Goodbye to The Shy Ones

(art's a Rumi quote)
Time for me to take a little rest in the praise ocean.

My desire to love and be loved by them, whether it was the platonic love that I was just beginning to feel for her or someday being able to be loved by both of them, was so powerful as to be unmanageable. It was so big I couldn’t even see it until I’d started to let it go. I knew (Or was afraid I knew, it amounts to the same in the end) that it was too big a want, too feral a need to fit into their lives as they’re constructed. I was so scared of that big desire. It felt like Kaiju want, Godzilla love. If I was a movie, you’d have to pretend the buildings had been evacuated before they got smashed. This is a terrible way to see myself, I’d like to change it.

Maybe Mrs. Shy One felt that fear too, because when I, last Friday, the day after all the texting joy, asked her permission to blog about her, she decided I needed to check with her every time I thought of writing about her. From potential friend and metamour to editor, just like that. For the sake of “healthy boundaries,” for “honesty and transparency.” (LADY. You pretend your girlfriend is just a friend on your socials. Your husband asked me to do the same. Come ON.)

Mrs. Shy One reaching out to grab my writing process was, to me, the exact opposite of healthy boundaries. To put it in Downton speak, she was putting her oar in. It was clear to me that the only boundary she/they cared about was the one around me.

The bottom dropped out from the whole plan then, and I saw the situation for what it was, for what I was. To keep playing with The Shy One, I needed to be controlled. Managed. Shrunk or at least stunted. Even, my now-panicking brain added, snuffed.

The box I’d agreed to, their affable and understandable closet, was not going to stop shrinking around me.

The part that was absolutely NOT her fault is that I felt completely submissive about the two of them. I knew that they probably didn’t mean to try and control me, but I felt helpless, without a voice to negotiate. I did have a voice. The so-big-I-couldn’t-even-see-it desire combined with the submissiveness I couldn’t talk through without crying, made it feel impossible to listen to them or advocate for myself. It shouldn’t have been impossible, I know. My body was telling me that the options were to fall at her feet or flee.

So I fled. More accurately, I blocked both of their numbers so I could stop crying long enough to get through my workday and get at least a little bit of the story into paragraphs.

The next day, seeing where the paragraphs were going and not wanting to break things off via blog post, I asked The Shy One to come over or call. He couldn’t do either, he said, so we broke up by text. I told him the closet feels bad, that I want them to be exactly them and exactly where they are, but that I just didn’t fit.

He was just as kind. He told me I deserve to love without guardrails or artificial limits. That made me feel appreciated for who I am, and not Godzillalike at all.

I know there’ll always be guardrails and limits because humans are involved and nobody needs to be falling off a cliff.

I’m sure I’ll have more to say about him, and I know I’ve got lots of Unicorn Stuff to paragraph out, but for now I’m just sad, grateful and quiet. I don’t think it’s kind or helpful to compare myself to Godzilla, but for now I’m happy to be back in the sea, at rest.

 

Fourth Date Tears: Part Two

In my neighborhood, there’s a little woods. I don’t get to walk there in the daytime too much because people let their dogs off leash and then I get mad at the people with the dogs off leash and then I feel like a monster.

They’re really pretty woods though, lit enough by the edge-of-city light that we didn’t need a flashlight. I steered The Shy One through, wishing I could feel the romance of the moment. Instead, the leashless dogs info came out, and I felt truly lost about how to be human.

“I’m sad, I said. “I want to be a real girlfriend. I want to be free. I want my heart to be free to go where it wants.” (I’m sure I didn’t say it this articulately.)

It’s been too many tears already in such a new connection, that’s for sure. He held me there, in the middle of the little woods, crying onto his shirt, both of us sorrying again and again.

“Are you still dating?” He asked, as I was wiping my face and starting up the path again.

It’s probably unfair, but my heart broke some more. I remember this feeling. I HATE this feeling—the feeling of not being fast enough, poly enough, TAKEN enough to be a safe bet. I don’t think that’s what he was saying, but I felt pushed to move on from him, whether we broke things off or not.

I haven’t been dating for a little while. Even during Ramadan when we were confined to texts and calls, he felt like a lot. He felt like enough. I’ve been working on a local primary campaign, building up my business for summer, and spending as much friend time and taking-pictures-of-flowers time as I can. Getting settled in with The Shy One and getting ready to meet Mrs. Shy One was a lot on top of all that. It wasn’t that I was suddenly monogamous, it’s just that people take time  for me to learn, especially when I really like them.

In the grief that was layering itself onto the evening, the not-dating felt like another way I was failing him, failing them by not having enough chill, not feeling able to sink into the warmth of Things As They Are, feeling like I was both too much and not enough.

The little woods has a kiosk where I like to put street art, woods art I guess, it always stays up a long time there. The Shy One held my bag while I tidied the old art and put up some new.

The story of The Good Boy came out after that, as unwelcome as my petty ramblings about the leashless dogs. (It’s an important bird area, people!) I felt wretched and stupid and not-nice, unable to find my way to the present with the beautiful man next to me, who seemed devoted to me in his own way, who, if I wanted (at least for a few hours) wasn’t going anywhere. I really wanted my body and spirit to stop hovering with heartbreak and panic. I wanted to come down to earth and be with him. I wanted to be with him.

Third Date Flag, Fourth Date Tears, Part One

Possibly, for the fourth date with The Shy One, I shouldn’t have chosen a date that mirrored my ill-fated Valentines date with The Good Boy. But it’s a good date! I was superexcited to see The Shy One and antsy to get some street art up, so that’s what I asked for. He even helped me staple some silk flowers to a watercolor that said “Forced Pregnancy: The Cruelty Is The Point.” The grimness of the message seemed extra grim, juxtaposed with his gentleness and the sweetness of his smile.

I was happy to see him, but I also felt removed, a few steps away from there being a me-shaped hole in the wall. There was a question I had to ask, and I wanted to force myself to accept the answer no matter what. On our third date, the one with all the presents, near the falling asleep time, after hours of slow, voluptuous cuddling and deeply affectionate sex I might write about someday, I mentioned wanting his address for a thank-you note.

“Just a thank-you note, nothing else.” That threw some cold water on the hours of intimacy and warmth of the night and the seemingly open-hearted month-long epistolary romance of our Ramadan routine. (Can a romance be epistolary if it’s comprised mostly of cute Bitmoji and flower pictures? I say yes.) Rightly or wrongly, it felt like he was protecting his safe little marital-paternal bubble from whatever unexpectedness I might mail. Of course, the kids wouldn’t know about me. I couldn’t expect that.

(I did have a painting I could send him from our second date, when we painted together, but he kept forgetting to take it home and I couldn’t picture it ending up anywhere other than a closet. I kinda want to make it street art, just so it could live.)

He did give me his address, and I did send the thank you note, but I felt constrained and worried that I might be giving too much information away, in case the note somehow fell into little hands. That would be his responsibility, not mine, but I still felt like too much.

(It should also be noted that I’ve been watching a lot of Downton Abbey lately, so my etiquette sensitivities may be a little haywire.)

So. While I was standing on a bench securing a long-up canvas (a list of names of mass-shooting victims, #stopaapihate edition) to a fence, I asked him the question: Could I post pictures of him and me on Instagram?

“Oh sure,” he said, “If you show us just as friends.”

His conservative background, where he and his wife are in their outness journey, those things are valid and important. They aren’t responsible for the rest of the conservatism barreling down upon all of us. Closeted poly isn’t banning books, I know that. It’s not The Shy One’s fault that, in 1998, my mom asked for that same “friends” dissembling as I introduced First Girlfriend into the family. It’s not his fault that on the last not-him date I went on, the suitor dropped my hand as soon as other people saw him with me.

But I wasn’t going to dissemble online, so there weren’t going to be any public pictures of us, not in the regular feeds. Not with faces. We kept walking, talking about other things, but I was a little bit broken, and I wanted to run.

 

Good Second Date to Ghost, Part Two

Since Nearby Guy and I had a nice d/s-ish vibe going, I maybe should have done some negotiating before welcoming him (OMG yay!) into my bed. But sometimes, a soft glow of trust feels like enough—that sweet letting-go when bodies take over safety feels easy. I just love those rare moments when humans know exactly what to do.

As we settled into my (unmade-I wasn’t expecting company!) bed together, our bodies felt so well-matched. I don’t often find anyone who can make me feel delicate and protected, but the way his arms encompassed me gave me all the princess feelings.

His kisses were skilled, assured, and leisurely, emphatic but reigning in my tendency to be a tongue-y teen about it. Sweetly and thoughtfully is a very good way to be kissed.

He held my waist with such ownership, then pushed upwards to very decisively whole-hand my boob through my PJs. He claimed it and me, wholeheartedly, nipple squeezed up into his palm. I know none of this seems like it should be a big deal, but it WAS.

As much as I envy my podded-up friends (And Nearby Guy’s cozy situations) this post-quarantine return to touch was a miracle to take in, too much to process or absorb except in heaves. Feeling the grasp I’d daydreamed and nightdreamed so much for so long made me into a full-body groan/yelp, a writhing sea serpent high on giggles and warmth. I was fully enthralled but I was also wondering if I could possibly be touching him enough, worrying I wasn’t doing it right, wondering how my one human body could possibly earn this much pleasure in this or any lifetime.

“I feel so overwhelmed, “ I pant/sighed, and he slowed to a snuggle while I caught my breath, arms circling my waist again and squeezing my shoulders toward him. When his hand wandered to my ass, I said (of course I said) “You know you want to spank it.”

He startled for a quick moment, maybe taken aback like that escalated quickly but then he grinned and his arm tensed for action. I turned over onto my tummy, ready as ready as READY could be.

“Ohmygoodnessit’ssucharelief” I exhaled sharply, my face half in my pillow, after the first hearty THWACK. Ohhhhh boy. The hard slaps, the thigh-tickles, the playful grabs. The perfect gift of him gently easing down the back of my pajama bottoms and my lacy-but-practical soft purple undies.

He smacked out yelp after yelp, my feet kicking with joy and my hips squirming with anticipation for every impact. He was pressing pain out and magic in at the same time. I curled close to his body like it was a warm cave I lived in now. He held me tight. Lightning bolts of squishy arousal pummeled into the center of me. I wanted everything, forever. I had everything I wanted forever.

Yes, relief, but also a power source flipped on, like when Godzilla’s blue lights glow up over the horizon. I was both kaiju and sea. How can a person do this for someone they hardly know? It seems impossibly generous and highly unlikely that any of this could have happened. It’s hard to believe my own typing hands!