlfriend telling me to stop all contact with Matt. I never wanted to hurt her so I begrudgingly respected her wishes. I had never engaged in anything like that before and since haven't, but through it all I felt horrible for what he and I did to her.
He would late write me a letter that read, "I've been playing the what if game for so long as well, but I can't have it both ways. If closure is what you need, consider this it." I needed it, I needed to let go of the idea of what he was to me. He wasn't that boy anymore and he wouldn't ever be. What he did to her and how he treated me made that clear.
For awhile though he was a wonderful mistake.
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