I listen to books alone and walk to the grocery store to buy chocolate, and other things.
It is surprisingly full for a Friday night.
I walk past the aisles, on a hunt for candy.
Around me the mania of people shopping seems to slow and I forget why I am here.
Oh, yes.
To buy chocolate.
I was listening to an audio recording of George Orwell's 1984 and during the scene where Julia and Winston make love in the field encircled by saplings, I suddenly felt the need for it.
Chocolate, that is.
Bad for my head cold, good for my body.
I also picked up bread, milk, kombucha, and sharp white cheddar cheese, which I later found out, wasn't as sharp as I would have liked.
I didn't eat dinner, but I wasn't hungry.
I just wanted chocolate.
When I returned home, I turned on the recording again. Alone in my studio, I stared at the high ceilings, doing nothing else, and feeling uneasy about it, even with the company of the recording.
Listening to it was like having some omnipotent person sitting with me in the room. I wasn't even interested in the chocolate at this point.
I ate some anyway, feeling a little guilty, but rationalizing that I was trapped inside via this head cold, and there was not much else I felt like doing. I needed to take it easy.
Still listening to the recording, I reflected on the feeling in the grocery store again — the people milling around, standing in lines, and adding stuff to carts. Then I contrasted it with the feeling in the room — the raw space, glowing light, and diminutive demeanor.
I longed to share the feeling of the room with someone, like Julia shared her secret hiding place with Winston in 1984. I knew several people I could invite over, but only one who mattered.
In fact, there was a person spitting distance I could have invited over to ravish me if I had wanted that. But he didn't belong in this space, nor had he ever entered it. Only one person belonged.
The person that belonged was kind, thoughtful, and curiously distracted. He would generally acquiesce to my invitations, in the kind of disinterested way that made him fun to pursue. Despite this reluctance, we always had a good time. A great time, in fact. But once he left, it always felt like I'd never see him again, which was torture. Weeks later, I would sheepishly send him a message to reconnect, detesting myself for it afterward. The process of meeting up, not hearing from him, and then re-inviting him to meet up was humiliating.
How could a person be so intimate with you one moment, and then ignore you the next?
Didn't he see I wanted him badly. Didn't he want me badly? Wasn't the general consensus that our bodies were meant for each other's. Why couldn't we lay in each other's arms for hours, comfortable and hidden and safe from the outside, like the room above the antique shop where Winston and Julia stayed. Our goodbyes were equally prolonged. The desire between us just as strong. What was he scared of? There were no thought police to fear. No explicit rules against intimacy.
I craved him so badly, it grayed out my sentiments for everyone else. In fact, the thought of ******* someone else after him just seemed...unnatural. I wouldn't be into it. Because anything other than his kiss, his touch, was just a kiss, or just being touched. Physical acts that carried no meaning for me. All I wanted was to create meaning from physical acts with him!
The fact that he didn't express this nagging feeling with his actions was unbearable. That fact that I might...bore him outside of providing physical pleasure, a nightmare. The fact that he might crave me like I craved the chocolate, as a temporary pacifier, kept me up at night.
I wanted to belief that he felt differently. That I wasn't just eye candy, but a human being, with feelings he wanted to nurture and respect. A human he desperately wanted to get to know, like I desperately wanted to know him. A friend, not a comrade, whom he could talk with about anything.
But it was clear that whatever the motivation behind his disinterest, whether it was fear, genuine, or sociopathic, it bothered me. And despite this, all I wanted was to be around him. I wasn't expecting anything more or less. At least, I told myself I wasn't.
Maybe I expected everything.
This is a sappy story but I needed to say it.