Broken Hearts Damaged Goods (8 page)

And when I had finally
shut up and stopped revealing even more of my slutty past, he said, “You know,
I’m still going to need your number.  I generally like to call a girl the next
day.”

“We appreciate that. 
It keeps us from thinking that you’re not going to call.”

At that he just held me
a little bit closer to him, and I was okay with him not saying anything.  And
before he fell asleep, I said, “And, Jack, you still haven’t added me as a
friend on FaceBook.”

“I’ll add you first
thing in the morning.”

“You don’t need to
worry about a relationship status between us.  I would rather be listed as your
friend than to be complicated with you or in an open relationship with you.”

And that was the last
thing that was said before we drifted off with me in his arms.  And it was the
most perfect first date I have ever had.

By

Jack Webber

I
’ve always considered
myself an extremely faithful, one woman at a time man, but lately the strings
of my heart have been being pulled in two different directions by two different
women.  It is making the whole romantic rehabilitation thing extremely
difficult as I am trying to get over a confused thinking process that is now
getting clouded by a confused heart.

Since the breakup with
my ex, I am beginning to see that she was not the ideal woman that I have
sometimes imagined her to be.  Love polluted my vision of her.  I have realized
that especially lately, and this has nothing to do with her cheating on me. 
The cheating was like a spring thaw that awakened me from the winter I had
grown accustomed to, but it was not something that I would call a character
defect.

No, my realization of
her true character came about after the breakup.  When she attacked the woman
that I am currently with for the appearance of any sort of promiscuous past she
might have had, I started to realize that the woman I used to love was not what
I had always thought that she was.  And it made me realize that throughout my
relationship with her that she engaged in this type of behavior.

I don’t know how many
times I have heard things like, “Did you see what she was wearing?  Oh, my
God!  Look at her hair.  Does she even own a mirror?  Oh, look.  She’s with
another guy this week.  I guess looks and a slutty attitude are everything.”

And I didn’t think
about it at the time, but she was always putting everybody else down and
judging them on some sort of cultural concept and moral high ground that she
seemed to possess.  And I didn’t think about her moral superiority in these
matters.  I could see where she was coming from in a purely societal sense. 
Some of these girls did have clothes that were horrendous, hair that looked
awful, and were seen with a lot of men.

And since I have gotten
to know the latest victim of her attacks, I have to say that the validity of
the attacks may need to be revisited.  Over the past two weeks, Liselle has
shared her entire sexual history with me.  Instead of judging her, I am finding
myself wanting to be with her.  There is an openness to her that longs to share
herself with you.  And instead of closing up like a hurt flower, she has always
decided to continue to bloom and to share her beauty with the world.

If blooming meant that
she got hurt in her pursuit of true love, she was willing to do that.  And I respect
that more than somebody that closes themselves off to the world and the chance
of love.  Instead of seeing herself as a victim of the game of love, she looks
at each guy as a learning experience.

My ex, on the other
hand, seems intent on some sort of moralistic crusade against love.  The
appearance of love is very important to her.  And I fit that role for a very
long time.  I’m not sure what caused it to change, except that the concept of
love can never compete with actual love.  So when a relationship becomes stale
and complacent, one of the people involved looks to alternate avenues.

And that leaves me.  I
don’t know what I did wrong, or if I could have even done anything differently
to have avoided the breakup.  And as much as I am hurt and want to hate my ex,
I am still partly in love with her.  And I am finding a substitute lover in
Liselle, which is not really fair to her.

When I am with Liselle,
I have started to find a lot of what I missed when I was in a relationship. 
There’s the physical touch of holding somebody in your arms, kissing them and
having them kiss you back, and holding hands with somebody where you feel
connected with something in this world.

I’m on shaky ground now
when it comes to love.  I know that I’m going through a certain amount of detox
when it comes to my ex, but I’m afraid that I’m just replacing one drug for
another.  And I don’t want Liselle to get hurt in the process.  I want her
close to me, and yet I know that I shouldn’t.  We both promised that we would
just use each other to get over the breakup.  When we are complete individuals,
we will float on to our next lovers.

I wish I could tell you
how the rehab was going.  There are times when I hold Liselle and wish that it
could be my ex.  These times are getting fewer and farther between.  Liselle
did a good job in the beginning of trying to draw the poison from the years I
spent with my ex, but lately she seems to be employing a new tactic in the
rehab process.  She has been breaking my already broken heart.

It was one thing to
have my heart broken by being rejected as I was proposing to the supposed love
of my life.  It is quite another to have it broken by the physician treating me
with her tales of past relationships.  Maybe my heart was broken in a way that
couldn’t be mended the first time.  It had to be rebroken and put into a cast.

I just hope that I
don’t end up hurting the doctor treating me.  If I had been whole when I met
her, or not poisoned by my previous relationship, I could have been perfect for
her.  Repaying one of the greatest friends I have ever had and one of the
kindest people I have ever known with being another man in a line of regrets is
not something that I want to do.  I just don’t know if I can overcome the
toxins and grow my heart in time while it is confined in the cast of my past.

By

Jack Webber

T
here are some things
that should be easy, like calling a girl that you’ve been living with for the
past three weeks.  But as I found myself on the phone with her for the first
time, I discovered that the conversation that flowed freely every time that we talked
started to get damned up somewhere in my mouth (although it could be my mind or
heart that was damned as well).

“Hi.  I’m sorry for
calling you so late, but I wanted to wait until I could find a good time to
call you, which was kind of hard since I was with you all day today.  I would
have gone off into the other room to call you, but I figured that would look
bad, even though I know you were expecting me to call you.”

“It’s okay.  I’m glad
you called.  When are you coming to bed?”

“I will be there
later.  I just wanted to take this time to actually talk to you without being
in bed with you.”

“I accepted your friend
request today.  Thanks for sending that.”

“You’re welcome.  I,
um... What are you doing next weekend?  I know that it’s a long ways off, but I
wanted to see if you would want to go out again next weekend.”

“You could ask me this
in bed.  You don’t need to do it over the phone.”

“I know, but I’m trying
to wean myself off of your shelter. And I...”

And the fact of the
matter is that I am a little confused right now.  I know that I am feeling
things that are similar to everything I was accustomed to with Brittney.  I
don’t know if it is because I am using you as a substitute for everything that
I miss about her, or if it is because I am feeling something for you.  You see,
that’s the trouble with love.  It feels good in the beginning, whether it is
real or not.  It takes time to prove that it has substance.

“...And I want to prove
that I can actually have a conversation with you, without your look, touch, and
embrace clouding my thinking.”

“So what do you want to
talk about?  How my day was?

“No, I... Was your day
okay?”

“It was glorious.  Was
it good for you?”

“It was...  Do you have
to make fun of me?  I haven’t gotten a girl’s number in over four years, so I
am kind of new to this.”

“I’m not making fun of
you.  I think you’re being really cute right now.  I can’t wait to tell Megan
about this in the morning.”

“Please, don’t.  What
have you told her about me?”

“I can’t tell you, but
she is wondering what is happening between us.  She’s wanting me to put a label
on it.”

“You could tell her
that we are FaceBook friends without benefits, but that you quite clearly want
to give me a blowjob.”

“I’m sorry.  I’m going
through a tunnel.  I think I’m losing reception.  You’re breaking up.”

“Well, before I lose
you, could you answer my question about next weekend?”

“If you can answer my
question about next weekend.  Are you considering this a date?”

A date?  A date by
definition shows some sort of interest in pursuing a relationship with somebody
else.  I have spent the past few weeks in an isolated microcosm with this
woman.  As much as I have come to depend on her for everything, I know that
love is a gamble that I may not be ready for.  My answer would be a bet as I
play a game of chance.  That’s another problem with love.  Every good gambler
knows there’s a time to bluff and a time to show your cards.

“I consider last night
a date.”

“In that case, I will
make sure that I don’t forget to invite you in next weekend.”

I have never been much
of a gambler.  I always enjoyed playing the game more than winning, but at
least I had a game plan and never bet more than I could lose.  When it comes to
love, I don’t know whether I’m bluffing or showing my cards right now.  So I
can’t say if she is calling my bluff or not.  Either way, I’m kind of down on
my chips right now and will just enjoy seeing how the next few hands play out.

––––––––

S
ept. 26, 2010

So Jack has clarified
that the other night was a date.  The only problem now is that it still leaves
us without a definition.  We aren’t hanging out, which is a good thing.  That
always means that a guy likes fooling around with you while he is trying to
decide if he thinks of you in more than sexual terms.

Anyway, Jack still
hasn’t tried anything sexual with me, even after the whole blowjob comment. 
It’s kind of nice being with a guy that I don’t have to worry about groping
me.  It’s also nice to not have a guy ask you to service him without being
pleasured yourself.  A lot of guys today expect you to blow them before they
enter into a relationship with you.  It’s become as normal as kissing a guy.

When I was growing up,
I always thought dating would be different than it turned out.  You see stuff
in movies or read about love in books, and it always seemed to be nicer than
what it is in real life.  And I’m not talking about that fairy tale sort of
stuff that you see when you are kid where the guy is a prince and everything. 
I’m talking about soap operas, teen dramas, and Lifetime movies.  They all make
you think that really hot guys can be somewhat decent.  And any drama they
might pull is really just to make you interested in the story and to make you
wait for the hot guy to realize that he is madly in love with the girl that he
screwed things up with, which really just makes you want him more.

But in real life, I am
finding that the really hot guys act like there are a lot of other girls that
they could get, so they don’t really have to treat you as anything special. 
And no matter how attractive you might be, you can always look around and see
some girl that you know is better looking than you are.

And I don’t want to
blame some of my previous behavior on guys understanding that women are
competing to be with them.  I mean, part of my past actions have been because I
did like the guy (if only physically).  But after blowjobs on the first date
and sex on the third date, I am finding that it hasn’t exactly been good for
developing a lasting relationship.  It has led to some extraordinary sexual
encounters, but that has never gone on to anything more enduring.

But, anyway, back to
the relationship status thing with Jack.  I don’t think Jack and I are dating. 
He has asked me on dates, but this doesn’t seem to be dating in the classical
sense.  Of course, in the classical sense of the word, the couple isn’t living
together as they start their relationship.  So given our circumstances, some
things are going to be messed up, which I kind of regret now considering that I
probably could have had a perfect relationship with him if we would have met
and gotten together in a different way.

I’m hoping that the
definitions get clarified when we reach that “in a relationship”

stage.  It’s just that with hanging out, talking to, dating, and going out with
guys nowadays that things have gotten very confusing.  You don’t know what you
are doing with them, or what they are feeling for you.  And you don’t want to
get too involved emotionally until you are sure that the guy feels the same
way.  If you start to feel too much, you are just setting yourself up for
heartache.  And yet, if you don’t allow yourself to feel anything for the guy,
then you end just having sex with them, which doesn’t exactly work out either.

And if things were
normal between me and Jack like a relationship should be, then I would have the
“Where do you see us going” talk with him, which I kind of want to do right
now.  It’s not so much that I am concerned about a relationship status.  I feel
like we need to have the sex talk, which I haven’t had with a guy since James
Michael Finch in high school.  And that conversation took place three months
and many blue balls for James before we actually had sex.

And I don’t know why I
haven’t had the sex talk with any guy after that.  I guess I just kind of went
with the flow with everybody else.  I told a few guys to stop a few times, but
then I usually ended up having sex with them a couple of weeks later.

I guess alcohol played
a certain role in some of my sexual decisions with guys I was seeing.  And once
you have sex with a guy that you are kind of seeing, dating, or whatever, it is
a lot easier to keep having sex with him.  You almost feel more for him than
that physical attraction stuff.  You do actually care for him like you do when
you are in a committed and caring relationship.  And the guy is actually more
attentive to you.  You know that they are no longer with you just to get some. 
So getting the sex out of the way has its certain benefits, if only for a short
period of time.

Eventually the sex
doesn’t become enough to sustain the relationship.  You start to see that even
really hot guys have physical faults as well as severe personality defects. 
Even if you try to recapture the magic that existed in the beginning, you
realize that it was never real to begin with.  And you wonder what happened and
how your opinion could change so much in as little as two or three months.

Anyway, this is the
longest I have gone without sex since I have become sexually active.  It’s not
that I’m missing the act right now.  I think I probably should somehow.  I
mean, I usually hook up with a guy right after I break up with somebody.

That’s the odd thing
about this whole thing with Jack.  I don’t feel like I’m a totally unlovable
person, which is how I usually feel right after a break up.

In terms of actually be
successful, I think this whole rehab thing is working.  I’ve changed a lot of
my previous negative behavior and am engaging in truly positive things.  I just
don’t know if I had a sex talk with Jack if it would screw up everything and
count as a setback.