Life Worth Living

Last weekend JT texted to tell me he had broken up with Jack Dawson, his boyfriend of just over a year. I was walking home with Leone at the time, so I didn’t look at the message until about an hour later, but when I saw what he had written I immediately called him, and I stayed on the phone with him for an hour. The breakup surprised me a little bit, not because it hadn’t been a long time coming, and certainly not because I thought he should’ve stayed with Jack. It surprised me because JT hadn’t mentioned wanting to do it, although that itself shouldn’t have been unexpected, because the fact that he couldn’t tell me is a huge part of the reason he ended it.

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The Dilemma

On Thursday I realised that JT was supposed to visit on Friday since he had postponed last Friday’s visit due to an appointment.  Buttercup, Jasmine, and Daisy were going camping this weekend, and I was supposed to come too, but I wasn’t that excited about going because it wouldn’t be like last time, when it was just the three of us and Jasmine’s mother, the whole beach and starry sky to ourselves. It would be Jasmine’s entire family and a few family friends, and I just didn’t find the dynamic that would add up to as appealing. I felt bad about feeling relieved when camping was called off on Wednesday due to bad weather. Other reasoning aside, there was a chance that my Kabarett class would want to practice this weekend. They didn’t, but I didn’t know that until Thursday after I remembered JT’s and my tentative plans. Tentative, because our plans are always so, but plans nevertheless.

By that time Jasmine had already looked up the forecast again and declared camping back on, but of course I wasn’t sure about going. I hadn’t even technically said I would go at all; just that I probably could, but would know by Thursday. Plus, when I told him I wasn’t going camping after all, Leone had invited me to his racquetball tournament on Saturday and I’d said yes. I fretted about the decision all week: I had more reason to stay, but I knew that if I canceled Jasmine and Buttercup would be angry/sad (it didn’t help that Jasmine had just gotten over of a period of resentfulness aimed mostly toward Buttercup but some toward me as well), and also especially since it would just look like I was abandoning them now that I was dating someone, which was only half true. Camping was also a once-a-semester type deal; so was the tournament, but JT visiting not so much, even though sometimes it feels that way. I could also cancel on Leone, because even though I had said “yes” to him we hadn’t made any official plans, but I didn’t want it to seem like I was being unsupportive of the things he’s involved in or that he was just a backup plan and now that my real plans had been un-canceled I didn’t need him anymore. In addition, I actually did want to see him play. The plans with JT I had made earliest of all, but they were also the least plans-y of all, and I wasn’t even positive they wouldn’t fall through. When I divulged this all to him in a massive 7-page text message bittersweetly reminiscent of the text monstrosities of two semesters ago, he essentially said, “I’ll come if you don’t go camping.” (Not in a manipulative way, but in a “if you end up canceling your plans for me, I won’t make it so that you did it for nothing” kind of way)

I kept flip-flopping. If I went camping I couldn’t do anything else and I’d lose an entire weekend of work. If I stayed I could hang out with JT, go to the tournament, and potentially meet my Kabarett class and finish some reading. The balance was obviously tipped one way, and so I texted Jasmine and Buttercup with the bad news. Jasmine seemed terse and angry, but Buttercup surprisingly didn’t try to convince me to go.

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There’s nothing to do. I dont want to do anything. It hit me just today, all of a sudden, and maybe it’s because I’ve been awake since 8 in the morning, and maybe it’s because I’ve finally had enough of break.

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I’m fairly sure that the Berkeley campus is having a mass hangover. No one on the streets, no one at the gym…I hope some people at least had more fun than I did. Well actually, I’m not that type of person, the kind ones the world really needs, who are happy for other people and willing to settle for trickle-down joy. And my Halloween was a little less than stellar.

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JT and Jack Dawson are in the other room. Alone. With the door closed. I hope they’re not, like, having sex in there, because it would be rude of them when I have dinner all heated and Buttercup is waiting for us to come over.

—

Although, even if they’re talking—which I think is what they’re doing—it’s still a little rude of them.

—

They did this a few hours ago too, at the dollar store. Jack Dawson had been pissy/quiet since he’d gotten here and he apparently pulled JT aside in the store and they then proceeded to have a 3o minute talk and I…strolled around the aisles and tried not to look like I was loitering around a dollar store. For 30 minutes. Finally I said to hell with it and went to fetch them, because there’s only so long a girl can stand in front of the check out lanes with a sullen look on her face.

—

Tomorrow is Buttercup’s Halloween potluck, and I’m dressing up for the first time in years and I’m excited. On a similar note, a very hot guy that I think maybe possibly may be a little interested in me might be there. Haha, I guess it doesn’t sound very exciting on paper. Er, cybertext. Or whatever.

—

Also, Korean 2 will be there. Korean 2, who, might I remind you all, Buttercup thinks likes me. And I see it too. And I have no real interest in him, except that I like that he likes me.

—

Romeo might be there too. But I’m guessing not.

—

I am so excited.

Wth was my last story freaking too-long-to-count ago? I need to get on that
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Buttercup asked me if I wanted Romeo‘s number. I told her no, but to give him mine and tell him to let me know when he’s horny. She didn’t at first because she didn’t want me to seem desperate, but recently when he messaged her she asked him if he wanted my number in a by-the-way. He replied to what she had said regarding the conversation proper, but not the by-the-way, and I’m guessing I should take this to mean he’s not interested? Surprisingly, I dont care as much as I thought I would. I dont take kindly to rejection, which is why I thought I’d be bummed, but I’m not really. Only thing is, I wish he would consent to replace The Chemist as my FWB, and I wonder if he thinks I want a romantic relationship, and that’s why he’s not chomping at the bit. Well; I hope that gets cleared up.
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The reason, I think, that I dont care nearly as much about Romeo’s apparant disinterest, is that I’m distracted by someone in my German class, who is hot as a smouldering volcano in August. He sits next to the window, so he’s always backlit, and that plus my crappy vision makes it really difficult to tell, but for the last few weeks I thought he’d been glancing over a lot. Last week he and I talked/joked/flirted, and this week I’m getting double the glancing over. Except now I know that he is, I’m not sure what that entails. Interest? Does he look at everyone? I would hate to lose this one too because neither of us had the balls to make the move, so I should get on that.
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Jack Dawson is a controlling, nosy, personal-space-invading jerk. And JT needs to grow a pair and either tell him to stop or tell him he wants out.

I’m falling out of touch with JT. There are three parts of this, as far as my thoughts are concerned:

(By falling out of touch I mean that while before it wouldn’t have been strange to have a text-versation (lasting all day sometimes) with him every day, we are now going through a dry spell. The last time I heard from him was Wednesday (it’s Monday now), and that because I texted him first. This may not seem like a big deal, but usually it’s almost always he who initiates. And this after more than a week of silence.)

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“Let’s just go home,” JT said to me for the second time in a week, the second time I’d seen him after the cruise, and for the second time, it was only 9 PM. I looked at him, and I thought about all those times a year ago, two years ago, when we had stayed out long past sundown, back when I’d take however many hours my father would give me and would complain that 12 was too early, back when after I left, whoever remaining would carry on into the darkness without me. Back when we didn’t need to have something to do, because sitting and talking in a park, or the in foodcourt of a mall, or inside a dark car would suffice; back when we didn’t even need anything to talk about because we knew that we’d always find something. I thought about how many other times we’d stared at each other, the four of us, and later on three or maybe only two of us, and wondered what to do, and found something rather than gave up, and I wanted to ask him why.

I almost did, but I’m not that kind of person. I have a sort of foolish pride (and it’s stupid, I know, to even call it pride), and I wont be seen asking my best friend not to leave. Unbidden, a part of me wondered if he just didn’t want to hang out with me anymore, because I knew that “going home” meant that I went home to my house, and JT and Jack Dawson go “home” together. But then I thought, we’re past that point in our friendship where I think like that. I’ve thought like that before, to no avail, and I was wrong besides, and I know that’s not it. It’s hard to not think like that sometimes, though.

So I drove home alone with the music blasting through my windows, and I looked at the road and the headlights and the streetlights and the traffic lights and the moonlight and the starlight overhead, and I thought—here’s a beautiful summer night. It was made for us. Why are we letting it slip by?

Because two years ago we would have held on to this summer night for all we were worth, and now here’s one giving itself to us, waiting for us to grab hold of it…and we’re just going home. And then I wonder if it’s because we’ve grown up…and I think, if that’s the case, then I wish we never had.

Ate most of it before thinking to snap a pic

For those of you who dont know what it’s like to have someone throw rocks at your window in the middle of the night, it did not play out like that scene in HSM 3 where Vanessa Hudgens is lolling around her room in A FREAKING PARTY DRESS AND HEALS WITH HER HAIR DONE UP AND MAKEUP BEAUTIFUL so that when her sweet Zac Efron showed up she looked perfect (Yes; I did watch that movie, and I’ll never admit it again. Here’s my defense: Rosemary made me.)  Real girls dont hang around the house looking like they’re ready to go to a party, at least this one doesn’t. Here’s what went down for me:

Female lead sits in her room playing a game on her ipod touch. She hasn’t looked in a mirror in 3 hours and is worse off for it. She’s just had a huge meal and is nursing her full belly in a 2-sizes-too-big t-shirt and baggy sweat pants.

TWACK.

FL: What was that, a stupid bird? Fuck, spiders come in through that window. Dont freak, dont freak…It can’t be a spider, they dont grow to that size, thank god.

TWACK.

FL: DAMN SPIDER. No—calm down; we’ve already established that’s not a spider. Which doesn’t mean it’s not a monster. BACK OFF, I HAVE MOUSSE. That stuff hurts when it gets in the eyes.

TWACK.

FL: WTF? That better not be my brother doing something stupid. The brat’s gonna get it tomorrow

Cut to the scene when I peered out my window and saw a car parked on my driveway. I was halfway out my bedroom door before I realised what I was wearing and how I must’ve look. Good thing it was dark outside. Turned out to be JT and Jack Dawson come to bring me a slice of the cake they had baked and to bid me goodbye before I boarded the plane on my way to Alaska and a 10-day cruise tomorrow.

I’m a girl; we’re easily swayed by pink, sugary sweets delivered to our door by two cute boys (and you’ll never hear me refer to them as cute again, so dont get used to it). And I sit here now eating my princessy cake that’s frosted even down the sides and thinking that those boys are damn good at following directions on the side of a cake mix box.

Whatever I’ll say about JT and Jack Dawson, it’s true that they’re not always sweet to only each other. Unless they’re just trying to get me to gain five pounds before I have to shrug in my bikini—in which case, it’s working!

Today after dark JT, Jack Dawson, and I drove to a park that had a decent view of the city lights. We leaned against the gate/fence huddled in the cold and peered down and out over San Jose.

We had spent the day like kids, the three of us, playing Frisbee on the grass after we’d climbed all over the playground and swung in the swings, running like fools to catch the ice cream man and dropping our Popsicle sticks in the trash only to spy him coming around the corner again, and then we cheering and scurrying over to shell out more cash for dollar ice cream bars. We threw poppers and made a mess on the sidewalk and giggled like buffoons when a little boy popped one scootering over it. We went to Chuck-E-Cheese’s and made funny faces in the photo booth for a quarter a pop. We went to the Togos that had been one of our oldest haunts back when we were in high school; we had spent hours in that plaza eating burgers and sandwiches, slurping down cold coffee and smoothies, playing Apples To Apples in the back of an SUV.

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