Pandemic 2020

 It’s Friday night and we’re at home on the couch. Radiohead is playing in the background and we sit under nanoleaf lights emanating a dull yellow hue, slowly oscillating in brightness like embers of dying flame. 

We sit perpendicular to each other, his head resting on my shoulder. Both of us are on our phones; I’m reading a long article about the rise and downfall Silk Road and he’s surfing Reddit. Occasionally I look up from my phone and laugh at something I catch sight of on his screen, and it is in one of these moments that I realize that life is really, really good. 

Why did she break up with you?

I don't really know, I guess she didn't know what she wanted, and she wanted to know what it was like to be single...

What did you want?

Her time...to be closer to her.

ENTP & ISTJ

I had envisioned a wonderful future with the ENTP. Our first meeting was initially slightly disappointing, but our conversation gave us a glimpse of how much alike we were, and that was incredibly exciting; his strengths were mine, his weaknesses were also mine. Perhaps he was a little more extroverted and more manual, but we still felt like kindred spirits. He mentioned that an ISTP would make a good pairing with an ENTP, to which I dismissed the idea by saying an N-S would never enjoy the connection of an N-N couple. We spent two weeks exchanging a flurry of texts, coffee breaks that lasted way too long, squeezing drinks with him into my December schedule (if only he knew how special of an act that was) - the way he would pull my coat's hood over my eyes and kiss me, his enthusiasm for taking our conversation in any direction but the current (and maybe a tinge too much of self-talk) - our time together was as bright as it was brief, and after the fizzle I'm left in the dark wondering what to do with myself.

The ISTJ was so gorgeous I didn't actually believe we'd go out on a date, let alone more. It felt rather amusing to not be the pretty one of the pair and to get cut-eye from gay men. He was courteous, straightforward, extremely attentive to my physical needs - he paid for every meal, every cab ride, every drink - it's hard to remember the last time I felt so well taken care of (probably the last ISTJ). Conversation with him however felt a bit interrogative at times (he wanted to absorb every detail) and I started to worry about how challenging it could be for us to remember to accept our differences, especially after a long day at work. Having thought I had him all figured out, he surprised me with a spontaneous comedy bar invitation, a questionable midnight gym session invite, an adorable late night offering of fruit - getting to know each other has been a slow-burning, yet lasting process. After two dates, we established friendship; but yesterday when he coaxed me into our second gym date in a row, his steady gaze on me with those light blue eyes - the same look in that diner at 3am after a night of dancing, as he observed me eat my chicken alfredo - I wondered if it really was just that.

Please tell me that the night is darkest before dawn.

Please tell me you're still around, and that you still hear me.

Please tell me that the night is darkest before dawn.

She died on my birthday.

My mother said that maybe she and I were connected.

My mind can't remember much -  a few memories - it wasn't as if we talked about our hopes and fears (all she ever asked me was pretty much if I wanted to eat), but it's almost as if my body remembers all those times she bathed my infant body, the birthday cake she fed me as breakfast for weeks on end (she couldn't let food go to waste) until I got sick of it, the wad of money she tried to slip in my hand as a send-off to university, so I end up in sudden fits of tears, gasping, my emotions heaving themselves to the surface, but I can't quite comprehend why. It's almost like a gut reaction.

Cachinga.

This week was a combination of getting my period, being sick, and getting dumped (after approximately three weeks of seeing each other) by some jerk via text. Well ok, after a bit of reflection I realize I can't quite consider myself the benchmark of saintliness, having casually dated three other guys while seeing him (oops) and then visiting my ex while I was out of town (double oops), amongst other misdeeds. If anything, I probably win the asshole race by a mile. But amidst the mess, I couldn't stop myself from having the tiniest bit of hope that we would be together. And when I saw what he wrote to me, I ran for the covers, curled up, and cried a little. Oh, hormones.

And he wasn't a jerk. He was just weak of mind, texting a girl supposedly scant in emotion.

ISTP after all.

I met his aunts; his family, the people that were important to him. By chance I had opened the door and they were there, and they were happy to have met the girl in his life. He had a party in his (and his roommate's) house that night, and when we had the room to ourselves, we cuddled. It was as if all the sensuality in the world resided in the bed we lay on, and we were enveloped in it.

When I woke up, I was back in the world where our lives no longer intersect.

I cared deeply for him, and I know his affection for me was genuine, but at the same time I couldn't be with someone who found it so easy to isolate himself from the world, isolating himself from me, and who ran for the hills at the first hint of commitment.