Tuesday, 09.07.2010 - 10:42 pm.
I was working at home this afternoon when the doorbell rang and I heard someone asking for me. It was JC. I went to greet him at the door and see the car he's driving now, ever since the accident that nearly got him killed.
I was a bit surprised and confused by his visit, I guess. I let him in and he said he was just stopping for five minutes, joking that he only came by for a glass of water while running some errands in my neighborhood.
We caught on our lives. He talked the most, as usual. I've noticed he doesn't ask much about me and I don't feel like talking to him about myself, so it's all good. He told me about his thesis and the Psychology Festival in October and about his lost dog and how he's almost on track to get him back. It was a nice conversation. I even found it in my heart to offer him some cookies I made on sunday afternoon. He loved them, but then I had the last one and I realized it was the half-assed baked batch. Still good, but could've been better.
His five minutes became some 45 minutes. I didn't feel it, I enjoy my time with him. Perhaps too much. I only feel hurt and angry with him when he's out of sight. And he had dissappeared this past week. I hadn't heard from him and I was fine with it. I never contact him.
But today he shows up and I'm quite frankly happy to see him. When my hurt side pulls at my sleeve and tells me to remember what he did and act consequently (be distant, even show him the door sooner), I feel like what he did, getting me entangled and hopeful and in love just to shatter my expectations, doesn't matter anymore. I'm like, let it go, man, we're pals.
We are, I guess. Victoria would probably grab me by the shoulders and shake me, "why the hell are you so good to him?!". I don't know! I know I shouldn't. I walk him to the door and we stay talking there for a while, and suddenly I have the flashback: we are in the same position when he "broke up" with me and we were saying goodbye. Except it was pitch dark then. He hugged me and said he was sorry and started to cry, like he was the rejected one. This time around, it was a bit sunny and we hugged briefly.
Then I'm left wondering why the hell he came to visit me in the first place. Unannounced, on top of everything, to see if he'd find me home "by any chance". It's tempting to say what you're probably thinking, but knowing him, he's just being nice, as nice as he would be with any other friend: "hey, I was in the neighborhood and decided to drop by".
He knows I don't even try to stay in touch with him, that he's always the one to call me. Don't you think somebody else would have gotten the hint? "This is a one-sided friendship, if she doesn't contact me, I won't either". I'm surprised that hasn't happened. Don't get me wrong. I'm glad, perhaps flattered, that he wants to maintain a friendship. We succeed at that, for the most part. But his efforts do confuse me a bit.
But hey, I make a huge effort, too, anyway. A bigger one! I have made the effort to get over all my anger and hurt and embarrassment about him, to keep talking to him. That's infinitely harder than dialing a number and being friendly as if no hearts were broken. And I wonder, why do I keep talking to him? Seriously. Why can't I blow him off like he blew me off? I've found it so hard to do it, and when he returns to my life, like today, I say, hey, good thing I didn't do it because it's nice to hang around.
The worst part is when he leaves and I'm left wandering around the house, realizing that perhaps, maybe, I wanted to kiss him while we were sitting on the couch. That he smelled really good and that I have very strong feelings for him.
Today this year is just like today last year: I like him so much but he has a girlfriend. The difference is that last year I had the possibility to have him, when he broke up with her. I had that chance and HE blew it. I don't have any possibilities to have him anymore and he got back to his ex. I examined his non-verbal language carefully but I couldn't find any sign that he was still attracted to me. Just a friend that came to see me and eat my cookies and tell me how his life is going.