I NEED DETAILS
[ear emoji] (message sent with echo effect)
Nothing to share yet
But you’ll be the first to know
I’d better be
I wanna hear all about the hot shit you’ll be getting up to and how you’re making up for all that lost time
[water droplets emoji]
* * *
A small part of mealmostasked for her advice on the situation I’ve found myself in. This predicament of being attracted to, interested in, someone I’m fifty percent older than.
It’s not even that I worry she’ll tell Chance, or that word will get out.
I think this is something I need to work out formyself. Something I’ll have to live with, whether I decide to pursue it, or treat it like the utterly insane idea it is and walk away from it, from him.
And before you tell meage ain’t nothin’ but a number, let me just remind you that his number prohibits him from entering a casino, buying a pack of smokes or a drink, going dancing, or renting a car. A few years ago, he couldn’t even see an R-rated movie on his own, for crying out loud.
This is the part of the spiral where I convince myself this is absolutely nuts. No matter how cute he is, how charming, how funny, or how well we get along—on large matters and small ones—this can’t end well.
The social stigma alone is probably the biggest factor that plagues me. The other eventualities that are sure to come to fruition include unsavory labels (predator, grooming, unsafe working environment, to name a few that haunt my mind when itreallystarts to run away from me), mockery, expulsion from whatever social circles I have left after my breakup with David, and worst of all, professional blowback.
I’m positive I wouldn’t lose my job were a relationship with Asher and I to occur, and come to light. While it isfrowned upon, it’s not means for dismissal at our companies. But it could irreparably damage my reputation there. What I’ve worked for so many years to build. All those meetings I’ve locked up my emotions, responded with nothing but logic, out-performed every other employee in this place, and I will end up as nothing but a punchline, the butt of a (probably dirty) joke.
And what kind of future could we have, anyway? He’s got another sixty-plus years left to live, he’s absolutely nowhere yet on the game board of life. Were he in college, he would be, what? A sophomore? Maybe a junior at most? Neither Chrissy nor I graduated college (she did attend for a whole semester before dropping out, I myself skipped it entirely to jump into real-world experience), so the only person I can compare him to is Chance. Who graduated well over fifteen years ago. My mindbogglestrying to overlay those timelines. Asher is younger now than Chance was when Chrissy (and I) met him all those years ago. It’s horrifying on one hand, flattering on another, and just confusing all around.
What guy his age wants to date a woman in her thirties? (I took it as a compliment that he thought I was younger at first, but he learned my real age when my mouth wouldn’t stop throwing me under the bus that first night, and that somehow didn’t change anything for him.) Does he know how boring I am? That my career, my company, is almost my entire life? I wouldn’t be the fun choice for him. He should be sowing his wild oats, making memories to last a lifetime. This is his chance to make mistakes, learn valuable life lessons, and I don’t want to be one of them.
To even cross the line of seeing him in that light was major for me. Harder for me, probably, than coming to terms with ending my last relationship. This one made me question who I am, what I’m willing to trade for what I want, in an entirely different way than the last life-altering decision I had to make did.
And the decision happened against my will in a split second. Seeing him as a co-worker one moment, and a romantic interest the next, despite my mental protests. I just can’t bring myself to believe this isn’t completely ludicrous.
If this goes badly, if word got out, would I trust my dignity, my professional persona, and my future trajectory would survive?
But what if all thesefeelings, this part of me I’ve never let take control, this chemical reaction inside of me, is right—if there is something with this man that demands to be explored, mined for all its worth, discover the depth of what exists between us… Can I walk away? Will I always wonder what I left behind? What I would’ve found, if I were braver?
I’ve already sacrificed so much safety, security and certainty in the way of comfort, a life that, for all intents and purposes, was going to bejust finein the pursuit of somethingphenomenal. Extraordinary.
What kind of a fool would I be to turn my back on something that could be more when it turns up at my door? Did I think that if I did find that chance, that it would involve no risk? Nothing at stake?
Nothing ventured, nothing gained, so they say.
It’s true in investments. It might be even truer in matters of the heart.
With my ex, very little was ever at risk. He was the safe choice, the logical one. Everything about us made sense. But he didn’t make my pulse race, my heart thump, or my core clench.
What kind of gains might exist if I’m willing to risk everything I’ve ever held dear? Not to sacrifice it, but to put myself on the line, do what scares me the most in order to find out what lies just beyond my comfort zone?
I’m not sure a yellow legal pad and an old-fashioned pros and cons list is going to be enough to solve this one for me.
I know the conversation with Asher is coming, and coming soon. He’s left me to digest, to stew on all he’s said so far, and respected my wishes while we’re at work, around others.
Each night, we’ve fallen into a routine. Once I’m home and have had dinner, we cue up the next episode ofThe Officeand watch together, from afar, and text throughout. It’s been innocent enough, mostly getting to know one another, with some (more or less) harmless flirts he’s thrown in here and there, but we both know there could be more here if we’d let there be.
