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I sat perfectly still while she shredded my heart with a few matter of fact words.
Words that I had taught her. Words that I had once believed.
Oh the sweet justice of it. Brought low by own cynical ideals.
She wasn’t done. “You pursuing a woman is like a lion chasing his next meal. It was simply nature. I ran, you gave chase.”
I disagreed with everything she’d said for so many reasons that I didn’t know where to start dismantling it.
What I said though, was, “Okay, first of all, your analogy makes no sense. Female lions are the ones that do the hunting.” I shook off the intrusive thoughts and got back to the point. Kind of. “Second, male lions are lazy. They don’t chase anything, they let the food come to them. That was me before you. I did not chase. I ate what was brought to me. I’ve only ever chased you.”
“The only point you’re making right now is that you can talk in circles. I’m sorry I used a lion analogy without doing proper research, but my point still stands.”
I stood up then and pointed at her. “It doesn’t,” I said stiffly, restraining myself from flipping my desk. “It doesn’t fucking stand, that’s what I’m telling you. I wanted to be with you, when I haven’t so much as considered that option for longer than I can remember. I still want to be with you and you’re the one rejecting me, and I want you to quit acting like it wasn’t your idea to end us.”
You hurt me. You’re still hurting me, was what I wanted to say, but it was just too pathetic.
“Your flair for melodrama is getting out of hand,” she said almost fondly, clearly trying to defuse the situation. “Have you never had anyone else end things with you before? Do you just not know how to react to that?”
Her teasing tone told me she was trying to make light of things, but it wasn’t working. Things were fucking heavy, and she was only adding to the weight. “You’re being cruel,” I told her with as much dignity as I could and walked out of my own office to get away from her.
The next time I saw her I was working sullenly at the kitchen table and she approached me waving a literal white flag. I squinted at it. “Where did you get that?”
“I cut up one of your shirts. Truce? Can we be friends?”
I sighed and gazed at her with tender gravity. “I’ll always be your friend, Ro. You’re my very best friend. I just wish we could understand each other better. I wish I knew how to get through to you.”
“We’re so much alike and so different,” said Ro. “Sometimes it feels like I can read your mind, and other times I find you to be the most unpredictable person on the planet. It’s been an interesting combination.”
I looked at the flag again, smirking. “You don’t find it ironic that you had to destroy my property to make a symbol for peace?”
We shared a smiled. “That was my favorite part of the gesture.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
THINGS DIDN’T GO back to normal after that but there was a tentative sort of peace. Above all things, I needed Ro to stay in my life as close as I could have her. So of course I tried to respect her mile high boundaries and took what I could get.
A few weeks post breakup, I noticed that she was looking a little different and a touch wan. I studied her more intently even than usual and by the end of the day I could put my finger on what it was.
“You’ve lost weight,” I pointed out blandly as she delivered an espresso to my desk.
She just looked up, blinked at me a few times, and began to walk away. “Maybe. I don’t know. Who cares?”
“I care. Why are you losing weight? Are you dieting, or are you stressed out?”
She paused at the door to say, “Being stressed out makes me gain weight, so it can’t be that. And no, I’m not on a diet. I don’t know what’s up. I guess I’ve been so busy I keep forgetting to eat lunch.”
“Well, stop it. Take better care of yourself. Take a proper lunch break every day.”
That at least gave me the excuse to start making her eat with me at more meals again. It was something.
For a time things were almost bearable. Not all the way there, but almost.
And then it became so much worse.
She met him at church.
Barf.
