“Hi,” I said humbly, trying not to
make eye contact. He was just as skirmish. He closed the door behind me, locked
it and moved quickly into the other room where there were mounds of sorted
items on the floor. Papers, DVDs, CDs, mail ... stuff. He got down on his knees
and seemed to continue something he’d been busy at for hours.
“What’re you doing?” I asked. No answer. Not even a recognizing gesture that I’d spoken.
I didn’t sit on the futon, just stood. I had nothing in my
hands and absolutely nothing to do with my eyes but stare at BD which made us
both increasingly uncomfortable. The television was off. Turning it on might be
perceived as making light of the situation. I left the remote where it lay.
I walked back into the kitchen and stood around there for a
few minutes and looked out the window.
BD kept shuffling papers in the other room, tossing this here and that there.
What the f*ck was he doing? This blatant diversion went on
for close to an hour.
So this is the game we’re playing. BD can be a bit of a passive aggressive type, and so can I. But somebody had to make a move and my sheepish humble “please don’t be mad at me” demeanor wasn’t getting us anywhere.
I decided to call his bluff. If he couldn’t even look at me, maybe he wouldn’t be bold enough to assert the obvious.
“What’s wrong with you, BD?” I asked accusingly. No answer.
“So you’re ignoring me now? If you’re going to pretend I’m not here, I’ll just go,” I said turning and heading for the door. For a finish like this, you have to be prepared to leave all your toiletries and little make up and lip gloss and shyt on the shelf, and the couple of pretty panties stashed in your little drawer right where they are because you can’t come back. I did grab my purse, though. That, I was absolutely not leaving.
“Wait,” he spoke up, rising from his kneeling position amidst the clutter he’d made on the carpet. I stopped short. I was so relieved.
“You know what’s wrong,” he said angrily.
“Dyou wanna ask me something, BD? Then just ask! I can’t take this moping! What is it?” Yes. I was pulling that card. Terrible, I know, but desperate times call for desperate measures and my only other option was defending my actions. How would I begin to do that?
“I’m not asking you anything, I don’t care.”
Wonderful. Then I don't have to say yes or no. I was beginning to feel a little less scared now about my position.
Who was he to be angry anyway? How was I to know how he spends his Friday through Saturday nights before I return to our neat little arrangement on Sunday evenings? It’s not as if we’ve discussed exclusivity or like he’s made any effort to lead me to believe he’s even interested in that kind of a commitment. And I know he can’t be mad because it was Digital. Come on, I was with Digital first.
I quietly amped myself up before I turned around to face him, confident and stoic.
“So did you f*ck him?” He
shot without warning.
I immediately deflated. And there’s the million dollar question.
A slow answer would evoke disbelief, but I couldn’t decide what to say, and it had already been two seconds (which is a long time to take to respond when someone asks you a pretty simple question).
“I,”
“Don’t stutter,” he cut me off. “Did you sleep with Digital?”
“What?” Wow. I am a loser right now.
They were best friends. The next time they got together and chatted over a game of Madden, it would come out. I couldn’t even lie. I wanted so badly to lie.
“I know you did, Melyssa. I knew it was gonna go down when you called me and said you were staying over there. That’s why I wanted to come get you.”
And so what? Really, why the hell I was still holding onto
this place, to this poor excuse for a relationship anyway?
But somewhere between his first sentence and his second, his anger became less angry and more ... sad.
“Do you think he cares about you? He doesn’t give a f*ck about you. When’s the last time you heard from Digital? When’s the last time you saw him.”
He was angry. I was not about to listen to him talk about a relationship he knew nothing about. So what I hadn’t heard from Digital in a while. Sometimes I didn't. He’s busy. He’s about to go on tour, he's working, he’s ...
“He has a girlfriend, did he tell you that? And who knows who else he's f*ckin, you know how he is. He’s about to go on tour. Dyou know what happens on tour? All the little chicken heads who wanna get with {omitted R&B artist’s name} gotta go through him first. He’s probably f*ckin two or three chicks in every city.”
Bullshit. And even if he was, I knew we were bigger than that. I’d been in love with Digital for years and regardless of distance or relationships that came and went or whatever, it was always understood that he was gonna be the one. He knew that and so did I. We'd talked about getting married and having kids and we'd met each other's family. We knew how each other felt and I was confident in that. BD didn't know what the hell he was talking about.
"Every time I talk to him he's with another chick. The only reason he wanted to get with you is because he hadn't had you in a while ..."
I will not hear this.
“I can’t believe you,” BD continued lamenting. “What if I was in love with you? How could you do that?”
What if ... what?
I’d never seen him cry before. He’d become such a brooding @sshole as of late, I had no idea. (This is the guy who moves the chap stick I insist on keeping on the nightstand and puts my toothbrush in the medicine cabinet after I’ve left it on the sink because he doesn’t want any reminders of my five-day stay during his weekend reprieve. (Yes, this is an argument we actually had). He’d told me several times how incompatible we were but what a good “friend” I was and would often make little comments to keep it clear to me that though “this” seemed like “that,” it definitely was not. Two weddings he'd attended since we began and he took someone else to each. And now this? I was utterly taken a back and yet, altogether remorseful.
I apologized a thousand times. I hugged him and felt his warm tears on my neck and I cried, too. This right here was real messy. A complete switch and anything but what I’d expected.
We slept next to each other that night as we had the last
couple of months.
He hugged me hard, wrapping both his arms around me from behind, like I was going to try to wriggle away or something. I could feel his heart beating fast against my back, his hard breathing on my neck. I must admit, the whole unexpected show of emotion did a bit for my ego in that moment. Here, I’d full expected to be thrown out, and he'd actually asked me to stay. (I’d later come to realize though, BD’s seeming acceptance of my indiscretion didn’t have nearly as much to do with his affection for me as it did a years-old competition he’d waged in his own mind with Digital. That, and his absolute inability to accept rejection. Both would turn out to be quite disturbing, but we’re not there yet.)
He hugged me hard, wrapping both his arms around me from behind, like I was going to try to wriggle away or something. I could feel his heart beating fast against my back, his hard breathing on my neck. I must admit, the whole unexpected show of emotion did a bit for my ego in that moment. Here, I’d full expected to be thrown out, and he'd actually asked me to stay. (I’d later come to realize though, BD’s seeming acceptance of my indiscretion didn’t have nearly as much to do with his affection for me as it did a years-old competition he’d waged in his own mind with Digital. That, and his absolute inability to accept rejection. Both would turn out to be quite disturbing, but we’re not there yet.)
We spooned all night in the dark and didn’t speak any more that night, but neither one of us slept well. BD tossed and turned, no doubt tortured by his own vivid imagination, while I wondered just how right he'd been.
I wondered if Digital would call.
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