Erin

I don’t even know what to say about this subject, one I should have probably thought a bit harder about a few years ago.  I kind of let it go for a while, maybe thinking that someday it would wear off.  No such luck, my friends, no such luck.  It was bad when I was in college, I couldn’t ever stop thinking about it.  I had a thing ever since that damn 8:30 am freshman English class that she sat next to me in.  The first conversation was a bit of an awkward one, had while lighting a cigarette after class.

“Dude, your bag smelled like weed that entire class,” she said.

“Uh…..well…….,” I stammered.

“It’s cool dude, I was just letting you know so you didn’t walk into your next class with it.”

“Well maybe you’d wanna smoke some time?”  

That was it; we were tight ever since then.  We spent so much time driving around in her VW smoking weed and passing off our crappy fakes at the drive-thru liquor store down the road.  She was so unlike any of the other girls I went to school with.  She wasn’t interested in the stupid politics of our social group and would hang out with the guys like no other (guess it had to do with how many brothers she has).  She was just so much different.  It didn’t take long before I was feeling it, granted it never really does. 

I sat on it for a while before I finally couldn’t take it any longer and gave it the kiss of death…I told her I had feelings for her.  Still don’t quite know what the fuck I was thinking telling her that, lord knows that is the fastest way to getting your number erased.  Strangely enough, she took it in stride and gave me the ol, “let’s not jeopardize our friendship,” line.  Even stranger was the fact that she never let it get weird, regardless of how often it seemed I was determined to.  We have been close ever since.

Now I’m not gonna sit here and bullshit about this, the feelings for her never went away…if anything they got stronger.  As I got a bit older, however, I realized it would be best to keep it to myself.  She was right; our friendship was worth way too much.  Still didn’t change how I felt, just changed how I dealt with it.

Well time passed, school ended, she moved up to Chicago (her parents had recently moved to my beloved hometown 100 miles to the north) and I was stuck in a shit relationship in Cincinnati with a dead-end job as the real frosting on the cake.  Naturally those feelings took a spot on the back burner as I spent much of that time after college concerned with other women, but they never quite went away.  I would see her over the holidays, the few that both of us were home for, and we would have a few drinks and run around town with my friends.  I always thought about it over the next week or so, but it would go away when I got in bed again.

When I went on my little “adventure” in New York I didn’t think about her anymore as I was so completely focused on the reason I went out there.  I never thought that I would be back here thinking about this, I thought I was with the one I was meant to be with.  I’m still not quite used to that yet, but more on that at some later date.  The simple fact of the matter is that I am here now and that false comfort is gone.  The other fact is that now my old friend is only 100 miles away from me and comes up here once or twice a month.  Bet you can guess what kind of old feelings that conjured up, eh?

Every weekend she has been up here has been a fucking blast.  She gets on great with my friends and is as hilarious as ever, not to mention oh so much hotter.  I have to admit, I’m right back where I was seven or so years ago.  Now I’m not gonna go and do something stupid like tell her I have been in love with her since freshman year of college, but I do wish I could.  I’m pretty sure that I’m securely in the friendzone and that she will never see me as anything other than “Cheese” her buddy from college, but I still hold out some foolish hope that isn’t true.  

See, now that it is actually feasible it has me thinking about her all the fucking time.  I know I’m still on a pretty hard rebound here and I know that might have a little something to do with it, but these feelings are not new.  I guess they never did quite go away and I’m seriously wondering if they ever will…or if I even want them to.