Good morning, friend! Oooh. Settle in for story time, boys, girls, ‘n everyone in between. :P We met eight years ago, October 2006–just weeks after I’d started dating someone else. He was painstakingly gorgeous. Brilliant. Kinder, gentler, & more accepting of those around him than I had ever witnessed in a soul prior. A writer like myself, with badass taste in music. Our connection was intense & instantaneous–electrified tingles whenever we’d hug or our hands would bump & what have you, always aware of one another’s emotions sans any obvious cues, constant bouts of saying the same thing simultaneously, or what one another was thinking, to the point where it was undeniable. All this, & it felt like we had somehow met before. But I thought, no. I just started dating this other guy. I don’t wanna mess this up already. So for a year & a half, we held back those feelings & remained “best friends”–creepily close ones who held cuddle sessions when he’d come over, & all the while, I was dating that other guy. That other guy? It turned out he was very emotionally abusive towards me. So, of course, Billy couldn’t stand that. It killed him to watch. He encouraged me all the time to get away from that guy, as firmly yet gently as he could be without hurting me with this advice that held the potential to completely alter my life. Even if, for some very odd reason I did not choose to date him afterward instead, he would’ve accepted it–he just wanted me away from that guy, whatever it took. I was in denial at first, but eventually came to see his point. But by then, my then-boyfriend’s anger problems had grown too substantially. I was terrified as to what he would do to me if I left him, so I stayed. I stayed & continued with my attempts to fix our qualms to no avail–for eight. Fucking. Years. But that’s another story–one of which I am far less inclined to divulge. About a year & a half into our friendship–I believe it was spring? 2007–Billy decided it was never going to happen with us. He couldn’t continue to witness my pain, hear me sob on the phone for hours every other night over this guy, offer help I wouldn’t take, or wait around for me any longer. One can only take so much. I do not blame him at all. He made the decision to date someone close to me, instead. Now, I know that, me dating someone else, I had no right to be upset with him whatsoever, after ample opportunities–but I was, nevertheless. In fact, very much so. It fucking tore me to shreds. But then I thought, hey–I’d actually be better off. No more temptation to be with him, instead of my then-current boyfriend, right? Clearly the better option. So I cut contact with him.Fast forward to July of last year: I finally left that boyfriend & moved to Orlando. About goddamned time. I stayed with friends until ultimately moving into what was meant to be my permanent apartment one month later. One of my roommates was one of my best friends from high school (who turned out to spew heaps of shit about me behind my back, but that is besides the point.) Well, I guess at some point in 2006 or 7, I had introduced this friend to Billy. They’d apparently kept in touch all the while. So we move in, & there’s no furniture…or cable…or anything with which to entertain ourselves, other than alcohol. So, we drink every night. Perhaps in as soon as two or three nights’ time, that roommate mentions to me that she’s talking to Billy on the achingly spotty wifi connection we managed to scavenge through the complex (or at least, that if not currently. she still did from time to time–I forget.) Jeeesus Christ. Billy. Now that’s a name I hadn’t heard in a while, aside from on the lips of old men calling kids “little Billy” on TV, & the guy from Bad Santa.I find myself deeply missing people with whom I’d lost touch–most of which for several years prior, for better or for worse–whilst intoxicated. At that point, I’m single now, & all the love from 2006-7 comes flooding back to my liquor-laced brain. Yes, love. We said, “I love you,” all of the time back then–while making embarrassingly weak attempts to convince ourselves that we meant it in some other context. Soon, we wouldn’t have to any longer. So she tells him that I’m willing to speak to him again, & I remember she said–& he confirmed–that he got so giddy, like a kid on Christmas Eve. He kept asking her if I would talk to him yet, but I had passed out. Cutest thing ever. I saw the friend request in the morning, & I was actually rather reluctant & cautious to accept, in fear of the note on which things had ended, or how things may have changed in that time (including his apparent move out of the state–I did not know if I could handle long distance). But when I allowed myself to feel out the situation, I knew exactly how it would go. Turned out I was right, every step of the way. I clicked “accept”…& the rest, as they say, is history. :)
