Last week an old friend reached out to me. Well, before we were friends we dated briefly. He was one of those perfect people that I instantly had a connection with. A rare circumstance. Instant witty banter. Similar sense of humor. A spark that ignites the instant you exchange words. I can count on one hand the amount of times this has happened to me with another person, it has always ended in heartbreak, and I have always wondered how someone could throw something so special away? It was never me who ended things in these scenarios. I loved the feeling these connections gave me too much to let them get away. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one in the relationship. And inevitably the spark burned bright and fast. It was gone almost as quickly as it was established.
This one was different than the others though. After our brief dating experience he wouldn’t completely let me go. We talked and talked and he even worked in the same building as me. Ultimately, I got over my romantic feelings and we became friends. We even talked to eachother about the new people we were dating. This was all pre-covid. 2018, 2019. I was absolutely willing to consider him a friend, I just liked having him around me. He told me I was funny for a girl.
I started to notice a pattern with him. He’d be “in love” with someone and then a few months later he’d be onto the next person. We’d talk about that at length. I was more curious to understand what was driving him than I was still hurt by him. I could clearly see that it wasn’t me that caused the ending of our romantic rendezvous. It was him. I knew he had an alcoholic absent father, I knew he had insecurities like the rest of us. I wondered if some of those childhood wounds still drove him in adulthood. His emotional unavailability was familiar to me. I seemed to pick partners like him over and over again. Maybe I was picking people that had wounds I could recognize. When looking in their eyes I could see myself.
He also struggled with addiction, and after we briefly dated he stopped trying to hide that from me. I’d meet him out on occasion and he’d be blowing lines in the bathroom at a bar, taking shots, etc. One time I showed up with someone I was dating, right before covid, and he asked me to come out to his car with him. I left my guy behind (my friend was persistent) and he poured his heart out to me. How he wanted us to be together. I told him he was just saying that because A) he was fucked up and B) he was seeing me with someone else. I shrugged it off, told him to get his shit together, and went back in the bar thinking nothing of it. But my friend left and we didn’t talk much after that, at least for awhile. I saw him about 6 months later, the first summer of covid, the last time I saw anyone before my breakdown. He was doing his thing, fucked up per usual, I was barely sipping my drink. Little did I know I was about to slip into psychosis. Needless to say, it was a full year and a half before we spoke again after that.
He called me last year around this time. Randomly on a Saturday night. He said he waited until he was out and had a few drinks in him to gather up the courage. I said why? I’m not a scary person. We had a good conversation, nothings changed there. Then he called me again at 5am. 6am. 7am. I answered, he hadn’t slept yet. We talked the next day, he was hungover. We talked about his dating life. I told him he just liked the chase. That was it. Another year passed. Then he reached out again last week.
This time was different though, at least he seemed different. The approach was different. We had a conversation. He asked me out to dinner. He wanted to ask my son to consign an art project for him. He seemed, I don’t know, more mature? We met out for food, he kept calling it a date. I like the idea of dating someone who already knows me since I’m a whole new version of me anyway. I get to just tell them what’s changed. He said while we were there, “let do this again.” I kept thinking, “has he changed?” It’s possible. I know I have.
So we texted a bit throughout the week. And then he sent a text that just shut me down completely. Yes, he is the king of jokes. Yes, we have witty banter for days. But for some reason when I received a message sexualizing me it just turned me off completely. Maybe it’s because it makes me feel disrespected. Maybe it’s because I don’t feel like we’re there yet. Maybe it’s because I’ve barely hugged anyone in two years, let alone kissed or more. These sexual advances seem so aggressive when you’ve completely removed them from your life for so long. It got me thinking, is it me? Am I the problem?
I’m starting to wonder if I’ve formed a fear of intimacy, but then I think “that can’t be it.” Is that really intimacy? Bare minimum effort? Making a joke about my body to get me in bed? Or how it’s just assumed that things will naturally advance to that point quickly if you go on a few dates. I just think that’s crazy. Maybe the dating life isn’t for me. Maybe I need to find someone with a bit of patience. Maybe it was just a joke and I need to relax. I’m just sick of being sexualized. I’d like some respect.
The Girl Without A Face 