not your dream girl
it’s been a month now.
a month since we held each other
in the vulnerability of our shared uncertainty.
dreaming up fantasy futures where
i’d go live there on your coast, or you’d come stay with me here on mine.
a month since we kissed goodbye
at the airport, en route to our separate adventures on dueling sides of the
Atlantic. i smiled through security, cheeks rosy through my tears.
i thought it was one of those
see-you-soon sorta goodbyes.
a month: all it takes to burn fire in our heart to ash in our memory, the joy in togetherness no
match for the harshness of present reality, distant in the delight of disconnect.
and i miss you in a way that feels
a lot like missing myself.
and you are nowhere.
*****
“do that on your own time,” they
said, scolding us like school children for our just-as-innocent meanderings. hand-holdings.
tent cuddlings. shadow puppetings. maybe some sexy snorkelings.
those kinds-a-things… were
unprofessional, they said. you had a job to do, and i probably did too.
we laughed. a lot. they had no
idea.
you kissed me at the end of the
world, white sand fine beneath our shared sarong, orange and purpley-pink. Caribbean
turquoise blinked closed in your eyes, and slapped at the island’s edge, the
soundtrack to our dreamy solitude. color was everywhere.
“so when did you realize you’re
not like everybody else?” you asked me, the weirdness in you honoring the
weirdness in me. you liked that i was
different, that i could be someone worth spending time with. could i be the
girl you’d been looking for? the one you want to spend all seconds of all days
and all nights with? just maybe, you thought, i could be your dream girl.
you made me want to set my life-adventure
table for two.
on our second date, you stayed a
week.
our heaven-on-earth brought perfect
waves in perfect company. our two-person tent found home on remote beaches, offshore mornings just for us.
“barrel!” you’d scream behind me, both of us racing along the face. i’d dodge and bail, of course,
forcing you to do the same.
“that was perfect,” you’d say,
shaking your head as we paddled back out.
i’d smile in sweet, predictable, comfortable regret.
******
i’d meet your favorite friends on
their boats between islands. you’d sing with my mom at the piano.
“it’s like he’s been here
forever,” she would tell me in confidence. “like you’ve known each other for
twenty years.” we’d known each other for ten days.
we’d exchange realities for weeks
at a time. and we’d love every second of it.
we felt right, together.
for months, i never got anything
done. and i didn’t care.
*****
it’s been a month now.
a month of you there, and me here.
and you’ve decided i don’t fit
the perfect mold of partnership you’ve decided you won’t settle for less than.
the time we spent together now memories of lustful adventures you’ve decided
you’ve had enough of, the times apart unbearable in uncertainty.
you want black-and-white and
here-and-now.
i’m continents away and all sorts
of shades of gray.
you’ve decided i’ll take too long
to be the girl you want me to be.
the girl i am melts into the smallness
of insignificance. crab-like, she withdraws into herself, clawing at nothing to
hold on to.
because how can she hold on when
you’ve told her to let you go?
*******
but don’t you remember shadow
puppets and freestyle partner raps and singing to me in your jungle room while
i wrote stories about you for your birthday? remember banana pancakes in bed
and Superbowl Sunday with my dad? remember trading waves on different coasts,
just you and me and the sea to infinity?
remember that?
because i do.
that was me. that was me there
with you.
and don’t you remember a story about an
Amazonian frog in search of his soul who found something he liked better
instead? and dark-skinned kids with a baby sloth-on-a-stick, and not-so-secret caves
fit for two, and waterfalls with Jehovah’s witnesses, and Adam and Eve
adventures in island coves sliced into paradise for you and for me? remember
swimming to the sunken earthquake island and sweaty-sexy yoga and tents on the
beach, moon and stars and dark to eternity? remember a bioluminescent
ending to a nighttime boat ride through the mangroves?
remember that?
because i do.
that was me.
that was me there, falling in
love with you.
*****
not the girl you want me to be.
not your dream girl.
…just me.
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