Monday February 23 2004
WELL I'm free. once again. I guess I told Neight that I wasn't comfortable being sexual with anyone. The pointlessness took me over. I lost track of the original idea, the original plan to befriend him and to hopefully be able to hold him in a high enough regard as I would hold a friend. Because as it was, he meant very little to me. Especially after Monday when he asked if we were dating and Friday he called really late and then I threw up (it was symbolic) WOAH, documentary idea. Silent, I walk into the living room, answer the phone, sit down, talk for awhile, go to bathroom, throw up. No, people would think it was about bulimia. I'm documenting my bulimic tendencies. It seems that hooking up with Neight was some strange distraction from the obvious necessities and realities guiding my life. And now I'm free again, following my own rules and moving along on my way.
Tuesday 2/23/99
5:30 pm
Hi. Today Bruce wrote a poem about how much he loves me. And I wrote a poem about how big of a homophobic, sexist, Racist man he is. And I got to wear the Barbarian Bracelet for awhile. Britta has my pyramid-spiked bracelet. And yesterday I got some red converse hi-tops. They are so cool, I love them. Now I'm 100% Grade A Punk. I played bump at lunch with Stacie, Nichole, Bruce, Kemper, and Rachel. I'm killer at bump. Stacie also watched Brink! last night. After school I went bowling. Kemper wasn't there, so Bruce was on our team. It was a good time. Then we dropped Britta & Bruce off at Kemper's so Bruce could steal beer from his garage. You know, for the Kegger Saturday. Oh, tonight is the dinner with Carol & Hailey! Excited? Can't wait.
10:23 pm
Hey. Well, Bryttni told me that I am a "wannabe punk rocker." Okay, sorry. I told her I got converse so she got into this big thing about how I've changed so much: new friends, different clothes, and different music. Oh, and I have a different attitude. Okay. I was always glad because unlike Stacie and me, Bryttni & I had a good relationship where we didn't judge one another. I always knew we were different in some ways and alike in others, and I never thought of Bryttni as a poseur as anything. I had always thought she felt the same way about me. She just tells me I've changed. Well I have, but like she hasn't? She has a different attitude lately. Like how she was at the movie, bitchy. That's her new thing. But if I were to tell her that, it would just start a fight. But it still hurts my feelings. Whatever. I'm sorry, I had no idea that Converse were so "punk." I don't consider myself a punk. I guess I'm punker than others, but I'm no punk. Some people actually think I am, when I don't even think that. So how can I be a wannabe?
Monday 2/23/98
5:28 pm
Well, well. On Friday I went to Fruit's after school. I also bought a new NOFX CD "Maximum RockNRoll" and a used Tilt. Right now I am listening to Blink 182's "Cheshire Cat." "Ben Wah Balls." Then we all went to Teen Night. We got there early and went into the stereo room and put in the likes of Blink 182, Tilt, NOFX, Beastie Boys, and danced crazy-like. It was fun. Then we found Andrew. Poor guy was alone and depressed. He was being his normal boring self at first. Then the gangsters (Nani for one) came and told me to take out the Beastie Boys. So I was pissed because they were forcing Tupac in the stereo. Excuse me, but Tupac? Hello! So I took the cord (devil child that I am) and ran into the bathroom. So Shannon Mackintosh came in and was threatening to kick my ass but I wouldn't give the cord up. Everyone was pissed at me but sure enough, the gangsters won. Later on Andrew got better. That was good. He let me wear his sweatshirt and he knocked me down, sat on me, then licked me on the cheek once because I stole his shoe and wouldn't give it back. Then he tried to do it again but I stuck my hand out so he got it instead. Then as he was leaving, he asked me for a hug and wouldn't give one to Fruit. That night I spent the night at Fruit's with Stacie too. Then on Saturday we walked around downtown and we went to this skate shop called Pipe Dream across the street from the skate park or the "skatpark" as this cool store calls it. Anyway. The dumbass guy that works there asked us for a smoke, then made fun of blades, then kicked us out. He was a total sexist jerk. He kicked us out because we're girls and I was wearing my Medium sweatshirt. Dude, I'm sorry. Then we went to Cafe Ole and Fruit & Stacie told our waiter it was my birthday so I would get free ice cream. I couldn't get any though, because I didn't order an entree. Fine then. But that didn't stop everyone working there from coming over to our table and singing to me anyway. Gee thanks. Then we went to Spanky's and Stacie got an awesome hat. Then Stacie & I went to my mom's house and rented two really cool scary whore movies called "Jack Frost" (starring a snowman rapist), and "The Fiance" whose title made no sense because no one was getting married. Talked to Andrew and said, "Stacie has her shirt off. I bet you wish you were here." And he said, "Stacie's cool, just not in that way." Then she asked if I was cool in that way and he said yes. Dude, what is this guy smoking. But anyway. Then on Sunday Stacie and I went to the Mall and I got awesome $58 olive green. Rusty cargo pants from Mr. Raggs. They kick. We saw billy (yippee). Stupid Fag. Then we went to my house and then to dinner at Amore with Shirley and we talked a lot about TJ and Halloween and all that crap. Then I talked to Andrew and he said out of nowhere, "You looked really good on Friday" and the more I think about it I get really scared. What? Poor guy was so embarrassed. He also said I had a cute laugh. Why, thank you. I know. Today I dyed my hair blonde.
Wednesday 2/23/00
Hi. There's a new boy in PE. What's his name again? Starts with an S. I don't remember. OP IVY T-shirt, (like a lil' boy called Trev'r) pyramid-spiked bracelet. He was pretty nice. I spoke to him briefly. he's a private school boy. I don't know, he seems like a cool person. He started out friendless, but he took off with James and Joe, so who knows? I guess you can't expect the new guy to hang out with you if you're me. I mean, I'm just not your typical hot you know, in a boy's opinion. It wasn't like that though, at all. I just think that since I'm not the hottest girl he's ever seen, he's going to naturally hang out with the guys. Naturally. Oh well at least there's no one for him to hang out with in PE, besides myselph, and I've got no one. Nick broke his collar bone. So I'm all alone. A good chance for me to attack the new boy? I'd have to agree. HE'S MINE! He seems nice, though, so it shouldn't be difficult to get SOMETHING out of the boy. Mmm Hmm! Fuck, I don't even know his name.
{The following was written in sparkly green and purple pens.}
Saturday 02/23/02
High! And guess where I just came from? The apartments of Shawn and Zach. But, it was Justin who called me which was the coolest part of all. So I left the company of Kari & Sam and went there to chill! And took knife hits. And I told Justin that he was coolest one, and I said that he was the coolest of his friends, and he said, even Zach? And I said yes, and he acted really flattered. I think it meant something to him, and I think that he thinks that I'm really cool. It sucks, he's leaving on Friday! I don't know how we're expected to chill. It sucks, because he seriously is way cooler and way much more fun than his friends.
Thursday 23 February 2006, 12:10 pm
Romain has soft, serious brown eyes and hair the color of mine, if mine wasn't so slightly copper. Our eyebrows are almost identical. If we had french/american children, their eyebrows would look just like ours with no distinction. His cheeks are gaunt, his face long and straight with a rounded chin, unclefted. His lips make a red heart. He is french, yes, and with a tiny waist and muscular stomach, soft, muscled arms, and delicate hands and feet. His body is almost hairless, save for a few very long hairs surrounding his dark, flattened nipples. His skin is more olive complected than mine. His penis is short and uncircumcised; attractive as an unattractive penis can be. As solemn as a sausage. He is built like a thick and shapely version of erwin, who, by coincidence, has recently emailed me a love poem about sex. I'm drinking french water, also by chance.
We meet at the Embankment train station after I pick up my perscription for birth control at the doctor's. I race out of there, sweating madly in nervous excitement at the idea of our meeting. I suddenly feel high, I feel serene, my heart picks up a notch, my blood burns red, and I hurry through the Oxford Circus, wanting to scream vivaciously that no, I don't have a minute for the environment, or for unfortunate children, that I infact have a date! And my date is pure, it is innocent. I want to see Romain again because I liked him when I met him at Fabric. I guess it was because he had nice eyes, and after I found him to ask if he had any pills, and he told me no but that he'd go with me to find some, and then he said to me in his accent of course, "I want to stay with you... until the end." I liked his voice, I liked his sweetness, I liked how he said this to me and I felt like it was important to both of us, how he didn't look at me with fuck in his eye, like most people. I wanted to see him again because I trusted him. I didn't know anything about him except that he had a hickey and a girlfriend from Slovenia. Because of this knowledge, the awareness of a significant other on his side of things, our date is then forced into this place of could or could-not-bes. It is chaste because of my undying love for Charlie, and the fact that I don't know this boy at all, and I have no idea why I've invented this attraction for him. I think it's because he is very beautiful and has the sad, serious eyes. I don't know why I have this liking, this creamy massacre of the heart. And I like it, I like that I am not being repulsed by someone, that I have a trust that comes simply from my intuition, and I of course must take advantage. So I am excited, I'm thrilled, having made Romain to be this boy for whom I have a strong attraction and desire. Even if it isn't so.
I meet him at embankment. I see him first, and my heart slams softly against its cavity walls, I say aloud, girly, oh he's so cute. I approach and stand at his side. We walk, hoping to find the pub he likes, but without heed. We stop in somewhere and drink Guinness, probably the best Guinness I've had in London. He rolls Drum cigarettes (can't smoke french tobacco in London, it's too expensive) for us and guesses my birthday, he guesses the 23rd of May out of all the days in a year. I ask his favorite colour, he tells me blue, like my scarf but less bright, Royal, just like mine. I feel comfortable, too comfortable, like it's very easy to speak to him even though we didn't always know what the other was saying. He asks me to repeat myself, I've got to simplify, to speak broken english. We sit on stools and smoke and stare at one another and laugh. He tells me he's leaving London on the weekend to go to Slovenia, to see his girlfriend. I'm planning to leave to Switzerland in the next couple of days, so part of me celebrates our leaving one another and the probability that I will see him in Dublin. I tell him I will, that he can show me the pubs and we can drink real Guinness. We drink and I go to the bathroom to stare at myself in the fluorescent lighting, noticing all clogged pores, wrinkles, redness. I then scold myself because it's better that I look unattractive because I shouldn't want to attract this person. We leave to find food.
We end up in the Duke of Argyll. The barkeep remembers me, and tells me I look much happier and I gesture at Romain.
"He looks a bit young, doesn't he?"
"Yes, that's exactly why I like him."
"Ah ha, robbin' the cradle, uh?" I nod.
"No, I'm just used to having old men hit on me. This is refreshing."
"Oh, I see." He lets me sample all the Samuel Smith beers, exclaiming, "Here, here, more washing for me, then!" I settle on the Best Bitter (which actually isn't as good as the other) and something else. We eat toasted cheese sandwiches, sitting closely on one side of the table. I tell him why I am a vegetarian. He tells me his favorite kind of meat is horse. The bar closes. We leave and I call Maz to see if I can get some weed. We walk with our arms around one another. I'm fairly drunk. We find Maz and go to a stupid bar that reminds me of American college. Maz at first seems interested in meeting Romain, but shortly he begins to make jokes about "the frenchie who doesn't speak," and at one point one of Maz's friends says to him, "those two are obviously in love."And Maz says, "No, no, she's got a boyfriend..." He needs to explain to people, or to defend, it looks like, my decision that he's so obviously respected, to be faithful to my boyfriend. He asks me later if I have cheated on Charlie, to which I can honestly reply no, I haven't. I ask him if he's got anything to smoke and he says apologetically that he doesn't but he'd really like some himself...
We leave; I am very happy to be with Romain, to meat someone with whom I feel absolute comfort. I am so happy to have met him; love the way we speak when we aren't sure. We joke well, and can say stupid things to one another and we share some kind of abstract understanding. We walk with our arms inside each others' jackets, as it's very cold and the wind is sharp. I like the way my hand feels, clutching his slender hipbone and I think, this person is so beautiful, such a small hipbone, not a giant pelvis like Charlie has and I think, oh charlie, you don't want me to clutch this boy's bone, but oh, I want to and oh, it makes sense. Especially in these misty streets where there're no cars only fox and leaves and moss, and wet wind blowing down us. It begins to get warmer. The rain comes and goes. The houses on the streets get bigger and the puddles reflect golden streetlamps. I feel increasingly happy, but I know we are headed to Romain's hostel and that it's 2 am and maybe I could just stay up all night until I go home in the morning. We see a fox. Very close and laying in the grass between two bushes. A cute, round face bigger than I'd expected, white fur around its eyes. It's a cross between cat, dog, and squirrel. We walk and walk and go the wrong way and Romain says, "Oh, this is boring," because 'boring' somehow translates in french to annoying or pissed off, and we turn around and walk more, and imitate the imaginary sounds of the fox as though it was that creature. He sings Frank Sinatra and something, something that sounds like "My Girl," because I think we heard it somewhere on our voyage. It's so cold and I feel so good; I tell him the chorus of the song. It brings back the image of him guessing my birthday, the two of us sharing a sweet coincidence and blushing on wooden stools.
We go to his hostel and sit on the stairwell, drinking tea out of a pint glass and smoking cigarettes. I let him stroke my head. We tell stories about the ghosts of the hostel. Once, a long, long time ago in the Hyde Park Hostel, there was a very bad fire. An american girl and a french boy were smoking cigarettes and didn't extinguish them entirely. Everyone was killed, but it's said that the ghosts of these two are still there, along with those two Spanish twins who constantly run up and down the hallway, making out in the bathroom. I tell him I will lie in his bed with him. I have the option of another bed. I would have a sheet, it would have been a bit cold, but mostly, I wouldn't have been able to lie in bed with Romain.
I want to lay with him because I like everything about him. So I do. I tell him I can't kiss him. He says okay, you don't have to. I get in bed with all my clothes on, and he wears underwear. He is tiny, very much like Erwin only shapely and muscular and very hard. He's cute in every possible way, and incredibly soft though at first I avoid touching him. He puts his face in the crook of my neck and his arms around me and we sleep. We sleep until he begins to rub my head.
He rubs with both hands, gently, intending to make me smile. He pulls my hair softly, and I begin to do the same. It becomes erotic very quickly, and I'm not sure how. All we're doing is touching one another's heads, but it feels so wonderful and we begin to breathe and it gets warmer and soon our bodies are pressing against each other and we're rubbing noses and pressing cheeks to eyes and lips and chins and it's all soft face parts caressing each other and we're almost fucking with our hands, our fingers fondling the other's hand and palm and stroking the outside, and the inside, soft then hard, and it's all a bit difficult to not want him so I keep my eyes shut, knowing that if I open them I'll see how beautiful he is and how much I want him, and if I keep them shut I'll not notice... but it doesn't work, I open my eyes and he's beautiful with parted lops big and red like an opened heart and his face is slender and brown eyes soft and serious and looking right at me. So I think, I've gone this far, it's not innocent anymore, it's as though we've kissed, our lips are rubbing over one another, we're smelling each other, he's pressed against me and he's hot and we're entangled and my hair's matted and I want to see how he'll kiss me. Our lips are dry and he's insistent, with thick tongue plunging and he's kissing me quickly. It reminds me of the first time I kiss Charlie and how young he is and how beautiful and excited he is. The kissing means nothing, it's the movement that's so incredible. One of the roommates climbs off the top bunk and we hide under the covers. The roommate stands next to my face; the frame is filled by a crotch wearing boxers. I never see his face. Finally we leave the bed. I go to the bathroom feeling like the queen of shit. What have I done? I ask. Was it worth it? How did I do this? Charlie will be so sad. I try not to cry. I tell myself it's done and now I'll have to pay for it and there's nothing left to do. Don't torture yourself.
I do cry, a little. And then I'm embarrassed, because Romain makes a half-hearted attempt at comforting me, and I can't except it, I don't want him to, I don't need to be crying so I stop and rinse my face and we leave to a cafe where I check flights, realizing it's too expensive to travel to Basel this weekend. He realizes it's too expensive to travel to Slovenia to see his girlfriend (simultaneously as I write this he is on the plane, or maybe he is still at Stansted listening to Valley of the Giants or Miles Davis). I'll go in the middle of March, instead of journeying to Dublin to have an innocent meeting with Romain. [I cannot, how I'd love to go to Dublin and go with him to the Guinness factory and to sleep and walk around in Ireland with him! But I can't, I can't, my relationship with Charlie is too important for me to allow this affair to continue. Maybe we'll never see one another again. Maybe, though I feel that if Charlie and I separate, I will crave Romain. I already do, I still do, I wish I was touching him right now.]
We have breakfast. His is traditional english, and he uses knife and fork. Mine is tomato soup with chips. I eat hardly any of it. I am in a daze, as I haven't slept but have instead partaken in a particularly beautiful (however innocent it feels, I know that it cannot be, that I've only just kissed him without letting him touch me and I've kept my clothes on just so that I could say I did, it's all about what I can say later to Charlie, about having the correct things to say even if the words themselves mean nothing, as they don't as I had an orgasm somewhere, and another to follow shortly, and it was not innocent, it was a most erotic experience) affaire francois stupide. Soon he has his hand on my knee and we begin to desire each other and I suppose I think to myself, well, I've done it, and how I want it still. His mouth is on my neck and throat and clavicle and ears as I clutch a cigarette and think how we are in a cafe with cheap reproductions of impressionist paintings and there's house music on the stereo and fresh-squeezed orange juice and bad coffee, and he smells amazing.
We have an astonishing kiss and I think, what a lover, and we talk and I listen to his voice and his accent and I love it and I still trust him. "It's okay," he always says, meaning don't worry, or sure, or I like it, or it doesn't matter. We leave after a few hours; whenever we go anywhere we sit for at least a few hours, 2 or 3. We want to walk through Hyde Park, I'm thinking how I have to leave soon because I need to go call Charlie and admit myself and stop the lying, I suppose. We first go back to his room, where we are alone, briefly, and we gaze and then lay with our arms around each other and doze. I dream lightly, but only in thoughts that keep going when I'm only slightly asleep. I think about Charlie, about telling him, and about making work here in London that I am proud of and about my friends back in Chicago and saying goodbye to Romain, and I think it will all be okay, almost that it is already okay. The thoughts are led to where they need to be, where normalcy and contentment are once again restored. We don't want to get up. We'd like to stay like that, because we find each other's faces are soft and pretty, and our bodies warm pressed against each other, our legs enmeshed, and I, fully enmeshed 'in an adulterous affair.'
We get up and I wear his shoes as my texas ropers are extremely painful and still wet. We walk through a misty Hyde Park, dark and bright at the same time, green and grey with long footpaths and birds flying over our heads. We approach a pond arm in arm, sharing a cigarette and there're large white swans with beaks tucked behind folded wings, floating on dark water. The geese wander slowly, unafraid of our presence. We walk through the park and I feel london and what I want it to be like. This is an example of what london should be. I realize again that it's really time to go. I produce another stupid pun which is always difficult to describe in broken english. He says what is a relationship and I say, or affair, and he says, what affair?
We kiss long and hard for maybe ten or fifteen minutes before the Bayswater tube stop. We have the most amazing kisses here, where we keep losing our balance and falling over and saying things like, I don't want to leave you yet, yes, neither do I, but I have to go, okay, I will see you later then... kiss for a long time, say goodbye, grab him again and pull him towards you and kiss more and more and finally wave as he's across the street and break into hot, confused tears and pace the train station, exhausted, bewildered, feeling slightly in love and totally vacant of anything I felt before. I think of charlie but not that I am sorry. I don't want him to be anything but happy- I keep saying this, but why would I still do this? It's so strange, I think about Charlie, or, at least, I did before I created this crush, as though he is the world, he is the best, he is the only for me. And suddenly, I am so attracted to another, I am so desirous of someone else that it negates all sincerity. I forget about Charlie, I forget his height, his heft that I love, his dark hair and lips and green eyes and I only glance over hipbones in my mind because I'm distracted by the bones of another. Charlie is so so so very far away, which is how I knew it'd be when I told him what I'd done. I could barely see him when I was with Romain, he was nearly a recollection, and I didn't miss him. I only missed him when I began to kiss Romain and he can't kiss like him, but then there's the truth that the kiss of charlie isn't absolute, that it began one way and developed into this perfection that I can recall now, only just. Of course with more time spent with Romain I'd have the perfect person to kiss. Later, I'd learn that sexually (except, of course, with Sex itself) his actions are hurried and he's as eager as with his mouth. This too would take not long to change... but I don't have the time or energy and there is no reason to commit to such things, it's for someone else. I'm only his american girlfriend, never to see him again, most likely.
I can barely see Charlie in the background dark. It doesn't bother but surprises me. I expect him to always be in front, to take me over from all sides, but now he is so small and I have no idea what he smells like or how his stomach feels. And this is the danger. It is frightening to not have an overpowering need for the one you love. I am happy to be separated from it, partly because it puts me in a safer position; I know that if something happens, if Charlie and I are not together soon or later, I will be okay because there are so many people in the world. I could have loved Romain more than I did. I wanted to, very much, thought still he would be wrong. He isn't in love, I'm sure he never has been and I suppose I've come before his time. He is like Charlie, I think, before I met him. This boy I could love with ease, and I could also be hurt and disappointed. If I didn't have Charlie it would be too much. I would cause myself too much damage. He is that good. Still, I don't think too far into this because it isn't reality. The reality is that Charlie is still there, that I am very much in love still... I have to tell him. I try to call him on the bus but he isn't there and then I fall asleep for 13 hours and miss Romain when I awaken. I talk to Eleneus about what's happened, and at this time I feel giddy like in pre-love but it's safer than that because I have to control it. I know that I'd like to see him that night, that I want to bring him back to my room so that we can sleep together. I am happy, I am relaxed, until it's time to call Charlie and I do and he's so happy to hear from me because it's been so long and I open up with the truth immediately, apologizing afterwards, without a tear. He is sad, then angry that I am not regretful, and I wonder how to fake it. He says it seems like I'll leave after the conversation to meet with him again. I can't say anything. He's somehow very understanding. I tell him: I love you, baby, and it sounds so fake. My voice is so small and far away. I love him. He knows how to react, nothing like how I would have. He tells me not to worry too much about it and I love him for that. He tells me to call him later. Later I am with Romain so I can't.
Wednesday February 23 2005
A break for intellectualizing.
For clearance of Mind. What's on mine? Oh, let me but tell you.
Erwin's coming back on March 8. I won't have forgotten about him by then. In fact, I think of him frequently, everytime I see the narrow back of a thin boy. Everytime the winter breezes catch my ear.
I don't feel mad at actual people and circumstances that have come from my relationships with them. Jealousy doesn't matter now. I don't have feelings either way, for or against Steve. It doesn't bother me to see qualities in others that I wish I have.
I like purpleorange trees and steel grey buildings outside the window at school. I don't yearn for there to be mountains, and if I did, it wouldn't make me angry to not find them there.
Still unsuccessfully growing up and playing the game and getting my act together.
