A Cat Has Nine Lives

1999

As I sank deeper into my chair, eyes wide but unable to see any­thing clearly I felt like the wind had been knocked out of me.  How could he say the words “feel” & “about you” in the same sen­tence?  I couldn’t find words, I just stared at Alex. Seri­ously, when did it get so hot in here? For­get hold­ing my feet to fire it felt more like a burn­ing flame across my entire being.  I could feel my face becom­ing flushed with the heat of discomfort.

“It’s just that I’ve felt for a while like if I was going to leave & not tell you how I felt that I’d regret it so I’m telling you.  I think I’m falling in love you with you.”

Oh, God.  This can not be hap­pen­ing.  It has to be a dream. Plain & sim­ple.  Things like this don’t hap­pen to me. Things like this don’t hap­pen to real peo­ple, they hap­pen in 1980s movies.

The voice in my head was scream­ing: No!!!No!!!No!!! Please, let me wake up.  That’s it, I will just wake up.  My eyes closed for a minute.  When I open them I’ll be awake.

I opened them. Turns out I was always awake.  Damn it!

Alex was intently look­ing at me.  He wasn’t smil­ing, just look­ing. He looked like a man on a mission.

I felt like a woman pinned by real­ity. I can’t do this.  I think I just swal­lowed my heart as it jumped up into my throat only to have “falling in love” push it back down.  Plum­met­ing down to my stom­ach, like the ele­va­tor cable snapped & there was my heart crash­ing down.

“Alex, I’m not sure what to really say.  I mean, we don’t really even know each other. It’s not that I don’t think you’re great, you are. But, um, I don’t want to hurt you.”

But before I could fin­ish he cut me off.

“I know you’ve said before you love him, but how can you know that you really love him?  How do you know he really loves you? How do you know that it is forever?”

Before I could answer I was again inter­rupted, this time not by Alex.  I heard the restau­rant door open & a voice call out to me.  As light hit his face there stood Mike, smile shin­ing across his face, walk­ing toward us. My mind began to race.  Oh, this isn’t good.  This is bad.  This is very bad.

Alex leaned for­ward & whis­pered  “If you change your mind. I’m leav­ing this week­end.  You can come with me. I will stop by before I go.”

With that he stood up and walked away.

“Hey, are you ready to go? Is every­thing OK? You look like you don’t feel well. Did that guy say some­thing to upset you?” Mike asked.

I looked at him & for a sec­ond I thought I didn’t have to say any­thing. I had nine lives.  That semi-truck that just ran me over & backed over me didn’t end me. I had more lives. I could go on to live another day. I could ignore it. I could just ignore every­thing & go home with­out ever telling him what hap­pened.  Like a dream that drifted away upon wak­ing.  But I couldn’t do that.  Alex would show up & what would I do then?

“Can I talk to you when we get home?  Or at least not here. I don’t want to talk here anymore.”

“Any­more?  Uh, OK.”

He got quiet & looked at me with a con­fused smile.  God, I loved him. I stood up with him, grabbed my things & out we walked into the cool evening breeze.  Together we walked out.  Together.

Know­ing I had to tell him what hap­pened.  Know­ing Alex would show back up.   What was he going to say, what would he do?  Won­der­ing how I ended up here. I felt like I was a walk­ing movie, all I kept think­ing was how John Hughes would have writ­ten this so much bet­ter.  I mean SO much bet­ter.  Because this was just awk­ward, this had no funny lines or witty dia­logue, this was my life.  

[this is part of my  “how I met your father” series–if you love a love story feel free to dive on in]

Tagged as: dating, drama, how i met your father, love, love story, Marriage