Monday, April 25, 2005

Act One – Saying Goodbye

We were silent in the car on our way back to the hotel. We both realized that the next day we may be saying goodbye to each other for the last time. A realization brought on by a damn John Cusack movie. John Cusack and that song. I remember tears rolling down my face as I watched him hold up the radio and play that song. It wasn’t that moment of the movie that was affecting me. It was that moment in my life. The fact that I may be saying goodbye to a woman at the very moment we were both finally in love with each other. It wasn’t our choice to spend the next year apart. It was a part of our lives that we had no control over.

We had met a year or so earlier. We were both in the Navy, stationed on a small island. I had been there for a month or so before she arrived. This was a small command of only about 600 people all living together in dorm style housing. Everybody knew everybody. I don’t remember the first time I saw her, but she remembered the first time she saw me. She relived the moment for me after we started seeing each other. She had only been on the island for two days and was watching TV in one of our common lounges. I came into the lounge and the first words out of my mouth were:

“I HOPE SHE GETS HIT BY A GASOLINE TRUCK AND TASTE HER OWN BLOOD.” (I loved Sam Kinison)

I was very agitated. You see, I had just gotten off the phone with my ex and we had one of “those” calls. I don’t remember what it was about, but I know we had them a lot in the first few years after our breakup. You see she left me about six months before I was shipped to the island.

There I was ranting and the future love of my life decided right at that moment that I was the guy for her. She somehow didn’t see the anger, the pain, and the resentment. She saw the passion, the fire, the possibility. She was wise for 19 years of age. She knew this wasn’t going to be easy. I was a 21 year old boy who had been recently crushed by his first love. I was also separated from my 2 year old son by 2000 miles. I was not ready to trust another woman, let alone love one. But she decided she would do what was necessary to bring back the passion, the trust, the love.

We took it slow. She made the first moves. I think I could have lived on my anger for quite some time if she hadn’t decided to save me. She started by asking me to dinner. We went with a group of people so it didn’t feel like a date, until she paid the bill. She said she asked me out so she felt she should pay. In a short time, we got friendly and pretty soon we were inseparable. I know she fell in love in those early days, probably for the first time in her life. I wasn’t ready. I kept telling myself that this was just a fling. That there were no real feelings involved. That I wasn’t going to let myself fall in love. That I wouldn’t let myself be devastated again. That no woman would ever do that to me again.

It was easy to rationalize our relationship in my mind. We were on an island. We worked together, in different departments, but in the same building. Our rooms were right next to one another in the barracks. There were limited options for me as far as women were concerned on the island. I mean the men out numbered the woman 10 to1. If a beautiful girl liked you, then you didn’t question it. There were 500 guys ready to step in and love her. She could have left me at any time. And I am not sure I was always the best boyfriend. I didn’t even like the term boyfriend. We were friends. Friends having sex.

We went on this way for six months. I was either oblivious to how she felt about me or I just didn’t care. I was giving her all that I could at the time. And she seemed content with our relationship. We were growing closer, spending all out time together. But I refused to let her inside. Inside the walls that I had built.

Then the rough times came. I didn’t want to date anymore. I didn’t want to be with her all the time. I wanted to see other people, even though the options were limited. I look back and realize this was my way of trying to avoid the fact that I had fallen in love. I loved her. I didn’t want to love her, so I tried to push her away. Luckily, she was stronger than me. I don’t know if she knew that I loved her and couldn’t admit it or not. But she would not let me go. She hung on no matter how painful it was for her. I went out with someone else for a while. We still saw each other at work and in the barracks, but I tried to distance myself. The 500 other men in the barracks tried to console her. Hell, they tried to move in while they could. She was having none of that. She waited me out. She did not have to wait long. I knew I made a mistake. I crawled back to her and told her that I needed her. That I wanted to be with her only. I remember that she smiled. A smile like she knew this was an eventuality from the moment she first laid eyes on me.

A few weeks later we vacationed together. It was nice to leave the island. To get back to the real world. To spend some time with my son. We traveled to California and stayed with my parents and then to Houston to see her parents. It was a great vacation and watching her with my son really made me realize how much I needed this woman in my life forever. I think that time off the island is what finally convinced me deep in my soul and my heart that I had found the love of my life.

We got back to the island and life was great for us. We were truly in love and everything finally seemed perfect in my life. Then one day we got word that she was accepted to a program allowing her to go to college while the Navy paid her way. She would have to go to San Diego for two years to go through a military prep school. Then to any college where she could get accepted. She wasn’t sure she wanted to go. We had finally gotten to the same place together and now we would be separated for at least a year. I didn’t want her to go, but I knew she had to. I told her what a great opportunity this was. That she couldn’t pass this up. That we would survive being separated no matter how long. I told her our love was strong and we were meant to be together. In my mind I knew the odds were against us. That we would likely not survive a long separation, but I also knew she couldn’t pass up this opportunity. I couldn’t be selfish. I had been selfish for to long in this relationship.

So that is how we got here. I decided to take some vacation and fly to the mainland with her so we could spend our last few days together by ourselves. We had enjoyed the last few days, but this was our last night. We went to dinner and decided to see a movie. Movies are a premium on the island as we don’t get a new release until it has been out for around a year in the states. So we take advantage of any opportunity to see a new movie. We decided we wanted to see this new John Cusack movie. We had no idea how it would affect us.

We got back to the hotel and went up to our room. We had not spoken much on the ride back from the theater. The gravity of this moment in our lives was weighing heavily on us both. Our mood was pretty somber. We talked. We made love. We held each other. We said I love you. We cried. We did not want the next morning to come. But it did.

She had an early morning flight to Seattle and then home to Houston before reporting to San Diego. I knew we would stay in touch. We would write. We would talk on the phone. I just wasn’t sure that two people our age would be able to overcome the distance that would separate us for a year. Would absence really make the heart grow fonder? Or would it destroy a love that had little chance to ever flourishing in the first place. We didn’t know what the future held for us both. We just knew we had to say goodbye and hope that our love would survive.

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