19

A few months ago, I was purchasing alcohol from the corner bodega/deli that sold to me despite the fact that I was underage simply because the guy who had the night shift really liked my best friend. Other funny stories revolve around this fellow but on this night he asked me about my "friend", whom I assumed was my best friend and I informed him of her status: that she was well but away in Massachusetts and away from me. He smiled and then inquired after my other "friend" and did a hand motion indicating a height difference. He meant my ex. Immediately my demeanor changed, I frowned and let out an uncomfortable guff and told the clerk that he was my friend no more. He feigned concern but still smiled and let out a hearty laugh, as he is accustomed to do and in his heavy Middle Eastern accent he said that summer was swiftly approaching and that I was sure to find a summer romance. Annoyed at the thought, I quickly collected my booze and my junk food and scoffed at his suggestion. He looked at me with amusement as I stormed out and yelling back at him to have a good night. I haven't gone back there since but I should introduce him... and then thank him.

Over a cup of coffee I angrily stared back at a pair of deeply hurt and confused eyes as I attempted to convey my idiotic amount of ire in the most polite way I knew how while still trying to deliver an emotional blow that would cause those eyelashes to dust those cheeks for months upon months. I sometimes wonder if I ever succeeded and then I become mad at the prospect that I didn't but slowly guilty for ever desiring success over such a matter. My cheeks were aflame, as I've described ad nauseum to my friends and family, as I hissed that I had no intention of being emotionally close to another male for an extraordinarily long time, maybe even never, hoping that he was perceptive enough to decipher the underlying invective of that comment. His eyes told me that he had a vague inclination towards where I had been going.

I always say, "never". I am a pessimist through and through and I can try to varnish that over by calling myself a realist but I am a little too paranoid for that to be entirely true. I would go to middle school dances, the height of my socially awkward phase of which I was brutally made fun of for, and convince myself that they were going to be absolutely terrible. All of those acne-ridden, New Jersey suburban WASP bros in the making would find me sexually repellent and none would grind with yours truly. After repeating this as a mantra in the car on the way there, my mom probably pondered why she was driving thirty minutes out of her way to something he daughter would not even enjoy. Sure enough, four hours later, I would climb back into the car, bathed in sweat and axe body spray with a huge smile in my face after having a mildly successful evening that seemed exponentially better given the fabrication of low expectations. It was fail-safe. To this day, my mother will bring it up once in a while with an air not of pride per sé but... certainly impressed. It seems horrifying when you extrapolate this innocuous trick to get through the debilitating awkwardness of the teen years to life in general. It seems like a dreadful way of looking on life: no one will like you, that you are bound for failure, etc., and truth be told, it does make one a little anxious and neurotic. But it certainly comes in handy... though it is another defense mechanism, another layer between you and someone else that has to come down eventually. I always say "never" and "never" never happens and you are always pleasantly surprised. I always say "never" and then I'm proven wrong.

And so, that excruciatingly long hiatus I was meant to have taken that was supposed to carry me through spinsterhood was remarkably short lived and I am pleasantly surprised. I laugh at the folly of it all. How can I not? All of the sudden I am devouring every single item of someone else's interests; appropriating them, analyzing them, dissecting them... inhaling a plethora of new things I would never have given a second glance or maneuvering my "to check out" lists so that their interest take priority or sitting through things I know I dislike simply because someone else likes them and that must mean something. Books, music, movies, comics, games, television, entertainers... everything. What is it exactly that I think I am doing and how am I justifying all of this to myself? Background material to understand them? Material upon which I can relate to them, discuss with them? Seem cooler? More genuine? Interested? All of the above? A professor once told me if there are multiple questions... the answer is usually all of the above. I answer D. I would like to think that I am making poetry, that I am intellectualizing everything and puzzling a human being together by listening to the lyrics of a certain song but I am pretty certain I am trying mighty hard to justify an overload of emotion I swore would never happen. When you are a pessimist running around pretending to be a realist, you also tend to be a closet hopeless romantic masked as a cynic. It is all a fantastic game that results in a great deal of self-loathing but its funny nevertheless because, as my new found activity of comic book reading would have me realize, we all wear masks. Anyways, the cynic looks at the romantic in euphoria over the whole situation, relishing in this influx of new information to process ... and crosses its arms and shakes its head. We see this stuff in movies and we always point to the screen and say, with half-eaten popcorn spilling out of our mouths, "That could never happen". And sometimes it does and all you can do is stare flabbergasted at the screen (see cereal guy).