So now it was official. Although saying it was "official" always seemed like a pretty stupid way of putting it to me. Marriage is official. They give you paperwork and everything. A scrawny ugly boy in High School hanging out with a short reserved blond wasn't anything official. There wasn't some kind of honor guard saluting us as it happened. "Going out" was always a stupid term to me as well. We already did that. We went out a lot. In fact, you know what changed? Nothing. NOTHING. FUCKING NOTHING. The only thing that changed was that feeling of awkwardness, where we clearly wanted it to go somewhere, but none of us had the will to bring it up. That was gone now. And with that big enormous wall out of the way, why would we want anything else?
You know what we did now that we were together in that special way? Nothing different. There were no romantic rides on the beach, no special dinners, no "IT'S SO SWEET, LET'S GO BE LOVEY-DOVEY SOMEWHERE" kind of bullshit nonsense. And that's the way we wanted it to be. I always wondered about that myself, personally. Those couples who always couldn't wait for prom, couldn't wait for the vacation, couldn't wait for the honeymoon. "The relationship would truly indulge itself and blossom then," they thought. Those 'big moments' that defined their relationship, that justified it. Couples, or individuals swept up in these moments or waiting for them to happen, I can tell you that I've seen a lot of relationships bomb on that premise. They're supposed to be special events. You should not base the foundation of your relationship, you should not test its longevity on a fleeting moment. Your blossoming and personal growth with your significant other should not be decided by such a ridiculously uncommon and superfluous situation. They're special once-in-a-lifetime moments for a reason, asshole.
"Well then Deoxic, your relationship must've been pretty shallow, mundane and boring, right?" Heh heh, WRONG. You know what's a good sign of a person you've grown attached to is something special? When they make the mundane worth doing. When they make the average entertaining. When they make those moments you're going to experience over and over again ad-nauseum always fresh, something you'd bitch and moan at the thought of doing alone. All the seemingly insignificant moments. Sitting in the school parking lot on Jimmy Fitch's car talking about how much of a dick he is while scratching it with your fingernails. Going to the store looking for frozen TV dinners. Walking home by the local theater and just deciding on a whim to watch an awful movie. Browsing in Hollywood videos for those games you say you're going to rent but you'll never get around to. Going to Carls Jr. sharing a single meal because you're both too poor to afford two of them. Bullshitting your way through homework in the library while whispering about how flat-chested that bitch Maureen is. A relationship will never be built entirely of those enormous singular moments; it's a bunch of those tiny ones where you realize "Well now I'm actually looking forward to doing this same-old boring shit, as long as I get to do it with you." And that was it. Neither of us had particularly exuberant lives because we lived in the middle of fucking nowhere, but we were able to make even the smallest things count, and that was what mattered.
I remember one particular moment where we both snuck out at night to meet up at the local movie theater. This was after my father bailed on my family and before her mother died. With my brother working 50-hour weeks and my mother tending to all the beer, I had free reign on what I could do. My brother lent me 30 bucks for the week so I told her we should go blow it at the cinema. I honestly couldn't tell you what the hell we watched when we went there. It might've been Hero, because they were still showing that movie for a few months at the local movie theater. But that isn't the point. We almost didn't even pay attention to the movie. It was a school night, so it was practically empty. We had it all to ourselves. We just... talked. And occasionally raided the cafeteria. We were both malnourished, underweight children; the obese cashier was wondering if we were eating it or hiding it under the seats in the theater for them to clean it up. We were doing both. After the movie we left the theater and made out behind the alley. Not a nice place to do it, but it was cold, oddly serene, and completely quiet aside from the kitty following us.
"You know, it's hard to feel you up when we have this damn cat following you around."
"Be nice."
"It's killing the mood. Well, whatever mood we could salvage in the back alley of a movie theater." She stopped groping me and started petting the cat.
"I think he's cute." she said.
"So do I. I honestly wish I could be stroking some pu--"
"No."
"What WHAT?"
"I said no."
"Oh the irony of being cockblocked by a pu--"
"LUCAS NO."
It followed us to her apartment and it became a permanent impromptu guest by the name of Louie. This wouldn't be the first time this cat prevented me from getting laid, but that's another story for another day. This was by no means a special night in that context of the word, but it was certainly a night that made us realize why we enjoyed each other's company so much.
Did we occasionally fight? Why the hell wouldn't we? It's normal. It's maintenance for any relationship with any people, ever. It's a tune-up to make you look at the shit you're doing wrong and then you can tweak it and either work with it or get rid of it entirely. If there are big moments meant to define a relationship, then it's the fighting. If you're forced to come to grips with some major detrimental personality flaw with your significant other or you're forced to confront yourself, then that's important. It's after those moments that if you're still standing, then you might be onto something special. You always notice it's the abusive psychotic Italian and Irish couples that are married for 10 or 20 years instead of the average marital lifespan of a fortnight in this day and age.
We were forced to leave our oblivious little reverie and check the situation deteriorate around us. Ah, High School romance is so fleeting. It's a fast time in our lives, and we couldn't keep our our own lives in check, let alone each other's. We had to start facing the ugly monstrosities currently wrecking havoc on our personal lives. We started fighting a bit more. And it started taking a bit longer to fix it every time. And I have to tell you, we were a lot similar in the sense that we were both extremely shy people by nature, but when provoked we could be rather... cruel per say. I was (am?) loud, blunt, and antagonistic when angry. I could harass somebody mercilessly. She managed to be completely indirect, always attempting to drag on an agonizing vocal exchange without so much as flinching. I personally found this entertaining as hell, and against my better judgment occasionally exploited it. What? Well she was always so damn meek and shy, so it's pretty badass to watch her murderous-rage shine through and verbally dismantle anybody who managed to get her angry with the cold elegant efficiency of rapid-fire ten-syllable single-sentence wordsmithing.
After my father left, she caught me drinking. That went over reaaaaaaaaaaal well. Better her than my mother or brother.
"Don't judge." I said.
"I will."
"Well that's just silly." I was not taking this conversation seriously.
"It's hypocritical."
"Yeah, probably."
She took the can of watered-down Keystone out of my hand and poured it down the sink.
"I think the beauty of this is that my mother will think she was drinking it." Again, still not taking the conversation seriously.
"Is this why you were showing up late to school?" she asked. And this is the longest sentence you'll see her say.
"I wouldn't doubt it."
"Stop it." A slap across the face. With the acne coming it, it hurt like hell.
With that, I stopped. Or at least I tried to. Funny thing about those habits; they're really hard to quit once you get going. I was not handling the rapidly degenerating household I lived in incredibly well. This was bad for two reasons; one, it takes my mind off what we were doing together. And two; you can't have two completely fucked-up people in a relationship. That's not how it can work. When both of you have personal demons that need tending to, it's hard to keep juggling that. She was a shy and detached girl with an occasionally blunt or dry sense of humor. She was not the kind of person who radiated empathy. In fact, a running joke among a few people who actually knew that we were in a relationship (something we rabidly hid from everybody around us) was that she was the man of the relationship, and I was the touchy-feely "TELL ME YOUR FEELINGS" woman. So she struggled to help me. But sometimes she lacked that subtlety.
She wasn't without her problems either. Her father was a complete bastard, mind you. I only had the indecency of meeting him once; real stand-up guy, mind you. Also an alcoholic, but physically abusive. No surprise that he was drunk when I accidentally saw him. I didn't get a chance to meet her mother. She died later that year. I never figured out how, either. Ami wouldn't tell me. Which was pretty insulting, mind you; when you know somebody that long and are around them that often, the thought of keeping secrets seemed arbitrary, especially at this point. Being the empathetic person I was, it was borderline torturing to watch somebody struggle with a tragedy yet they refuse to let you help. It was an appalling similarity with my mother I didn't really want to acknowledge.
I remember the day it ended. I hadn't seen her in a few days. Things weren't going well. It was Friday, the 17th of December. My birthday was Tuesday. No one remembered. Except my brother. He gave me money and said to run down to Game Crazy and buy something nice for myself. I wanted to get Baten Kaitos. On Wednesday, and I was extremely sick. Bronchitis, hadn't eaten breakfast or Lunch. I didn't care, I wanted my damn gift to myself. I got it, got lost on the way home, felt sick as a dog and probably should've been hospitalized. My mom didn't care. When I started talking to Ami again, neither did she. To be fair, she was swept up in her mother's death. This happened around the end of November. But ignoring my birthday, ignoring the fact that I virtually killed myself just for something to make me happy and bring that day up. It wasn't her to do it. I got angry. She got angry. We both calmed down, and took a long hard glance at how fucked-up our lives were at that moment.
"...We're in trouble, aren't we?" I said.
"Probably."
"...I don't think we're going to make it."
"...Probably."
There was silence while we sat on a bench near the school parking lot. It was cloudy, but it wasn't raining. We looked at each other and smiled. It was forced as hell. I don't like smiling much anymore for this reason.
"I'll see you around." I said.
"Alright."
I walked her home, and there was little or nothing uttered during those 10 or 15 minutes. Nothing needed to be said.
Then the weekend came. I didn't see her waiting for me that Monday morning on the walk to school. Or the next day. Or the day after that. We occasionally caught glances of each other, but we didn't say a thing to each other. That year didn't end well. Christmas would've completely sucked if my drunkard mom didn't spend my dad's child support money and got me a DS. So there's that.
One particular day in Spring of 2005 I saw her at the bus stop. She was smoking. I caught her eye.
"...Don't judge." she said.
"...I won't."
"You smell like alcohol." she muttered.
"You smell like cigarette smoke."
"Does this make me a hypocrite?" she asked.
"Yeah, probably."
We both laughed. She smiled at me, and I smiled back. She caught the bus and waved as she left. That was the last time I would ever speak to her. She moved over the summer. I don't know where, I couldn't get much out of one of her friends. That same friend told me her life went to Hell when I left. That made me depressed to hear it, but ironically enough I started laughing my ass off. Not much people knew her, so it was like that shy little phantom was effectively erased from memory. So it goes.
We were both one in the same, it turns out. After everything was said and done, neither of us had the gall to admit that we helped each other cope, whether we admitted it or not. That twinge of regret didn't sit well with me for a while. But life goes on, and I have to say that 14 months for a a first budding High School relationship wasn't too bad, given the circumstances.
That's it. What, do you want some profound moral to the story? Here it is; there is no perfect relationship, because there's no such thing as a perfect person. For people holding out for one, you're going to die alone. A 'perfect' relationship in the subjective sense of the word is being able to see and cope with somebody's imperfections perfectly. So you're going to get stuck with stupid shit no matter who you're with, it's just a matter of if you're willing to wade it out.
And that's all I have to say on that matter. I hate you people for making me write this.
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