Bobby.

Let’s start with Bobby. I’m calling him Bobby though that wasn’t his name. In fact, Bobby couldn’t be further from well, Bobby. Bobby feels light. Bobby feels silly and fun and sometimes frustrating in his lack of attention to detail. Bobby was heavy. Dark. Intense. Bobby noticed everything. Always. Not in an admirable way, but more in a fuck off and leave me alone kind of way.

We met on a cruise, in Greece. I shit you not. My beloved grandmother Harriet (real name and all the things a Harriet should be) took me on a magical cruise to celebrate my high school graduation. My grandfather had passed away by that point in my life and so, it was just me and H. Two ladies cruising around the Mediterranean, trying to figure out timed lights in public restrooms. Harriet was actually a dirty stay up but still no match for my early 20s vigor and special breed of insomnia. I was fearless in a way that was unknowing and a bit stupid, and so, I wandered.

I ran my fingertips across dated velour wall coverings and ate soft serve at 1 AM and read paperbacks in the movie screening room with my feet propped on the empty seats in front of me. My short hair perpetually smelled of sunshine and cheap sunscreen and my large plastic unbranded sunglasses were always crookedly tucked into the front of my top. I remembered buying them at CVS with my sister, Neva. I tried on at least fifteen pairs that day, looking for the perfect shades.

What about these?

Those are nice.

You said the last ones were nice.

Right. Those were nice too.

She breathed heavily, the tiny tight curls around her face moving gently. I was trying her patience. I knew it and yet, I couldn’t stop.

What about these?

I’m gonna go look for new conditioner, okay? They all look…nice. Just pick a pair.

I look at myself in the tiny funhouse mirror strip on the side of the sunglass carousel and pick up another pair.

Now I’m stretched out on a poolside lounger, the skin of my hot sticky thighs trapped between two sun-softened plastic slats. It feels comfortably uncomfortable and I resist the urge to shift.

Catching some rays?

I look up and there he was, Bobby. Thick brown hair on the longish side, high cheek bones, and a thin but sturdy frame. Oh, and gorgeous. A beautiful human. He wore a polo shirt. A Polo polo shirt, khakis, and Adidas sandals. A prep school wet dream. His smile was arrogant but he radiated some kind of anxious energy.

I tried to think of some clever way to respond. Something about moon rays? What the fuck is a moon ray? I just looked up at him and smiled. Sure.

That first exchange was so telling. My awe, attraction, and intimidation. His confidence, his command, his insecurity.

I didn’t realize at the time what I had or who I was, not really. It didn’t occur to me that sitting poolside with Franny and Zooey during the wee hours was unusual and even a little bad ass. I didn’t feel strong or brave or cool. I felt special that this very average boy was talking to me.

I thought ours was to be a vacation fling. Romance on the high seas. And yet, Bobby had different ideas. Ideas about keeping in touch and a long-distance relationship. He was smitten, or so he said, and I was still amazed.  

I think what I’m most embarrassed to admit is how quickly he showed the ugliness beneath the stiff exterior. I wish that I could tell you it took ages. I would love to share that by the time he was a mean piece of shit, so much time had passed that I was in too deep to clearly see his flaws.

Sorry. Sorry because I want to be better. Sorry to myself because I should have done better. Sorry that I feel compelled to apologize.

He wasn’t the guy that takes time to get comfortable. He’s the guy who walks into a room of strangers, takes his shoes off, cracks a beer, and pops a squat. You feel me? He’s that guy.

He was outrageously quick to anger. It was terrifying. I mastered the art of walking on glass. Of making nice. Of making better. I appeased and I prayed. A lot. I’m not religious but I prayed to the universe. I begged for respite, for calm, for peace. I just needed him to not freak the fuck out, always.

The most amazing part is that he was completely unphased by how his behavior affected others. Nonplussed. He would lose his ever loving shit wherever, whenever, for whatever reason he deemed appropriate. He would see red and I would see disapproval, disgust, and pity. I became the disclaimer queen.

Let me explain. He’s just had a long day.

My roommates would give me those wry smiles. You know the ones I’m talking about, don’t you? The kind of grin that just screams ‘what the fuck are you actually talking about’?

I did an awful lot of pretending. I became the queen of denial. I mastered the art of ‘it’s all good.’ I was in love but also, wrecked. Devastated.

I was pretty used to yelling. I understood yelling. This was different. It was harsh in a way that I didn’t know how to process.  I just shrank. I made myself teeny tiny and I crawled inside myself and I hid from his lack of control in the darkest corners within me.

We didn’t go head-to-head. There was no sparring. I was annihilated by him and still, I stayed. Why? He loved me in a way I thought I needed. He was so passionate. Of course, that was it. Bobby was so goddamn angry because of all that passion. This is what I told myself. This is where I lived. This is how I coped.

Bobby gave me reflux and bed bugs and a deep desire to be someone else.

There was this time that his parents brought him groceries to keep in his dorm and they didn’t fit properly so he spent twenty minutes screaming and throwing boxes of Triscuits and Chex into the wall.  

He enthralled and terrified me. He was nothing I wanted and everything I desired. We decided to study abroad apart but together. I would graduate early from college and take graduate classes in London. He would spend the latter half of his junior year in Italy.

He said pronto when he answered the phone and made plans to meet me in Paris on Valentines Day. And then one day in January he sent an email explaining that he was fucking a Texan. I wasn’t supposed to see it, you see. It went to a group. It was an update for his roommate Seth, still in Virginia. He was lazy and impatient and wrote his nonsensical and mostly juvenile life update on the top of that chain, and then, he sent it to everyone. Mom, dad, grandma and grandpa, and well, me. His girlfriend. Not a Texan. A heartbroken New Yorker. Living in London.

I was devastated and desperate. I tried everything to win back his affection. To convince him that there was something worth saving. There was nothing worth saving. He was a toxic piece of shit and I was an abused rag doll.

I was shattered. I still met him in Paris and somehow, in my despair, found my courage and my sense of self in that cramped hotel room meant for one and shared by two. Two estranged humans who once shared something that barely resembled love.

I saw the Eiffel Tower and ate crepes and told him to go fuck himself.

I still didn’t love myself enough to understand why I had to be taken to my knees. Not then. Not yet. Not even soon.

xo

L.