The warning shot was the lobster. I don't eat it very often at all, although I'm pretty sure I can cook it. I'm adept at boiling things provided that's all I have to do.
Granted, the fact I would have to boil something while it's alive would be hard to get over, but lobsters look a lot like armoured spiders. With that in mind, I'm sure I could plop the creature in a boiling pot and then flee the room, only to return when it's done. Or has stopped screaming. Whichever.
Eating lobster is more of a problem. I stay away from foods that require separate tools to eat, tools normally only used to put together furniture from IKEA. At the rate I'm going, knives and forks are becoming less of an every day reality and more of a concept for special occasions, given I regularly eat my dinners in front of the TV, and occasionally out of a pot. This is one advantage to being exhaustively single - good manners take a back seat to efficiency.
I'm not really dedicating an entire post to lobsters, or at least I'm trying not to. Obviously, I have some avoidance issues. Also, a craving for anything with butter on it.
What I'm clearly doing is trying to explain how Alex told me he'd met somebody and that they are serious while also not thinking about it at all. I think it's going rather well.
It happened that I hadn't heard from him in weeks. All summer as a matter of fact, which is weird. Normally there's text messages, an IM on Facebook, a quick chat on MSN - something to remind the other of our mutual existence.
Though we hadn't been talking nearly as frequently as we once did, our check-in conversations were always the same. When are you coming here? When can I see you? He would always ask me if I was dating anybody.
Sometimes that exact question, sometimes asking if I was still his and more recently pressing me if there was anybody at all in my life who was special. Anybody I cared about. Any guy I cared about. Of course there is, of course there was, but I never said it.
Naturally I'd ask him the same, and then wait with all of my air sitting still in my lungs until he told me that no, he was single. He liked it that way, and I said I liked it that way too.
I think he took it to mean that I liked being single and free, when what I was really saying was I liked him being single. A small miscommunication that didn't seem worth correcting.
I never worried much about miscommunication actually, even though there's literally an ocean in the way of our being neighbors. We established very early on that we would be close, and we would not lie to one another. Ever.
(I lied though. Every time he asked me what I was wearing I lied, which I really don't think should count. It was a helpful lie, it made him happy and he should have considered whether I could really be lounging about at all hours looking like I'd been run over by a Victoria's Secret store.)
(That's it. That's all I lied about. Well that, and one big sin of omission. I do wonder what would have happened if I had answered truthfully, more quickly when he asked me if there was any guy I cared about more than any others.)
We were going to be different. We thought every romantic relationship requires a certain amount of deception, and we weren't going to play that way. Sometimes this was revealing, for both of us.
"I'm in bed Alex - it's past midnight. What's up? And yes, I'm wearing black lace panties."
(And by black lace panties I likely meant a Winnie the Pooh nightshirt. See how some lies are actually better?)
"I'm waiting for some chick to get here and I wanted to talk to you." "Waiting for some chick? Avon deliver this late?" "Ha. No. I'll have about an hour to fuck her and then I've got to get her out of my house." "That is charming. Really, really charming." "What? I'm tired."
"Who is this chick?" "Nobody important." "Jesus Alex. Have you considered greeting cards? That kind of romance shouldn't go to waste." "Nothing romantic about it. It's just biological for me. It's like taking a piss."
"Did you just compare sex with somebody to peeing?" "Well yeah. It's not like that all the time or even half the time but sometimes there's just nothing more to it than I kind of need to."
"Huh. Well now I'm nervous." "Why?" "I would never want to have sex with you to hear you compare it to taking a piss." "I never would." "Liar." "I'm not lying. It wouldn't be like that with you." "You do know how to sweet-talk a girl." "I'm serious. Door's ringing. I miss you." "I miss you, and I am not going to tell you to have fun." "Ha. I know. I miss you, I miss you..."
This was hard, but it wasn't the worst. I'd spend at least an hour knowing beyond any doubt that he was with somebody, but comforting myself that she was nobody to him. And also contemplating exactly what kind of safe-sex protection I'd need just to touch a guy who considers sex to be like peeing.
What was harder was hearing about girls who had names. He told me about all of them in detail. These were the girls he'd say he was kind of dating, and I knew before any of them when he stopped being interested. Some times he'd complain how one or the other was over-bearing and I'd convince him to break it off. Yes, I'm that girl.
Other times he'd already know he was done with them and I'd tell him what to say. He thought this was funny, but to the girls out there who were let down in the nicest way possible - you're welcome.
And then other times it was downright infuriating.
"So I can't talk long because I've got company coming over but I wanted to hear your voice." "Aww. I like hearing yours too." "Tell me something sexy." "I'm wearing yoga pants and a sports bra." "I can actually work with that." "Of course you can, you're a pervert." "Tell me you're naked underneath." "Fine, I am naked underneath." "Well now you're lying but I miss you anyway." "How much do you miss me?"
He'd tell me how much, and in graphic detail. I liked it. It was flattering. It wasn't ever just the standard phone sex - he'd remember things I don't think any other guy has ever even noticed about me. The colour of my eyes, the freckles on my shoulders, the way I sigh when I'm happy. But then he'd fuck it all up.
"OK I have to go. She's going to be here any minute." "Who is she?" "This girl I'm kind of seeing, but I really don't want to have sex with her." "So don't." "But I have to." "Actually you don't. The sky won't fall if you keep it in your pants." "It's expected though."
"So why don't you want to?" "I'm just not into it with her. If I hadn't talked to you I probably wouldn't even be able to get it up." "Whoa. Wait. What?" "I mean, she's so super nice but she just doesn't do it for me. You do." "OK first of all - the guy who bagged my groceries today was so super nice but guess what? I'm not going to fuck him." "You know what I mean."
"Actually I don't, and I can't believe you calling me was just so you could get it up for another girl." "You sound mad. Don't be mad." "I am mad, and I don't like you very much right now." "OK, that's worse." "Yep." "Please say you at least like me because she's going to be here any second and I don't -- OK she's here." "You don't have to sleep with her." "I do. Please don't be mad?" "Fine. I'm not mad. Still don't like you right now." "I know, but I miss you." "Miss you too."
Who he was or wasn't fucking never really hurt me that much. After all, it's not like I don't have my friend with benefits and it was acknowledged many times that Alex would rather be with me and I with him.
What hurt more was hearing about other things he'd do with these girls. Ski trips. New Year's Eve. Dinners out. I didn't care if he slept with them but the thought of them sharing an appetizer made me crazy.
Which brings us back to that goddamned lobster. Like I said, I hadn't heard from him in weeks. We always check in, and we tell each other everything.
I couldn't take the silence any more, so when I saw him come online and I knew he was there I sent him a message. He wanted to know what was new. Usually there's more of a lovey-dovey greeting than that, but I'd take it.
I told him about my crazy job, and the crazy guy I was dealing with, playing it for laughs. He was suitably surprised and amused, but then he had to go.
Shelley was making lobster.
There was a moment of hope. Aunt Shelley? Cousin Shelley? Transvestite Shelley?
It wasn't his birthday. Some other special family-related occasion perhaps...?
Please...?
I told him it sounded very romantic and he's a lucky guy to have somebody making him lobster and then I waited with all of my air sitting still in my lungs for him to tell me why she doesn't matter.
He agreed he was lucky. He said, "Shelley is an amazing girl, and I'm so lucky to have her in my life."
Oh.
Now there was something he had been hiding from me as well, and her name is Shelley.
Every other time I waited not daring to breathe, maybe I should have dared to do something else. Say something else. Say anything.
I told him I was happy for him. He said he was worried about me - crazy guy and all. I need to call him and tell him I'm OK. I said I would. I lied.
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