Making Out In Front of a Romcom (ala) and Other Perfect Things: Part Four

 This series is taking forever to write, what with the whole triumph-of-evil thing un-hottening life most of the time. (Not last night though, I had a really nice date! But that's a story for another day.) Whatever stage of grief today finds you in, I'm with you. I love you. And I'm here to provide cuteness whenever I can bear it.

Back to being splayed out on the beach-day of my bed, with my beautiful sweet Southern Charmer smiling down at me.

"What do you want to do?" I asked.

His finger slipped down into my absolute sopping wetness and he said:

"I'd like to be inside you."

*****Welcome***** is the emotion I felt as he slid inside me. I felt so filled and fulfilled, happy and free, He was SO PRETTY and so good at kissing and so beautifully and easily part of me.

After what seemed like a good long time, he started apologizing and I didn't really know why. 

"It's been a hard time, I've been going through a breakup, I'll have to owe you."

I think he felt like he was coming too fast, but even if he had been, I wouldn't have seen it as a problem. I always feel gratified by a quick come, like, oh good, this guy is willing to give me what he has.

"I need it," I said, as I always say, when he came. (Or fake-came? Maybe he just needed to stop? Maybe this is the moment when the breakup grief washed back in for him? Oh I wish I could have known and soothed him, that I could have taken care of whatever had brought out all those sorries.

I switched the Donald Glover to lofi as we cuddled up. He asked if it was okay to fall asleep and I said sure, I just have to get up and have my night cereal. After Cinnamon Toast Crunch, I climbed over him to the inside spot and (Just like that, says the part of my brain that thinks only of Sex and the City) I was falling asleep (trying to) with a guy for the first time since The Shy One.

I haven't gotten any better at it in the intervening years. Though we cuddled up sweetly, I felt so alert. I thought about what had just happened. I thought about whether he would stay for breakfast, if he would drink coffee on my couch.

But he woke me up at six AM, same cursed hour whenTSO always left, and seemed a little distant, like he was already out the door. His voice had the cadence of a Barack Obama, if Barack Obama was late for a school presentation.

At least I was able to fully sleep then, warm and content but already a little lonesome for him. And I kind of still am, all these weeks later.

Love.

 

We’re in a new phase of the Kitten Calendar adventure now, friends. It wasn’t an accident when the word snuck into some goodnight GIFs. The Shy One loves me back. We had deep, complicated conversations in the days following my Big Jealousy Weekend, and those eventually landed at him saying the phrase.

He loves me. I’m loved. It feels like a safety net and a bedrock and a sunny meadow and a beach day.

Being loved isn’t new of course. Though I couldn’t always be in touch with it, I’ve been surrounded by so many different kinds of love all along. Work love, art love, nature love, friend love, even the sometimes-impossible-seeming family kind of love. Sweetie-Now-BFF and I have loved each other since 2001, with no signs of dissipating. On the teetering cliffs of romance, I’ve had a strong foothold in love, maybe that’s how I grew into someone ready, or just, he was one of the very-right ones.

I’ve had so many (JEEZ so many!) connections with men that have felt fulfilling, sexy, exciting, and (from my end at least) loving, for a few weeks or a few months. Sometimes I told them I loved them after they were gone, after a this-girl-is-crazy-loving-me-after-just-a-few dates reaction was no longer a worry or concern. I’ve loved. I’ve been wanted, liked, and THOROUGHLY fucked. But this.

It feels, a rare thing in my shifting/fleeing/healing/losing heart, like the earth is steady beneath my feet. My life can be serene, or lovely, or a cyclone of emotions, or a mess, or a newly vacuumed apartment, but his love is holding still beneath it all. A harbor. A cove. A weighted blanket. I can mix as many metaphors as I want. I’m in love.

It's tempting to remind myself to stay vigilant, to wait for some imagined other shoe to drop, and it always could. But The Shy One has asked me over and over by now: Have faith. There are tricky parts, disconnects and differences to listen and squabble and evolve through. But I have a home in someone beautiful. A home in this moment.

I fell asleep with him the other night. It took several Tums and some melatonin and eventually I’m going to have to stop feeling too self-conscious to get up and have my night cereal, but for a couple of hours, I slept. Next to his beautiful, strong body, his soft hands petting me, his breath in my hair.

My cat is very shy. She usually sleeps with me, either right next to me or perched on my hip. When there’s company, she generally hides in the closet. Dates have only known her as a grey streak as she runs from the closet to her hiding place inside the couch.

But Saturday night, while I was laying blissful and awake next to The Shy One, I heard the grey cat’s claws kneeding the side of the mattress. I reached down to pet her, and she jumped up. She sat on my hip for a moment before she remembered there was a non-me person in the bed. She fled almost immediately, but still. It feels like progress.