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[personal profile] exhilaration
I worked all weekend. Got stuck very late at work friday night - I didn't get home until almost three, and we close at one, and I wasn't even supposed to be there until close in the first place. I've been trying pretty hard to make work as least awkward as possible - Saturday night I always do take-out, which means I'm at the bar, and Saturday night is B's bar shift, and last week I bailed and got someone to cover me so I wouldn't have to work so close with him. This week he switched with another bartender and waited tables I guess so he wouldn't have to work so close with me. Yeah... we were talking to each other, I mean, we had to, we had to talk to each other because we're working together. It's a restaurant - teamwork, and all.

But Sunday - I mean, one of us had to say something at some point, I guess. When lunch was ending and the dinner shift was coming in I was kind of hanging around by the bar - I had asked, at the beginning of the shift, if B could drive me home, and he said okay, so I was just waiting for the other bartender to come in. And we have been talking - about nothing. About the Phillies - incessantly - oh, did you know, the Phillies are in the world series? I am starting to fall for the team, really, I am. They're hardcore. I'm in love with all of them. I can't believe I saw them play that first time over the summer and could barely pay attention to them. Not now, my friends! Now I am glued to the screen!

So yeah, we've mostly been talking either about working or the Phillies. Safe topics, or whatever. But Sunday afternoon B kind of leaned on the bar and looked at me and was like, "will it do me any good to apologize to you?"

And I'm not angry with him. Angry, yes, but not really with him. I didn't think I made out like I was, either. And I wasn't sure I wanted to talk about it - I wasn't sure there was anything else to say, anyway - didn't we do that already? Didn't it lead to me crying? Especially not at work, but... when else would we even see each other? We certainly haven't been hanging out. I'm not assigning fault here - I just want to forget the whole thing even happened. Really.

But he brought it up. So I was like, "well, what exactly are you apologizing for?" And of course there are guests at the bar, since we're at work and all, but the next bartender was coming in in a few minutes. He said he was apologizing for making me feel like shit.

Which is a nice gesture and all, but I know he meant everything he said that night, so I still feel like shit, and an apology means nothing to me. And that's pretty much what I said. And then the next bartender came in, and we left the restaurant to go sit in the car.

And there's a lot of stuff I've been kind of thinking to myself, under it all, this past week. And I kind of spilled a lot of it right then.

I haven't had a huge amount of experience dating, by any means. But I'm not totally inexperienced, either. And I know that I've never, ever been with anyone who was totally repulsed by me before. "You don't repulse me," he said, but I do. He made that completely clear. He meant everything he said to me that night - he wasn't trying to be mean, he wasn't angry with me and saying things just to be cruel, he was just telling the truth, which is why an apology, for the truth, just seems pointless to me.

There's something about me that's just completely unattractive to him.

It's not all that much different than if I were to say, hey, I like you and all, you're good company and a cool person, but really, I'm only attracted to people who are more than two inches taller than I am - you're just to short to be attractive. Or, I just can't be turned on by someone who plasters their hair down onto their head - it doesn't look nice, it looks stupid. Or, hey, you don't have a college education, and that really turns me off.

You don't apologize to someone for not being attracted to them. Do you?

I've never had a friend-with-benefits before. I've never been somebody's fuck-buddy, or whatever. But I refuse to be what someone just tolerates because nothing better is available right then and there. I'm not that desperate. I'm not that lonely. And yeah, it does really hurt to feel repulsive.

So what's the apology for, again?

I'm not unattractive to him. He said. He's sorry he ever made me feel that way.

I'm not mad at you. I said. And can we please just let this drop? I get it. He feels bad that I'm upset. Well, though shit. That's just how life goes sometimes.

And, while I'm sitting in B's car being a complete ass, I'm kind of thinking to myself, I really don't care that he is only two inches taller than me. I don't really care that I don't like all the shit he puts in his hair - I know what it looks like with nothing in it, and I like it that way better, but whatever, it's his hair. I certainly don't care that he's got no college degree - I don't have one either, what can I say, I was grasping at straws and couldn't bring myself to call him "stupid" I guess.

And I'm thinking to myself, what is my problem? What is it that I want from this? Why can't I just be like, ok, apology accepted, let's just continue on then, shall we?

And he's explaining to me why he feels so bad, that he asked me to be his date, that he made a big deal about how I'd have a good time, how we WERE having a good time, and then THAT had to happen and spoil everything -

Bevan and I have been kind of operating under an assumed pact of non-communication all this time. There are certain things that neither of us will bring up and... it's kind of all caught us at once, I guess. Cause... while I was being all... belligerent... in the car, it was kind of brought to my attention that never once have I expressed any attraction towards him. (I'm not sure this is entirely true. I think I must have said something at least once. But maybe once is not enough to be memorable, or something) Apparently I make a big deal about how I don't do this and how I'm not attracted to guys. Apparently he's never been sure where I stand on all this. Whether I'm just tolerating him until something better comes along.

And that kind of caught me by surprise. Cause he's right, one, and two, that's kind of hurtful, to give someone the impression you're just using them. That was never, ever something that even entered my mind. If I had known that's how I was coming off... I don't know. I would have tried to act differently, I guess. And I really hope there isn't any truth to that - I haven't been just using our friendship to "scratch my itch" ...HAVE I???

...and of course in my head I'm going off on all these tangents about gender roles in relationships and what guys stereotypically expect girls to act like, and I could feel myself being thisclose to starting to go off on that out loud, because I'd been sitting there just thinking to myself for I guess a little too long because the silence was suddenly really oppressive...

In the end I said something kind of like, I'm not sure why I act the way I do. I know I'm an awful girlfriend, and I guess I'm not a very good friend-with-benefits, either, but it's not something I've ever done before and I really have no idea how it's supposed to work, just this vague notion that I don't want to fuck it up, because I like you and I don't want to wreck what we have going.

And stop apologizing about the other week - I don't even know how to respond to that. I'm sorry that whole thing happened but I'm not mad at you.

That's pretty much what I said.

I keep trying to pull from other experiences with other people cause I'm just feeling... totally over my head here... but it's not really worth it, because I don't think I've ever known anyone much like B, let alone been friends with them.

I think I have this tendency to surround myself with people who like to talk about themselves - people who are really confident and really assertive about their self-identity. I used to live with this girl who was a self-proclaimed dominatrix - she talked about it all the time, she talked about who she was and what kinds of things she was in to, and at the slightest prompting she'd tell you her interests and her plans and hopes and dreams and likes and dislikes and her entire personal history if you'd let her, and that's kind of how I get to know people, I watch them talk about themselves. That's also kind of why they like me, it's like, they think, ok, I told her all about me, she's my friend now, or something.

Bevan isn't anything like this. He doesn't talk a lot, and when he does talk, it's not about himself. He can be kind of... silly, and it's not for show, it's just part of the way he is, like, one day at work I saw him playing with the water in the sink behind the bar. No one else was around - he was just... playing in the sink. Cause it was there, and it was fun. I thought it was kind of cute. And he's pretty low key, and just... no hype. If he's tired, he says he's tired, and that's that. No getting all crazy and downing a bunch of red bull and vowing to stay out all night. I know, I sound like I'm comparing him to Erica, and I kind of am. Cause she's kind of my "type." And there's more to being attracted to someone than just liking them... isn't there? Or is there?

We kind of... deliberately re-created the "old days" last night. To kind of force ourselves out of the awkwardness. Prove I'm not mad at him. Prove he's not disgusted by me. I slept over at his place. We laid on the couch together and watched the Word Series. Phillies were winning. Weather delay though - in the World Series! Crazy! But yeah, just... watched some baseball, drank a few beers, laid on the couch, and then pulled the bed out and went to sleep next to each other.

But the whole time I had this weird feeling that this is the last time we'll ever do anything like that. Like it's already too late. Like we've both already said too much and we can never go back to the easy way things were. Now it's either going to be complicated, or it's going to be over.

And that's what I was trying to avoid all along. I'd say he was doing the same thing, but really I have no idea.

It makes me kind of sad.
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Lara I.

October 2012

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