And So It Is…

I have never been able to see a “good” guy, even if  he fell on top of me. My relationships have been primarily abusive, toxic ones.  About 4 years ago, I met a man, purely by coincidence, and was instantly attracted to him, not in the physical sense, much more complex than that.  This man, or as I call him, a boy, was the complete opposite of me, and he intrigued me. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I sensed in him something very similar to me and yet very opposite.  We had similar situations, bound by an unhappy, unfulfiling life, but while I cried and complained and whined, he never expressed any unhappiness, yet I could see it in his eyes. I could feel it whenever he was around.  He expressed an interest in me early on, and how could I possibly give this “good” guy a chance?  After all, he wasn’t making fun of me, or using me in any matter.  I remember him researching for me as I lay in bed about my illness, contacting doctors, actually throwing me into he bathtub when I couldn’t, wouldn’t bathe myself. At the beginning, I didn’t want him around much, yet he kept coming and I felt guilty, knowing somehow he needed me allowed him in my life, for weekends, sometimes weeks straight.  He’d call me 2, 3 times a day and in the beginning I didn’t always feel like talking but knew he needed to and did.  Our cultural backgrounds couldn’t have been more different, but our feelings were the same, manifested in different ways, but the same. He would hide, detach himself from them, well you know how I handled them.  I envied that in him, how he could just pretend that everything was OK. The more I grew to know him, the more he became my world, things began to change, I needed him, I clung to him, because without him, who would I be?  My identity is so fragile that I latched onto his, even wanting to become him, indifferent, comfortable to be alone, paractical, rational.  Yet, at the same time I hated those qualities about him, and tried my very best to try and evoke some kind of emotion from him.  One night in particular sticks out in my head.  He would come over uninvited,  I had plans to go out, he told me he would leave.  The next thing I knew, he had drank a bottle of wine, clearly unable to go home and I would not be going out.  He fell to the floor, and just repeated over and over, “I have failed you.”  He thought he could be my savior I suppose, and I was trying to be his.  I put him to bed and caressed him, telling him he failed no one, and that he’d done for me more than anyone ever has.  And he did.  But, like  with everyone else, people have limits, today he has run away, and I feel more alone than I ever have.  A man who once told me he loved me, now tells me he doesn’t care if we are ever friends again.  I did that.  I caused that.  I lost him, my best friend.  And to be very honest, I do not know what is worse– making friends and losing them, or just being alone, not risking the chance to get hurt.  So, finally after pleading with him to be my friend, to care about me again, because he was the only link I had to the outside world, I had to say goodbye, the hurt was too much, the indiffference intolerable.  I feel as if an imposter has taken over his body.  The man I knew would never say the things he has, or do the things he has, but I have that way of pushing people to care for me too much, which causes not to care for me at all.   To quote him, anytime I’d say, what will you do if  I meet someone, he’d say “Walk the Earth…”, and today I am the one who “Walks the Earth,” alone, unrecongnizable, lost and skeptical about trusting again…