Never Felt So Alive

The Marine called Saturday.

My phone rang around 11:30pm.  I hit the button to silence the ringer.  It was the call I had waited for all day.  I wanted to be unavailable to him for once in an attempt to make myself feel better. 

When the call went to voicemail, he hung up and dialed again.  I hit the button to ignore the call, sending him straight to voicemail.  Again, he made one last attempt and I let him go to voicemail.  Everytime he called back was another small victory to me.  I just wanted him to feel an ounce of what I felt on Friday night.

In the email he sent me the next day, he said, "I called you last night, but you didn't answer.  I didn't know if you were asleep or out or just mad at me."

When he called me on Sunday, I finally answered.
"I emailed you today.  Did you get it?"
"Yes."
"Did you email me back?"
"No."
"I figured you didn't."
"Why?"
"Because of how you're talking ... I swear, I was on my way out the door on Friday night.  You believe me, don't you?"
"Yes, I believe you, but if you really wanted to see me, we could have found a way."
"You've got a point, babe."  What did that mean?  That he really didn't want to see me?  I didn't want to know.  I didn't ask.  "Do you still want me to come see you at work on Tuesday?"
"Up to you.  I don't want you to come back from Tennessee early just for that."
"I'll be there.  I promise."

The plan was to go out to lunch with my favorite girls from the office.  One of the girls was on vacation but wanted so badly to meet the Marine that she wanted me to call her and she would drive in just to meet him and have lunch with us.  But I decided against calling her due to the events of Friday night. 

When I arrived to work Tuesday, my manager had called in sick--no way I could get out of the office for lunch now anyway. 
Text message to the Marine:  "Can't make it to lunch.  Can we still get together tonight?"
"Sure.  What time?"
"What time can you be at my house?"
"6pm."
"How about 7pm?  In case I get stuck in traffic."
"We'll see."

HUH?

So, with no definite time that he would be arriving, I went to finalize the paperwork for my new car and ended up at the dealership until 8pm. 

I called him when I got home.  He was spending time with his dad so we agreed he would call me once his dad had gone to bed.  I fell asleep at midnight, waiting. 

When I woke up Wednesday morning, I had a missed call from him at 12:30am. 

Wednesday was a big day.  Val and I had rounded up a group of people to go to the Cavs-Hawks basketball game that night.  I had invited and bought a ticket for the Marine, not believing he would actually show up but felt it was worth the risk on the off-chance that he would make an appearance.

As we all met up and headed to the restaurant, we began making bets on whether or not the Marine would come. 

He was the last one to arrive, but he arrived.  He was dressed nicely, smelled amazing, and got along with all of my friends.  I was happy to see him.  He was all over me all night, a little too into my personal space at times, but I didn't mind too much. 

I drove him back to the restaurant to get his car.  I pulled up next to it and parked.  He wanted to come back to my place with me.
"I don't know."
"You don't know how you feel about me anymore?"
"It's not that.  I feel the same about you, but there's a point where I have to protect myself."
"I fucked up, didn't I?"
"I don't know."
"What I did Friday ... it hurt, didn't it?"
I nodded and vigorously wiped my eyes.  Ugh, I hated how lame I was for crying, but I couldn't help it once he verbalized exactly what I was feeling.  I was definitely feeling physical pain.  It was in my stomach, in my chest.
"Come here," he said.  He put his arms around me, and I literally cried on his shoulder.  I hated how dramatic all of this was.  "You don't deserve this.  I am just causing you problems."
When I finally calmed down, he asked, "So, do you think I can come over?"
"I think you should go home tonight."
"Seeing you like this, I feel like I need to be there.  I feel like I should hold you."
"Let's just see how things go.  I want to be alone tonight."
What makes him (and every other man) think that being held by the person who is causing me  pain, is going to make me feel better? 
"Bet you wouldn't marry me now, would you?"
"How could I marry someone I can't depend on?"
"Please don't stop seeing me, Michelle.  You're still my girl, right?" 
I didn't know the answer to that question, so I just nodded.
"When can I see you again?"
"Friday."
"So, is Friday like a test?  To see if I actually show up?"
"No, I don't believe in 'testing' someone.  The more you follow through with what you say you'll do though, the more I'll trust you."
"Will you call me before you go to bed?"
I agreed.  But I just got his voicemail at 12:30am.  Strange, because I got an email from him at 1:30am saying thanks and that he had a good time that night.

I sent him a text message Thursday because I realized that all night Wednesday, he told me how beautiful I looked, and I hadn't complimented him once, outside of telling him he smelled good.  He didn't respond.  Pretty unusual for him. 

So, here we are.  It's Friday night, technically Saturday morning, about 2am, and no Marine.  I had called him at 9pm to invite him over to watch movies with us but got his voicemail again.  Every minute I sat here waiting for him to call back was painful.  I was reliving Friday nght all over again.  I couldn't believe that I let him do this to me again.

Three strikes, get on out ...

The Marine came home tonight.

Only I didn't see him.

I had talked to him on the phone almost every night this week. Instead of turning his phone in to his superiors at the end of his day off like he was supposed to, he held on to it, sending me text messages during class or calling me at night before he went to sleep. He had kept his promise and for that reason, my feelings developed even stronger for him this time. I returned to the thought that all of my initial inklings about him were correct--he was the one. I was going to marry him.

And it came up in our conversations. He asked me if I would marry him. He asked me if I would move to North Carolina to be with him. To which I answered yes.

He told me he would be home Wednesday. Then, he told me he would be home Thursday. Then, he would be home Friday at 2pm. Finally, I stopped asking when he would be home because it seemed that each time I asked, the date was later and later.  I was starting to wonder IF he was even coming home.

Friday, I eagerly waited for him to call or text message that he was home. When he finally text messaged me at 6pm, he was still on the bus. He would be here in a couple of hours. Once he was in Atlanta, we agreed that he should spend some time with his dad first and once his dad had fallen asleep, he would come see me. While he was visiting with his dad, I was vigorously cleaning my house, showering, and making sure my hair and makeup were perfect.

Showering twice in one day is unusual for me. I hate getting my hair sopping wet because it takes forever to blow dry it. As I was stepping over the tub out of the shower, the doubt crossed my mind--what if I'm doing all of this for nothing?

He called at 11:30pm. His dad was asleep. I gave him directions to the house. He said he would call once he got to my exit on the freeway. I figured I had 15 minutes to do one last touch up on my makeup--conveniently, my face had broken out that morning.

15 minutes passed. Maybe he made a wrong turn and had to backtrack. 30 minutes passed. Maybe he's lost. 45 minutes passed. Maybe his dad woke up and wanted to visit some more.

At one hour, he called. I was about to ask if he was lost, but it was quiet in the background. He wasn't in his car. Something didn't sound right in his voice so I braced myself for what was coming ...
"I lost my charge card."
"Oh ... is that a big deal?" Did he need it for gas? Borrow money. Use cash. Borrow another car. What was the problem here?
"Uh, yeah."
"Did you lose it at the house?"
"Maybe. I'm still looking for it ... ok?"
"Ok." I couldn't even hide my disappointment. I laid down on the couch now. I was tired and I no longer cared how my hair or my makeup looked. He wasn't coming.

And the longer I laid there, the angrier I got.  When we first met, he prepared me for physical separation.  Months and months of training, being stationed hundreds of miles away, months and months of deployment to Iraq.  So far, I've been able to handle that. 

It's this other type of separation that I can't deal with and I can't define.

Why didn't he stop at my house to say goodbye before he went to infantry training, like he said he would?  His excuse:  He doesn't like goodbyes.  He just wanted to be alone.  Fine, but I didn't even get a phone call to say he wasn't coming ...
Why didn't he write?  His excuse:  I didn't have time.  SOI was going to be easier than boot camp, he kept telling me.  He wrote me a couple of times while at boot camp.  I would get another letter from him even before I had a chance to answer the first so why no letters while at SOI?
Why didn't he visit or call at Thanksgiving?  His excuse:  He didn't get Thanksgiving off.  Really?  I have a hard time believing that the U.S. military does not get a national holiday off.  The previous time I talked to him, he was scheduled to get 72 hours off for Thanksgiving ...
What is up with this weird timetable issue?  Why does he never know what days he has off, what time he's getting in, what time he's coming over, etc.?  Here we are, 2:30am, almost three hours after he initially called me to say he was coming over, and I still haven't heard from him. Has he been looking for his credit card the entire 3 hours since I hung up the phone?  If I didn't leave within 15 minutes of the time I told a person I was leaving, I would have called by then ... not an hour later ...

I'll wait for you to come home from boot camp.  I'll wait for you to come home from training.  I'll wait for you to come home from Iraq.  But is it really necessary to make me wait like this?

After hearing so many excuses, it becomes difficult to believe anything a person says and that's the status I've achieved with the Marine.  Everything now is suspect.

And it hurts me (again) to have been wrong about something I felt so strongly about.  I felt that he was IT for me, and now, that feeling, the thing that I had felt most sure of my entire life, was wrong.  It's a horrible feeling.

Maybe he just doesn't like me.  His words don't say that.  But his actions do. 

So, why doesn't he just leave me alone then?

Text message, 2:03am:  "Hello how have u been"

Of course, I didn't respond.  I was asleep.

Text message, 9:53am:  "Hey michelle u doing alright i know i havent called in a while im sorry ive been very busy but havent forgot about u"

How to respond?  I could go for the angry, bitter angle.  The sweet, ever-forgiving angle.

"Yes i'm fine thanks. Hope you're doing well"  Nope.  Cold indifference will work for me.
"Ive been doing good alot of training r u mad at me"

Yes, I was mad that I let myself think this long distance thing would actually work, that we would actually get to communicate while he was training for the Marines hundreds of miles away.  Yes, I was mad that he didn't call or write once when he promised every weekend.  No, I couldn't be mad, he was just too sweet ...

"No babe"
"U still miss me"
This was easier after the "r u mad at me" thoughts filtered through: "I don't know"
"That sucks i know its my fault"
"No, I think we both should have known that it wasn't going to work"
"Whys that"
"Because you're far away and at training. I guess there's no way really to make that work"
"Ill be done in 2 weeks is there someone else in your life now"
Conveniently, someone just exited my life last night: "No but aren't you supposed to be in virginia after training?"
"No things have changed. I'm staying here"
"So you'll still be far away and i still wont be able to see you and i probably wont hear from you"
"It would be a regular job, weekends off. I would have my cell and i would come see u on the wkends"
"Yeah but I thought you were going to have your phone weekends at training and i never heard from you. You never wrote me. I just don't want to get my hopes up again"
"I'm going to get a shower and then call you"

He called me.  He apologized for not being in contact.  He gave me excuses.  He promised things would be different. 

I forgave him.  I made him promise that the only reason I hadn't heard from him was because of his schedule.  I made him promise to not promise things he couldn't promise.  I told him I missed him. 

So now, I just have to wait 11 days to see him again.  I just have to stay single and not meet any men for 11 days, because once I meet someone who generates even half of the feelings I had for the Marine, I will easily blow off the Marine, deciding that he should have made more of an effort to keep in touch these past 6 weeks ...

Well, Colossus just left my house ...

He had called me from work tonight.  Said that he had a long day and was exhausted.
"I had wanted to hang out with you, but I just don't know if I'm up for going out anywhere."
"You can come over here ..." I suggested.

He agreed we would watch a movie and then go to bed.  He arrived as I was finishing up some studying for Chemistry.  I ended up with a D in my Anatomy lab and so was determined to do better on the rest of my finals.

After giving him a hug, I returned to my computer to finish the assignment I was doing.  He sat on the floor and ate the food he brought with him.  Midway, he jumped up and onto the couch to kiss me on the cheek.
"Oh, you're crashing and burning!" he said, watching as I missed problem after problem.
I laughed and said, "Go finish your food!"  I was going to work on my assignment until he finished eating.

During that time, Hannah called me.  I was hoping it would be a short conversation--no, I wouldn't be up for going out that night, maybe tomorrow?  Instead, she was all distraught about catching her friends doing crack at Kristin's house.  As I was listening to her unnecessarily long story, I stared intensely and made loud noises with my computer, trying to get Colossus' attention so I could make a face and/or hand gesture to him to let him know I was trying to get off the phone.  He wouldn't look at me though.  He looked pissed.

When he had finished eating and was getting up to throw away his trash, I finally said, "Hannah, I really have to go.  Can I call you tomorrow?"  I looked at my phone--7 minutes, not too bad.

I put my phone down and said to Colossus, "I'm sorry about that."  He didn't respond.  "Are you staying the night tonight?"
"I don't know that you want me to."  Something was wrong.
"Hey," I said, raising my hands defensively, "Whatever you want to do.  I didn't know if you were ok with sleeping over here or if you would rather sleep at home."

He didn't answer.  Instead, he sprawled out on the floor and closed his eyes.  I continued to work on my assignment, occasionally asking, "Hello?  Are you going to answer me?"

While he was nonresponsive, I called Justin quickly to let him know I wasn't going to be able to hang out.  When I finished that 45 second conversation, I asked again, "Are you staying the night tonight?"
He sat up and was giving me what I would call a dirty look.  "I don't know.  Are you going to talk to me tonight at all?  You know, I came over here tonight, dead tired, hoping you would cheer me up."
"What?  You've been here like 10 minutes.  I was just trying to finish something up while you ate.  Why are you trying to pick a fight?"
"I'm not."
"Is this about the phone calls?"
"You've taken time to listen to them but not to me."
"I have been listening to you."
"No, you've been on your computer."
"I was on the computer when I was on the phone too.  Are you saying that I wasn't listening to them either?"
"I just thought that when I came over here, we would hang out."
"Look, when you called you said you were tired.  Maybe it's just me but when I'm tired, I just want to be left alone.  And then you said you wanted to go to bed, so I was just doing what I needed to do so that we could go to bed soon."
"I'm just telling you how I feel.  Why are you yelling?"
"I'm not yelling."  And I really wasn't.  I was proud of how composed I remained.  Back in the day, my temper probably would have been out of control at this point.
"You never act like you're interested.  You never call me.  You never let me know that you're thinking about me ..."
"I just text messaged you the other day and said that I was thinking about you.  Is that what this is about?"
"No."
"Then, why are you bringing it up?"
"And you didn't hug me when I came in."
"Yes, I did!"
"No, I hugged you."
"You want to turn this into who hugged who?  Oh my gosh, you're like a chick."

He started getting his stuff together to leave.  I heard him at the front door.  I debated whether I should call him back.  Then, I heard him unlock and then open the door but never going out it ... and then closing it.  I heard him say, "Damn it."

He walked back to the couch where I was sitting, crying a little bit now.  I covered my face with my hands while he put his arms around me. 
"How did I hurt your feelings?" he asked.
"I didn't even do anything."

And I truly felt that way.  I was just giving him a minute to unwind, giving me a minute to finish my stuff, so we could go to bed.  I thought I was being sweet.  That was the most frustrating thing of all. 

He wanted to talk.  I was done talking.  The whole situation, especiall y my feelings at the time, was very reminiscent of X.

And that's how I knew it was the very bad ending to a relationship that was never really going well in the first place ...