Desperate for Closure

The neighbors almost seemed to be watching me as they mowed their pink flamingo dotted lawns. Well not watching me exactly, just glancing at me every few seconds with distrust in their eyes. Like they we're really that far gone to mistake a seventeen year old girl in a red VW bug for some neighborhood nuisense. But I didn't care what they thought. After all I wasn't parked out here on the curb roasting in the Florida sun for them. I was parked out here for a different reason entirely.

It had taken me five years, five long years, for me to get here. Here, at this particular curb, in front of this particular white-washed house. It had taken five years for me to summon up some sort of courage to make it to the edge of this driveway. Five years of struggling to make my feelings known and second guessing myself every time. Five years of trying to convince myself that it needed to be said. That somethings, the truth, was better off saying... no matter what the consequences. Five years of my life spent asking myself, sometimes out loud, what hurt more: saying something and wishing you had not, or saying nothing, and wishing you had?

I was here out of desperation. Desperation, not for love (for that time had long past), but simply for closure. I had made it this far. Only the three steps to the front door remained, but I couldn't bring myself to turn the key and immerse myself in the sweltering heat...not yet anyway.

So instead I sat there, like some crazy psycho stalker chic, knowing that any second he would look out his window and just know. Just know, without even needing me to tell him. After all, I wasn't the first that would be utterly spontaneous and show up at his door like a manic proclaiming my love for him. And I wouldn't be the last. No...I wouldn't be the last.

I mean what the hell was doing here? There was no happy ending in sight. This wasn't the end of a 80's move or some fairy tale you tell little kids so they don't realize how shitty the world is. I knew as well as anyone that there was no Prince Charming waiting within those doors that would be perfectly happy to carry me into happily ever after or a sunset or some other cliche movie ending technique. I knew exactly how this was going to end; tears and disappointment. Both probably reshaped later ,when I'm old enough, into some half wit philosophy that I would tell to my grandkids in some hope they would live a better life than I did. I knew that nobody within those brightly painted red doors wanted to star with me in the ending credits. That nobody behind those doors cared, not really anyway, even him. Especially him.

Jeff.

I can't even hear the name without thinking of him. Of the first day we met, five years ago, when I didn't give a damn. How I fell in love quickly, silently, and easily; masking my ignorance in a half hazard mix of rage and anger. Trying to disguise what everyone else freely displayed.

He was my first love. Not that he took any notice; I was one of a hundred, or a thousand, or...god I don't know. What is it about people who don't believe in love that makes them so attractive? Why must we chase after the people that don't want to be chased? The people that are content living as they are. Why are they the ones that come along and change everything? Why are they the ones forcing us to comprehend the fact that we'll never be truly content without them? Why are they are ones that make us fall in love?

I grew up thinking he was the one. And maybe it was a combination of TLC wedding shows and a sister obsessed with being the next Cake Boss, but I could almost picture it: us together, a big white wedding with a band, six bridesmaid dressed in purple, our mutual friends crying and smiling with joy or jealously and Him (a guy who never wanted to be anyone's boyfriend) becoming a husband. But there were always clouds of doubt overshadowing this sunny vision. I could never picture how he would look or how he would look at me. I couldn't see him saying 'I Do' or even holding me tight. I couldn't imagine our families there or even him smiling. Even in my dream, reality was setting in. The same reality of desperation that had brought me here. That had made me take these steps toward the door as I held the car keys tight in my hand. Gripping them so I later the imprints would still be on my skin. The Florida sunshine burning my eyes as I flaunted my courage for all the neighbors to see, even thought there was none among them knowledgeable enough to appreciate it.

I was alone as I stood at the door, on the too-green grass. Waiting. Waiting like I had been for the past five years. Waiting for a lapse in conversation, some perfect moment, some time when we'd be able to look back on this whole thing and laugh...and laugh. The doorbell had been pressed, there was no going back. There was no running. There was no way to reach my car and drive off into some semblance of a normal life where I'd always be able to think 'What if.' This was it. This was the end. The end of that little innocent little girl who was never fully prepared to fall in love and wasn't prepared to fall out of it now.

"Allison?" He asks once he opens the door. The shock visible on his face. 'Who would of guessed', he probably thought, looking at me with those brown eyes. Begging me, not to say what I'd come there to say. Begging me not to do what so many girls had done. Begging me not to throw five years of friendship and deceit away.

He knew. I could tell it from his face. From his eyes. From the way he held the door handle like any second he was going to shut it closed. Closed on the unwarranted love, on the lies, on me. He knew. But I was going to say it anyway. I couldn't help myself. I had made it this far. I had...I had to.

"Jeff...I-"

But he interrupted me. He was experienced. He knew that by asking that one causal thing, what was I doing here, I was lost again to the sea of doubt. My shallow confidence gone. After all how was I supposed to answer that? I've come to profess my love so I can move on with my life. Cause loving you is like fighting an uphill battle everyday, knowing you're never going to care but lying to myself and saying maybe one day you will and then we'll get married?

I blurted out a lame excuse before I could even stop myself. It had become second nature by now: lying, acting, pretending I'm all right when I'm not.

"I was just in the neighborhood. Thought I'd stop by."

"Oh." He said, but I could tell he didn't buy it in the awkward silence that fell after it. The struggle inside of me, showing on my face like headlights.

"Okay well I'm just in the middle of something." He says, not inviting me inside. Obviously trying to get me to leave. Obviously clinging, just as deliriously, that next I'd see him, I'd be normal again. I'd be that little girl, he used to see. I'd be his girl friend again, always a space between those two words and no questioning it. Who knows...maybe I will be. Maybe I didn't need to say it. Maybe this was enough. Maybe.

"Okay well I better be getting home." I say letting him off easily.

"Okay goodbye Allison." He says, not even chancing hugging me goodbye.

"Bye, Jeff. Oh wait, Jeff I-I"

I love you.

Too bad he'd already shut the door.