This is a story that doesn’t feel like it’s mine… but it is. Which is why I’m telling it in second-person.
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It’s December. You’re at a party in an immaculate house in the middle of the desert. Everyone is drinking except you. Not because you’re a good girl, but because there is nothing but beer & whiskey in the house & you don’t prefer to drink those kind of drinks. Instead, you sit back & watch them all as they get plastered, as they laugh at things that don’t make sense, as they slur their sentences & their intentions. & then you find out he’s coming. He’ll be there in 10 minutes, they gush, spilling their drinks on the lush white carpet. You pretend not to notice what they just said, as you nonchalantly challenge a friend to another game of air hockey. But inside… your heart is throbbing. You feel dizzy & lightheaded.
You excuse yourself to the bathroom, & check your appearance. His coming might not mean anything, but you want to look dangerous when you see him again. You want him to feel regret, to feel stifled when he sees you. You borrow a couple of sprays from a sugary-sweet perfume bottle on the bathroom counter. You restlessly wait for his arrival.
Five minutes later, he walks through the door, wearing loose jeans & a brown leather jacket. He’s paler than you remember; skinny & kind of unattractive. The lighting of the room accentuates acne scars & his tired face. Yet, your heart skips a beat at the sight of him. You pretend not to notice him as he walks into the main room, saying his hellos, becoming familiar with the party-goers, engaging in small talk. He finally catches your eye. You stiffly say hello, & his reply is just as rigid. He looks uncomfortable, as though he didn’t know you were going to be there tonight, & you relish in his awkwardness.
He goes about the room mingling with classmates, nursing a beer, trying to seem as involuntary as possible. & like a hawk, you watch him. You ask yourself in those moments what you ever saw in him; why you ever gave yourself to him; why you still love him, the asshole that he is. & you can’t seem to come up with an honest answer. You continue to watch him as he crosses the room, & goes outside for a smoke. You follow him.
He’s at the end of the driveway, lighting a cigarette. (You thought he quit.) He glances up at you as he hears your bare feet slapping the pavement. You approach him casually & ask if you can join him. He politely says you can. He sits on the curb, taking long, dramatic drags from his cigarette, & you sit beside him, watching him in silence. As he exhales against the black night, you catch a whiff of that familiar, intoxicating scent: his breath — his smell — mixed with the heavy tobacco. The hairs on the back of your neck stand up. You think you’re reminiscing but you’re just shivering. He notices, & he offers you his brown leather jacket. You foolishly mistake this chivalrous gesture as a subtle sign of him still caring about you.
He asks how you’re doing; you tell him you’re great. (You’re lying.) You ask how he’s doing; he blurts out that he’s going to Iraq in a few weeks. The news brings a lump to your throat, & as you try to swallow it down, he asks how your family is doing. You tell them they’re doing great (you’re lying again), & you ask him the same question in reverse. He shrugs carelessly as he inhales more smoke, telling you they’re doing okay as he exhales. & then there’s silence. He suggests that you go inside. You say that you don’t want to go inside, even though it’s blatantly obvious that the winter night air is making you tremble. In that moment, you’re grateful for his jacket. When you know he isn’t looking you take small inhales from the collar. You smell his cologne, the one you gave him for Christmas one year. You struggle with sadness as you try to keep that breath inside of your lungs for as long as possible, taking him in, memorizing his well-known scent.
He finally finishes his cigarette, a signal to go back inside. You walk together, your steps synchronized like they always were in the past, & you mistake that as a sign; a foresight for something good.
When you finally get inside, you’re reminded of where you are; you’re at a party in an immaculate house in the middle of the desert. The music’s loud, the guests are taking shots in the kitchen, & you’re still without a lover. The reality of your lonely life stings your eyes as you both sit on a suede couch by the front door. You then realize that you’re still wearing his jacket. You motion to take it off, but he stops you, telling you to keep it on for a while until your body is back to room temperature.
Before you can thank him, he opens his mouth to speak. His words are hurried, his tone is sorrowful (or sarcastic, you can’t quite tell). He seems remorseful as he apologizes for everything he’s put you through. You smile, & tell him it’s alright (though it isn’t), & he continues on & on about how terrible he feels for ending things the way he did. He tells you he’ll never forgive himself for treating you like dirt, & you are floored by his declarations. You think he’s about to tell you that he regrets his decision. You think he’s about to tell you that he misses you. You think he’s about to proclaim that he wants you back.
But he keeps talking & talking, not really giving you a decent chance to speak. You’re waiting on baited breath for the point of this conversation to be revealed, presumptuously preparing for the way you’ll react when he tells you he wants to give it another shot. You’ll hug him; really hug him like you mean it. & then you’ll cry & laugh, & say that you forgive him & that yes, you want to try again; you want to start over.
But he doesn’t say anything remotely close to that. Rather, he mutters under his breath, with a tiny smirk on his face, that he’s still in love with her. He then rushes in more words to say that he had always loved her, & never you.
You’re dumbfounded & devastated, even though you know he doesn’t mean it — how could he? Before you know what you’re doing, you slap him across the face, catching him off guard. You then use all of your strength to push his entire body into the couch, calling him a bastard, calling him a liar & an asshole. You take off his jacket, throw it to the floor, & run into the bathroom fuming. You are breathing heavily, your heart feeling like it’s about to explode. & then you catch a glimpse of yourself in the full length mirror. You start to come to terms with what you just did. You just slapped him, & hard. Replaying that very quick moment in your head a few times, you giggle a little. You realize it felt good to hit him. Hitting him released his hold on you just slightly. You feel powerful & brazen. You want to do it again.
You then storm out of the bathroom, heading towards him once more, not able to control yourself. You manage to get in a few more punches to his body, which don’t quite connect, but the windup in itself releases more of that exquisite feeling. All this time, you are screaming, yelling, kicking. People are holding you back, telling you to calm down, telling him to leave. It takes two guys to sit on you to keep you from going after him again. He picks up his jacket from the floor, that ugly smirk wiped off of his face, & walks out the door.
(That was the last time you saw him.)
Before they let you go, they make you promise not to do anything crazy. You tell them that you’re done; he’s gone, so you can’t do anything more. You’re sweaty, shaky, disoriented. You can faintly smell his cologne on your neck where you wrapped his brown leather jacket collar close to keep the winter air out. You go to the bathroom, wet a paper towel & try to rinse the smell off of your skin, rubbing him away.
You thought people would be staring at you as you come back to the party, but no one seems to look up. A few people ask what happened, & you smile proudly as you tell them that you slapped the shit out of your ex-boyfriend. They laugh, give you a couple high-fives & hold up their glasses full of whiskey to your irrational behavior.
You see a friend of yours making a drink. You ask him for one, & you tell him to make it strong. He looks at you skeptically, but you insist, & he makes you a drink that he says he’s famous for. You sip on that strong, fruity blue drink for the rest of night, feeling a heavy buzz, eating Sour Patch Kids, walking around like you’re the cat’s pajamas.
Sometimes you find yourself feeling guilty for having become “that” kind of ex-girlfriend. The one who has no self-control. The one that went a little crazy at a party. But those thoughts pass just as quickly as they enter your brain, & you smile to yourself in complete arrogance.
You slapped him good. & he deserved it.