What’s up with you. I uttered the words, “What’s up with you” in a high-pitched voice, nerves on 100, and with butterflies coming out to play in my stomach. I didn’t think that he would actually come and talk to me. I NEVER in a million years, would have pictured that this boy…this particular boy…would speak to me. This boy that I had that moment with. You know the moment when you just know…you just know that something is going to happen, you don’t really know if it’s going to be good or bad, but you know that this person will be in your life somehow and leave some type of mark. Yeah, so I guess my plan worked?
Anyways, so yeah. I repeated what he said to me. I could feel my face turn red and hot, because I didn’t know what to say next. He just stared at me for a good minute or two. I didn’t know why, and to this day I still don’t. However, within that minute I got to stare up-close to his face. The first thing I noticed was his beautiful fair skin. Then it was his highly defined red lips that were complimented with his snow like complexion. And just above that lay his eyes…oh the eyes. They were a bright green that if you stared long enough you could find yourself just getting lost as if you were in front of a beautiful garden of fresh flowers. The way they looked back at mine, I could almost notice a bit of his personality, just enough to make me want to know more. It was his eyes that drew me in. They gave me a piece of him, a piece of his happiness, a piece of his troubles, they gave me a part of him. A story that I needed to know more about. It’s always in the eyes.
The rest of the night we talked. He even held my hand. Him and I were attached at the hip, we got to know each other more and more, and as the night was coming to an end, we realized that we each weren’t done. Oh no folks…this was just the beginning. Had I known what I was getting myself into, I would have done nothing different. My friends were ready to go, and they weren’t going to let me go home with him. Our rule was that If you came together, then you left together. So, I was forced to say bye.
I remember this goodbye vividly as it felt like a scene in a movie. He placed his hands gently on my waist and drew me in slowly. He told me that he had just met me but that he didn’t want to say goodbye. He gently rubbed his nose against mine. My heart began to pound. The Capricorn in me STARTED SCREAMING. Was this okay? DO I LET HIM DO THIS? What’s going to happen after? He proceeded to raise my chin up, and then…NOTHING. Let me tell you, this man loves to leave a girl hanging okay. We of course exchanged contact info, and parted ways. I couldn’t believe I had just met this stranger, someone in my city that lived a completely different life than me all these years. A stranger in my city that could make me feel this way within a few hours.
Did the night end there? No…of course not. I had to know more. And just when I began thinking of him on the ride home, his name popped up on my screen. The message read, “Did you make it home okay?”. I knew this was my chance. I didn’t work the next day. I figured what harm could be done if I just went to go get food? Go talk? So, while I was being dropped off, he was on his way to pick me up. AT 2 AM. What was I thinking you ask? No clue. All I knew was I needed to know more, regardless of my history with relationships, I just wanted to know this person more. He picked me up in his red Jeep Cherokee and we were off.
The night led us to a lake with a view. We started talking, I made sure he knew that nothing more was going to happen BUT talking. He was okay with that. I began to ask questions. Questions about his life, what he was doing, where he wanted to go, his dreams. He looked at me crazy as if no one had asked him before. He uttered the words, “Don’t laugh, but I’m studying fashion.” He proceeded to stare at the ground. I picked his chin up and reassured him that those were his dreams, and if they were to ever come true, then the first person that needed to believe in them was himself. He smiled. I think at that moment he realized that his dreams could be a reality.
I began to notice more and more about him as we got more invested. He found out I was at UT, and as anyone from my hometown would do, he awed in admiration, and praised me for being so ambitious. I learned that he had come from a broken family, that he took care of himself, and that he thought he was going to be stuck in our small town. You see guys, this cute boy at the party was just more than a cute boy, he was someone looking for a way out, someone who was hurting because he thought he knew his end game. He thought he was going to be stuck. He figured that everyone around him was doing such big things with their lives that what he was doing with his could never compare. I couldn’t help but believe in him. I couldn’t help but WANT to believe in him. His dreams were told to be so big.
The night flew before my eyes and I knew I needed to be home. So, he took me home. He was quiet for the majority of the ride. I wonder to this day what he was thinking. He held my hand while gently caressing it with his thumb and occasionally gracing it with his lips. We finally made it to my house and just looked at each other once more. Looking into those eyes one more time, I knew this couldn’t possibly be the end. He gently placed his hand below my chin, and with a forward motion, drew my face in just near his. He held it there for about 30 seconds and under his breath, murmured the words, “I’ve been wanting to do this all night since I saw you behind me next to the bathroom.” My eyes got HUGE, and with no time to waste, he grazed his lips over mine. It left me speechless. LITERALLY. I got out of the car saying no words.
I started getting ready for bed, and as I heard his truck leave from my front driveway, I couldn’t help but wonder, why? Why now? I put on some pajamas and laid down. I closed my eyes and as I was just about to fall into a deep sleep, I woke in a sudden caution. I kept repeating to myself that I couldn’t do this! I couldn’t fall for this guy I had just met. It was a stranger, and frankly with my history with men he was just going to play me! There was one problem, however, one problem that with my history, I couldn’t take no exceptions for. In about 4 weeks from that night, that magical night, I was going to be 3 hours away, taking 15 credit hours as a college student. There wasn’t time. So, in that moment, I decided to ignore all the signs pointing to yes, and deleted his number.
To be continued…