The other night, Brian and I sat on my porch staring out at clouds and stars and the gloomy glory of Binghamton High School, drinking Corona and... talking. Strangely, Brian and I never really got a hell of a lot of chances to talk. Something was always in the way. There was always somebody to appease. There was always a class or homework. Or somebody to appease. Mostly somebody to appease. It was so good to talk. Just to talk. Just to know I was sharing a night with somebody who wanted to know me. Somebody who has a great capacity for making me feel as though I am worth knowing, not just hanging with. It is so good to be cared about. It is so, so, so good to know someone like Brian. I would like to spend the rest of my life getting to know him. I think I could share many, many nights with him, watching stars, and never quite know him. I like that. I like to feel the complexities simplifying, and the simplicities morphing into complete confusion...
I like to remember that I'm not the sum total of work, home, appearance, boyfriend, family, hometown.
I like to trust. I cannot believe how completely I trusted Brian. I'm not one to tell secrets easily. I'm not one to speak freely except here in this journal, and even that is very questionable. Hell, even though Norman and I have been together nine and a half months, he still doesn't know where I keep my super-secret stash of waitressing tips. It's not everybody who gets the opportunity to see me drink half a bottle of wine at the confluence of the Rivers and go into "confession mode." I don't think I'd ever let anybody else color little stars and planets all over my feet with ballpoint pen. There have only been two or three people in my entire life whose eyes I could look into without the slightest hesitation or fear. But how could I help trusting someone who once placed his hat on my head in the windy Nevada desert, stars and scorpions all around, to keep me warm? Someone who once brought two beers to my room in the middle of the night and didn't even comment on my messy room, my gross sweatpants, the weird smell of my room, or my quite-obviously-unstable frame of mind. Someone who would never, ever break my heart without my express permission.
I said -- was it only last night? -- "I know this is a little cheesy and cliché-ish, but you have touched a part of me that I had forgotten about."
He smiled. That made him happy, I think.
And I said, "But I will not let you break my heart."
He said he didn't want my heart to break. He said he wasn't worth that sort of thing.
I said, "Yes, you are. But I'm just not going to let you." I know Brian would not want to break my heart. Would hesitate to cross questionable boundaries into my messy little emotions. Would probably do everything possible to ensure a state of relative peace and happiness for me. But it wouldn't be difficult for me to let down all my guards and offer Brian some things he probably wouldn't be able to feed and water every day. Still, I think those things are safely locked away: stirred deeply, but not quite given away.
I'm sitting here in Norman's apartment, listening to Neil Young, a sort of neutral, droning, bad tape-recording. Neil Young seems to think only love can break one's heart. I might add a few statements of my own to that theory.
The wall of the building next door to Norman's apartment is a tan false-adobe one, uglier than hell, but I'm peacefully allowing it to watch over me. It reminds me of Santa Fe: the sunlight and shadows, the blue sky and sandy-colored wall... I never fell in love with Santa Fe, never could really see the beauty of such things. But today, that silly wall whispers nice warm things to me... It whistles at me and yells, "Hey, Beautiful." It reminds me of coffee and magazines. It reminds me of stars and a certain rainbow I know disguised as a rather ordinary person with rather extraordinary eyes and a rather extraordinary way of making me happy just by smiling.
It's six PM here; I imagine Brian's a few thousand miles away by now.
"...but with me you will stay..." --Suzanne Vega
~Me*