February 11

My first Thanksgiving living in Philly, I had come home to Minnesota for the holiday.

Completely unexpected, he called the house. (He, him, you know who). He called to see if my brother was home for the holidays. My father, who had answered the phone, told him no but that I had come home and would he like to talk to me. My father handed me the phone, told me who it was, and everything in my stomach dropped to the pit of my bowels. I had come to a point, finally, where I was convinced that I was over him, but when that phone was handed to me I was overcome with….well.

We met up at The Mall of America to have a few drinks and catch up. I was expecting his girlfriend to come too, but he came alone. This wasn’t the first time I had seen him since I had moved away. I had come home for one of my brother’s weddings, and that was the first time I had seen him in years. This particular Thanksgiving is worth telling, however, because it explains one of the many reasons I hate the holiday and get physically ill through it year after year. Again, spare me your judgments, Reader. I know perfectly well how weak I am. Understand that this is one of the reasons I hate Thanksgiving, not the only.

We met up at a bar on the fourth floor of the mall. For hours we talked, laughed, played, drank, walked the mall, wheeled each other around in a wheel chair we found by the bathrooms, held hands, caused a ruckus, made people stare, and found each other between this huge, unspoken understanding of regret on each of our parts. Our goodbye was the most bittersweet awaking I’ve ever experienced in my entire life. We hugged. I wanted so badly to kiss him, but instead went for the cheek. “He has a girlfriend,” I told myself. “You can’t tell him you love him.” He got out of my car in the parking garage, and I was never the same again. I should’ve told him, then. That was the moment. That was when I should’ve told him I loved him. That was the defining moment predicting our entire future of regret.

The following Thanksgiving, or rather the weekend before it, I drove across Pennsylvania to visit my brother. Well, two brothers actually. The youngest came to live in Pittsburgh too… and he had a roommate. He was a creative, funny, witty, cute roommate who little did he know became victim Man #6.

Long story short, #6 and I went out for dinner while my brothers were at work. We went back to his apartment only to end up face locked and on the floor. Having enjoyed his company profusely, and feeling extremely freed by not having to think about you know who, and ….well. Let’s just say this was a defining moment of proof that loneliness and grief can turn you into someone you never expected to spawn into existence.

My infatuation with him was intense, and I made an extremely desperate move. I asked him, mid-make-out, when he was going to move to Philly. At first I thought I was being recklessly charming and flirty, but the look on his face was, “Oh shit…”. And then my insides were saying, “Oh shit…” So I told myself to, “just keep kissing….go for the neck or something….” But the damage was done. I had made an ass out of myself.

Not long after this, the jiggling of the lock on the door was heard, and the two of us sprung up from our positions and threw ourselves onto the couch attempting to look like we were innocently watching television. My brothers walked in, and that was that.