The Cause of the Effect

He looked damn good that night. He had just come from some award ceremony in which he had received some School of Management prize. (Looking back, I guess it was pretty strange that he didn’t invite me.) We had been dating for five months or so - five amazing fucking months - during which he had inspired me to pursue my artistic side in ways no one else had ever before. I felt alive - really alive - for the first time in my life. I loved listening to him play his guitar - in fact, most of our nights together consisted solely of just that. Me, lying on his bed, naked or in his green high school running pants and a tank top, listening to him experiment with new chords and off-the-cuff lyrics as I smoked a cigarette.

I had been waiting for him on this particular night, just relaxing in my apartment and playing silly videogames on an old school Nintendo when the buzzer rang. He came up and into the apartment and I felt so happy, so content and full of joy that I was the one - me - who got to kiss him hello. He grabbed a beer and watched my roommates play as I packed my overnight bag.

On the way to his apartment we stopped so I could get dinner - an eggplant parm hero, as I can still recall. I remember us sitting there, waiting for my order and telling him about my upcoming sorority formal. Now rather than just take a mental note of the date as one would expect a college boyfriend to do, he pulled out a small calendar to check the date. He wrote it down in pencil as though he would have to ponder this invitation at a later time. It struck me as odd but I just paid, took my hero and we went on our way.

As we walked to his apartment, we saw a group of his friends standing outside another building, smoking. Todd, Craig and Topher. I hadn’t seen Topher in awhile - he was a sweet kid - very young - only a freshman, I believe (I was a senior). I noticed Topher had grown some sideburns and so I reached out and touched them, saying something like “Ooooh, Mr. Sideburns, sexy!” - in the same, mind you, completely non-sexual way I would probably use while complimenting my own brother. I didn’t realize that I had done anything wrong. But I had.

When the boyfriend (we’ll call him D) and I got back to his apartment, he turned on the stereo, immediately lit a cigarette and picked up his guitar. I sat in the hallway/dining room eating my eggplant parm, feeling more in love than I ever had before. So content at going through these familiar motions. Once I finished, I brushed my teeth, took off my clothes and got into bed - noticing D was quiet. So I inched over to the corner of the bed with my naked ass arched in the air and asked, “What’s wrong, baby?”

He took a huge drag on his cigarette and put it out in his barely-drunk beer. He walked over to the bed and held my face in his hands and said, “Nothing. Absolutely nothing at all.”

And then he kissed me. He kissed me slowly and tenderly and as though he had never kissed me before. His fingertips explored the back of my neck. His tongue caressed mine over and over. And I felt a wave of electricity surge through my spine. I was literally dizzy with attraction and love and had never, ever felt so wanted or needed or connected to someone in my entire life.
We made love - really made love - for over two hours. It wasn’t fucking or sex - it was intimate and quiet and punctuated with long, tear-filled stares from both of our eyes. It was almost indescribable. And like nothing I have experienced before or since.

And then we slept.

I woke up the next morning, smiling, and turned to grab his chest and kiss his cheek as I always did. Much to my surprise, he was already awake, staring at the ceiling. I kissed him and he turned his face away. “What’s wrong?,” I asked, thinking nothing much of the question.

“I can’t do this,” he said, coldly, without pause.

“Do what?”

“This. Us. You and me. I can’t be with you.”

I shot up, the comforter falling down. I suddenly felt very naked.

“What? What?,” I screamed.

“You heard me,” he said. “I can’t be with you. I can’t do this anymore.”

I burst into tears. Was this a joke? We had fallen asleep with our lips pressed together, our last words, uttered almost simultaneously were “I love you” and he was doing this?

“No, please no. Don’t do this. You don’t mean it. D, please no, no.” I was hysterical. But he barely blinked. He just laid there, his arms folded behind his head.

“You should go,” he said.

I didn’t really know what to do but I got up and started to get dressed anyway. I ran back over to the bed screaming, “Why? Why are you doing this? What did I do? I love you. You love me. Why? Why? No, please.”

He didn’t move. He didn’t speak. And so I left. Weeping the whole walk home. Walking past kids going to class. Past moms pushing strollers. With tears streaming down my face. How could something this good be over?

I got back to my apartment. One of my roommates was up having coffee. I just looked at her and managed to say, through tears and drool and snot, “He broke up with me.” She put her mug down and just hugged me. Tightly, as I was shaking violently.

I cried every day for three weeks. That is until he came back, begging for forgiveness. Of course, stupidly, naively, I took him back.

The three weeks in between are a book onto their own, filled with comforting oral sex with one of my closest male friends and the near rekindling of a romance with another man who had previously broken my heart almost as terribly. But I won’t go into that here. The bottom line is that D did come back - but I was never the same. And never have been since. He had broken me. Fulfilled my ultimate fear - of being abandoned without warning and without reason. He pulled the same trick twice more over the course of our relationship until we finally broke up for good. The worst part of it all is that he always knew it was my biggest worry. And yet he did it over and over again.

Today, D is married. I am single. In fact, I haven’t had a really solid relationship since we broke up years ago. But I’ve been writing about him a lot lately - getting it all out on paper because I’m finally ready to move on. I’m ready to let someone back in. Ready to forgive myself for allowing someone to put me through such hell. Ready to roll over and kiss someone good morning. Ready to make love again.