I have no clue what I'm doing or if it works or if it's garbage. I hate rating this rated R, because I've been thinking like this and talking like this with everyone I know since I was 13. For those of you who haven't been in mature relationships yet, be warned, this is about mature relationships. (And yes, I just got out of one)
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The Ex-Lovers
It was by the window in his friend’s apartment as the clock approached midnight of the New Year that Torque saw Amy again. There she was past the group of drunk seniors who grinded to the beat of Jay Sean’s new single, which induced a skinny brunette to jump on a sofa and yell that she loved this song, as her pissed off boyfriend frantically tried to cover her visibly erect tits that were stabbing through her wet tank top while simultaneously screaming at his friends to find that pervy son of a bitch who dowsed his girl with a half-full beer keg, who was at the other side of that crowded neon room high-fiving his friends right next to Amy, who was conversing with her own friends.
It was her in the same jeans that she spilled ice cream on last spring when they spontaneously decided to skip class and waste that radiant day at the park before sneaking into her bedroom later that night to slowly unbutton and unzip those stained pants as he kissed her navel, the same ones that he unbuttoned and unzipped when they first made love and when they last fucked. From across the room Torque leaned against a wall near the window with a beer in his hand as he watched her chat and laugh with the same voice that both softly sang to him while he fell asleep and cursed him and his useless, ugly penis many times before.
Then she saw him. Amy didn’t recognize him at first, for it’s been a while since she had last seen him (or even thought about him). It wasn’t until she identified the indistinguishable sagging shoulders of the figure’s sad silhouette against the bumping backdrop of the party that she realized that it was Torque. Through the distance she peered into his face and imagined every wrinkle, pore, hair, and zit, in their entire beautiful splendor that she had first loved, then hated, and now found curiously interesting.
It is true that she broke his heart, but he committed a much hideous offense, and it is unfortunate that he is unaware of his own selfishness. The truth is that she surrendered her life long ago to the unconditional demands of his desperation, whereas he views himself as the victim of love. The throbs, fever, and anguish that he suffered are not love, or unrequited love for that matter, but they are merely symptoms of a pathetic man whose illusion of his own self-worth was shattered before his eyes with her final and ultimate rejection. He used to work so hard for her, to the point that she mistook that effort for love. Once he felt secure with his newly acquired property, there was no need to maintain his attention on something that will (he assumed to) be always there.
But affection can quickly spoil when it isn’t refrigerated. Soon it seems disappointments are the only outcomes from continually living with another person instead of pleasant surprises. Cute quirks become nuisances that evolve into hideous offences of the mind. Suggestions turn into disagreements that escalate into conflict. Soon sex transforms from an enactment of love to a struggle of war. But the worst is when movements cease and they do not dare touch each other, or see, or breathe the same air; when it is absolutely quiet and they are aware of nothing except the stranger lying beside them and the stone cold truth that the heaven they once imagined was a lie.
Break ups are the hardest things that a person can easily do. The most difficult thing about it is learning how to live without having someone to critique movie trailers with, or teaching how to salsa dance, or learning the rules of football from, or sleeping without the weight of another naked body, or waking up to text messages that read, “time 2 shower baby. use that herbal essence that i like but u pick the conditioner. cant wait to guess wht u use! cu at school babe.” One has to adjust to the solitude of being single. The person who knows you the most and who you know the most is gone. She is no longer there to receive your drunk texts that read, “i want to kick your puppy,” when you meant to write something entirely different. He is not there to hold your hair up and tolerate the fumes of the semi-digested cheeseburger that you’re vomiting into the toilet. She is not there to playfully resist you when you’re horny, but finally surrendering to your charm only to be disappointed by broken promises while you lie there turned away with a dented ego, which is further smashed when she pats your head and tells you that it’s alright, we’ll try again next time.
Next time, they pondered as Torque’s friend hooks his arm around him and guide him through the mesh of flesh and salty fluids to introduce him to a girl. Can they try? they ask as Amy watched Torque get closer and closer through the crowd of fabric and flashing lights. As she became closer and closer, he noticed that both of her delicate hands gingerly held a glass of strawberry wine cooler that pulsed a deep blood red under the beating strobe light, the same hands that could both gently stroke his cheek and play with his ear and lips as if promising something magnificent, and firmly seize and tug his hair as his buried head between her legs violently shoved her closer over the cliff of fantasy.
Then they finally were there together.
“Torque, I would like you to meet Amy, my girlfriend. Amy, this is my friend, Torque.”
She smiled a smile that could create and destroy men and said, “Yes, it’s nice to see you.”
He looked at her with eyes that promised everything and said, “It’s good to see you, too.”
And it was good, to see. It was good to see that they weren’t sorry for what they did: for wanting, for taking, for having, for giving, for losing, nor for leaving. They weren’t sorry they’ve ever met. It was over, but they weren’t sorry for that either. Nor were they sorry that there was nothing to save in that apartment as everyone erupted into cheer when the clock struck midnight of the New Year.
