Hello, I Dislike You Intensely. Have a Nice Day.

Okay, everything’s better now, I think. Between me and Alex. I guess it should be since we apologized and went back to feeling more or less the same way that we felt about each other before, but I still can’t decide how exactly I feel about feeling that way.

I was ridiculously and absurdly tired today. Walking straight mystified me so I didn’t even try. People thought I was drunk and I let them because it made me feel bad-ass and IDGAF-esque, something that is indeed a rare feeling. My neurons felt constantly ready to short-circuit and explode like firecrackers on Chinese New Year, spattering nerve and skull fragments in a disgusting yet fascinating way over the nearest wall. I would say things I thought were logical, then get paranoid they were actually shockingly ridiculous or stupid right after they were out of my mouth. It was disaster.

I went to Alex and slurred at him to “explain himself”. He understood what I was referring to and told me he “just wanted to be completely honest. Like, I don’t want either of us thinking that I’m keeping things from you that you should know. Even if there were never any way you could find out. It still wouldn’t be right. I mean, it would just be wrong. And, I, I love you. And I, want to do this right…Are you okay?”

I felt like a smeary, oily handprint on a bus window. “Tired,” I said. “It’s my own fault though.”

“Oh.” A slight smile dusting his lips. I wished I could remember everything he just said but I was just too tired. I thought it was good, though. Honest and Alex-like. “Is there anything else?” I asked.

“Well. I just felt…like I wanted to get it over with all at once – our fighting, and our animosity, and our brutal honesty. Every couple goes through that stuff, but I want us to be…different. Smarter. I’m sorry I fought with you. And that I said shit, because I regret it now, more than a lot of people regret things even worse. It was just because I was angry you were so right about me. It was my last defense mechanism, but you know, fuck, what’s wrong with owning up? So, I am an avoider and a wallower and I like hating myself and reveling in my faults.”

Like you are right now, I thought. It was good to be aware of one’s faults but I felt like he didn’t really want to try and fix any of them. Of course, nobody was ever perfect, but this bothered me.

“Is there something you want to tell me?” he asked in turn and I balked. The word balked reminded me of the Balkan states pre-World War I and nationalist groups and assassinated archdukes. I similarly felt like something would very soon snap and set off a chain reaction. “I’m really tired,” I said, unsure. “But yes I did blame you for my friend problems. I’m sorry too. You never did anything wrong. I was the one not paying attention to my life. Please…” I didn’t know what I was trying to say. Please don’t change. Please try to change. Please just hold and kiss me, uncomplicatedly. Please make it like it was in the beginning. Love is easy to start but hard to hold on to. That is what many enlightened strangers and dead writers and starved artists have tried to tell me before, before I thought love could actually happen to me. Like getting meningitis or winning the lottery.

I was lost in the gold haze of my epiphany before the fold of arms brought me back to reality. (Wow, I didn’t even notice I was using so much slant rhyme.) We sort of fell into each other, and the hug felt like things changing. But it was still something to lean on and into, for both of us. Is that what love eventually becomes?