Light and Dark

I found these old photos of Lucas and I. 

We're not together in the photos but they were taken on the same day because my sister had a photography project. I keep the pictures in the very bottom of my sock drawer. Out of sight, out of mind. 

But lately, I've been thinking about all the things I've lost. My schooling, my shot at a relationship, my respect for myself. And I lost Lucas. 

Every now and then, I go back to the days I was pining after him. They were simultaneously the best and worst days of my life. It felt good to fight for something. To want something so badly that I knew deep down in my heart that I would do anything to get it. But it also sucks that one person could bring me down to that level. That I would throw away everything about myself to please one person. And I knew deep down in my heart that I wouldn't look back. I would throw it all away and not give a damn. I would do it for him. 

But he wouldn't do it for me. 

I was never that person for him. I was never going to be the girl he thought about day and night. The girl he would send an early morning text to. The girl who's house he would drop by to with my favorite flowers just to see my face light up. 

And these pictures remind me of why it wouldn't have worked out anyway. In my picture, my face is lined with heavy shadows. I'm expressionless, looking straight in to the camera. There's a look of angst in my hooded eyes that makes it seem like I've been carrying a weight on my shoulders for far too long. 

In his picture, his face is alive. He's grinning so wide that the sun glistens on his teeth. He's looking away from the camera with squinted eyes from a heavy smile and a bright sun. He's radiant. Vibrant. Present. 

He looks like a living, breathing, laughing person and I look like a shell of a girl. 

That's how it's always been. He knows who he is and what he's smiling about and why the sun shines every morning. But I don't know anything. I've been waiting to see a light, so have something with substance fill me up inside so I can shine the way he does on the outside. 

The sun that shines so brightly on his face dims on mine. The smile that stretches across his face is lost on my mouth. The squint of his eyes make mine look haunted in comparison. 

I've been waiting for the expression to flit over my face easily. To squint at the sun and grin without a care. I've been waiting for the sun to come and dry up all this rain, but I'm caught out in the storm. 

Lucas

I first fell in love when I was fourteen. His name was Lucas and we live in the same neighborhood.

We became friends when I was about thirteen.  My best friend at the time was a very pretty girl. And eventually, she and Lucas started dating. At this point, I had a huge crush on one of the other neighborhood boys, Alex. Me, my best friend at the time, Lucas, Alex, and another one of the boys from the neighborhood were five friends that couldn't be stopped. We did everything together because we all lived in the same neighborhood and at the time, we were too young to drive. 

While us girls were going into our freshman year of high school, the boys were going into their sophomore year. We discovered everything together - alcohol, weed, cigarettes, sexcapades. We shared them all. While Lucas and my friend were dating, everything was fine.

Then, one day, my friend just kind of lost interest in him. We stole some liquor from her parents' cabinet, got drunk at about one in the morning, and walked to Alex's house to hang out with everyone. I let Alex in on the low down - she was going to break up with Lucas. So Alex and I went outside to let them have some alone time.

So she broke it off with him.  It had only been a couple months. We both thought it would be no big thing - they were really young and going to different schools and all that jazz. As far as my friend was concerned, she was just along for the ride and this was her stop.

But, for God knows what reason, Lucas took it hard.  He started tearing up by the time me and Alex got back in the house and Lucas went back home a few minutes later. We barely saw him for the rest of the summer.

By the time school came back around, my friend ended up moving and living in a different school district. Alex went to public school, our other guy friend went to the charter school in our town, and the only two people that ended up at the same school were Lucas and I. We both ended up at the prep school a few towns north.

Lucas and I didn't really end up talking very often in school. However, he did come over to my house about once a week after school and we'd hang out. For some reason, though, he didn't like to talk to me in school. 

It took me a damn long time to finally figure out that the reason Lucas didn't talk to me in school was because he thought he was better than me. He went there the year before and I was brand new and he didn't want to be known as the only friend of the new girl. Which just kind of fucking blows, you know? Like, I wasn't terribly ugly or bitchy or unpopular. By the end of the first week, I found my group of friends, got the hang of the uniform, and built myself a decent reputation. So I didn't really get it.

Then one day, around the time we all got rowdy, ready for Christmas break, he was sitting out in the hall eating lunch when I walked up the stairs and saw him. He stuck his foot out and tripped me.  I didn't fall on my face or anything, I just kind of stumbled. At first, I was humiliated. But when I turned around to glare at him, I saw he was grinning. He stood up, and tickle-attacked me. I started cracking up and ran down the hallway. He immediately started chasing after me. We were both laughing unabashed as if we didn't have a care in the world. 

But then we made the mistake of running past Mr. Brown's room. Mr. Brown was the Chemistry teacher. An awesome guy who teaches better than anyone I've ever been taught by. However, he was also a no-nonsense kind of guy.

"Hey, hey, hey!" he yelled. We stopped in our tracks and snapped our heads down in shame.

Mr. Brown told us to come in to his classroom and sit at tables by ourselves in opposite sides of the room for the rest of our lunch period in silence. We made faces at each other from across the room when he wasn't looking. After what seemed like hours, the lunch bell finally rang. Lucas shot up like his ass was on fire and speed-walked out the door.

As I was packing up my bag, Mr. Brown asked me, "That your boyfriend?"

I stuttered for a second because, for some reason, I was just really not expecting that.

"Just a friend," I replied eventually.

"Do you want him to be your boyfriend?" Mr. Brown asked with that knowing smirk that middle aged men get when talking to naive teenagers.

I was as blase as I possibly could have been when I said, "Nah, he's not my type." My cheeks were flaming red by the time I finally walked out of the Chemistry lab. I wasn't fooling anyone - Mr. Brown knew I was head over heels for this guy. And he was right.

I stayed up day and night thinking about this guy, wondering if he was thinking about me. I constantly daydreamed about what we would do together if he possibly liked me as much as I liked him. But I knew in my heart of hearts that he didn't. He didn't stay up at night wondering what I did that night - if I stayed in or went out with friends. He didn't fall asleep thinking about how happy he could make me.

But I was so infatuated with him. Everything he did was just another reason for me to like him more. I was naive, I was fourteen, and I was in love. 

The school year ended and summer greeted us with open arms. And suddenly, Lucas was back in my life again. A few days before my fifteenth birthday, we ended up making out thanks to a game of truth or dare. 

And after that, I was seeing a hell of a lot more of Lucas. He was over almost every other day. One day in July, we started playing poker. We turned it in to a little bit more than a game of cards though.

Somehow, we decide that when Lucas won a hand, I would feel up on him. And when I won a hand, he would feel up on me. I looked forward to those games every time I heard my doorbell ring and saw him standing on the porch. This continued on and on and on until the Christmas of my sophomore year.

In the time that we were fooling around, my feelings soared for him. He was all I ever thought about. As far as I was concerned, he was perfection. Everything I had ever wanted and everything I ever would want.

When Christmas came around, I didn't see him for a while. I thought it was just because of the holidays so I didn't pay much mind, although I did miss him. But by mid-way through January, I still hadn't seen him. 

He ended up showing his face a few weeks into the new year, but I didn't see him nearly as much. Now, instead of staying up thinking about all the romantic things he would get for me, I stayed up thinking about what had changed. Was it me? Did I do something wrong?  Was it my fault? Did not even like me as a friend anymore?

I was confused and heartbroken. By March, we hadn't fooled around since Christmas and I had only seen him four or five times. Then, halfway through March, my best friend Justin threw his sixteenth birthday party.  Surprisingly, Lucas was there. I didn't expect to see him.  Usually he wouldn't be caught dead hanging out with guys that were younger than him.

I was nervous. I wasn't exactly sure how to approach him. And, at this time, I was dating Shane. I had been dating Shane while this whole Lucas thing was happening. But I didn't know what I wanted. Shane was easy. Shane liked me. And I liked Shane. But I had history with Lucas. And I wanted to see where it would go. I should have stayed loyal to Shane. And I know that now. But I got this rush with Lucas, like he was where I wanted to be. Like he was home. And the Shane thing wasn't serious - not serious enough to tell anyone about, anyway.

So I walked up to Lucas and put my hand on his back and smiled at him. He smiled back. Just as I was about to open my mouth and say something, he walked away. As if the smile was enough for him. We had acknowledged each other's presence and he didn't need anything else. 

I was sad. More than sad, I was mad. I was angry that this guy I used to sabotage my relationship with Shane could drop me so easily. I wasn't anything to him. Just some girl he fooled around with a few times months ago. 

For the rest of the night, I let that anger fuel my fire. I danced the night away with my friends, hung out by the pool, and laughed louder than I usually would. I tried my best not to look at Lucas during the whole party. I wanted him to believe that I was as unaffected by him as he was by me. 

I let myself glance over at him a couple hours later and he was dancing with a girl I played soccer with in the varsity team at our school. She was in my grade - a year younger than Lucas. And she was pretty. 

And it's funny because the more I thought about it, the more I realized that Lucas had a "type." Soccer girl and I both had a lot in common, starting with the fact that we obviously both played soccer. But beyond that, we were both tall, a little big-boned, and had long brown hair with a bleached streak in the underside of our hair in the exact same spot. I mean, it was weird. That's not a coincidence.

Lucas started dating soccer girl by the end of spring. That was fine. I just threw myself into my relationship with Shane and I told myself that I wouldn't look back. But I did.

I still do, every now and then.

It's hard because we live in the same neighborhood. Although he left my school to go to some private school in the city after my freshman year, I still had to pass his house everyday to get to my house. He lives on the first street in my neighborhood and I live on the last street. There is literally no way for me to get to my house without passing his.

And every time I pass his house and his car isn't there, I have to wonder where he is. Who he's with. What he's doing. All these scenarios pass through my mind and it fucking blows that the days of me pulling up to my house and seeing his bike in my front yard are over. In the blink of an eye, we weren't even so much as friends anymore.

It's been almost five years, and every now and then, I still think of my first lost love. For a long time, I thought about Lucas constantly. I hoped and prayed that I'd pull up to my house in my rusty old Jeep and see his little coupe pulled up outside. But that rarely happened. He officially had bigger and better things to do. I was pushed aside to live a better life.


But now? Now I'm nineteen. I'm no longer the naive girl I was five years ago. We haven't had a real conversation since and I've barely seen him. When we do run into each other, it's awkward and strained, even now.

And that's okay. Because five years ago, he dropped me for a better life. And three years ago, I dropped his memory and the hope that he'd return to my life so I could focus on what I had. I was happy without his weight.

What cracks me up now, though, is that he's a total deadbeat. This sounds so wrong and terrible, but it's almost like I beat him in the long run.

Five years ago, I was pining after him. But five years from now, I will be a pharmacist. Ten years from now, I will be living the American Dream with a beautiful family in a blue house with a white picket fence.

And he won't have moved an inch.  He'll still be stuck in a dead end job trying to figure out who he is and what he wants to do.

He may have left me in the dust all that time ago, but I fucking won. And better than that, he lost.

Anonymity

I left school. Everyone is pissed at me for doing so. My parents, my sister, my grandparents, I can even see the glimmer of disappointment in my friends' eyes although I know they're happy to have me back.

But it finally got to the point where I was so unhappy there that I started feeling a way that I think everyone feels at one point in their life. I started feeling like maybe this was it. This was the best it was going to get. The marriage I had made with my life that constituted the point "for better or for worse" had given up on the better part and was only able to give me the worst. 

Every other thought that ran through my mind was pessimistic and depressing. I didn't know what to do. It got to the point where dragging myself to work was bad enough but class, too? It was impossible. 

I felt helpless and discouraged. Like there's was nothing I could do to take myself off the path I was leading myself down and I was doomed to fail. Not just fail my classes but fail my family, my expectations, my life. I felt like I was doomed to fail myself. Like I would never amount to anything because I just wasn't worth it. I wasn't worth the trouble or the money or the saving. I wasn't worth it. 

So I made the decision and I left college. For the most part, I enjoyed my time there. I liked classes. I like the people I met. I liked my job. What I didn't like was feeling anonymous. 

Which is kind of ironic because I'm writing this anonymous blog for strangers who will never know that I am the author. My high school teacher or one of my coworkers or the guy working on the line in Chipotle or the girl that sat next to me in Calculus could be reading this and have no idea that it's me. That is anonymity. 

But what I hated about going to a state school as big as mine was the feeling I got walking around by myself, unable to connect with the people around me. The only thing that tied us together was the school we all attended but they all found something else to click with. Maybe it was a class they were both struggling in or the same complaints about a dining hall or how excited they were for the game that weekend.

And I couldn't tell you why, but it's so hard for me to bullshit my way through those conversations. It doesn't make sense to me. That I can't sit down with a stranger and discuss simple things. Not like I can discuss important things either. 

It's moments like this when I actually realize how terribly low I think of myself. I don't think anything of myself. But at the same time, I think so highly of myself. I'm a walking contradiction. It's like I'm the dirt on the bottom of your shoe but I'm also the best shit in town. I'm funny as fuck but I'm also as boring as watching paint dry. I'm nice to your face but I'm a bitch behind your back. I'm a good person that does bad things. At least, that's what I'm trying to tell myself.

If I was honest with myself, which I very rarely am, I would look myself in the mirror and list out all the horrible things I could say about my character. It would be an extremely long conversation and not one thing I would say to myself would be a lie.

I'm trying to change this things about my character that I find fault in without fully admitting to myself that it's a fault. Maybe that's not the way to go. Maybe I should sit down one day and just say to myself, "Isa, get your shit together and stop being such a cunt all the time."

But I think that would just make things worse. But then again, how the fuck would I know, right? I've never tried it. Maybe it will be relaxing, therapeutic, even. But I'm scared. I'm scared that I'll just be my own worst critic and hate myself even more.

Now, I'm trying to think of the positives. The things that are making me happy right here in this moment. Because I have so much to be happy about.

I'm sitting in my Justin's room with my two best friend while we're all just noodling around on our laptops, only stopping to do something funny or exclaim a witty comment. I'm home from school and although there's a new weight of guilt on my shoulders, the weight that remained from wasting my parents' money on an expensive education that I wasn't taking advantage of.

We spend all of our time together and I couldn't be happier with the company I'm keeping. Here, I don't feel anonymous. I feel like I'm thriving. Like I can do anything so long as I keep up with the pretenses and let these two people who mean the world to me honestly believe that I am worthy of their friendship.

Am I worthy of their friendship? I'm not quite sure. But I'm trying to be.

Safe Haven

I need a safe haven. Somewhere I can stop thinking about work and school and all the drama and everything I dislike about my life right now.

Some people use drugs. Some people have a friend they can count on. Some people just take a fucking nap. But I can't do that shit anymore. Drugs aren't really my thing. My friends are slowly growing more and more distant. Fuck a best friend. I don't even know what that is anymore.

There's always something to worry about. Like how I'm most definitely going to fail Organic Chemistry. Or how I may just be fired from my job because I'm going to slap my freak of a manager one of these days. Or how I lost my best friend because all she's concerned about anymore is her boyfriend.

Let me tell you a little something about my "best friend." We have one of those really unhealthy relationships where I don't think either of us can really stand each other for very long but no matter how annoyed we get with each other, we're still going to be close. Which is okay, I guess.

But it's like I'm so annoyed that I don't spend a lot of time with her anymore but then when we finally do get to see each other, I just want to find any excuse to get the fuck out of there. And I don't really get it. I mean, I want to say that I could never even entertain the thought of breathing a bad word about her, but boy, can I. She's conceited and superficial and she thinks her shit don't stink.

It's exhausting having to inflate her ego all the time.

I love her, I always will. She's a loyal friend and you can't really ask for much more. But, God forbid, she's ever wrong. God forbid someone calls her out on something. God forbid some guy doesn't leave her his number on a tip slip. God forbid one person decides not to worship the ground she walks on.

Remember when I lost my virginity? When I said that I went through with it because I felt like that girl from the beach and David both liked me more than they liked my friend and my ego was so fragile that the feeling of being liked made me ready to hop on whatever chance I got?

It's the same feeling I got when I found out that my current crush doesn't like her at all.  And neither do his roommates.

My "best friend's" name is Melissa. She's a petite 5'2" with blonde hair, blue eyes, a big ass, big tits, and a flat stomach.  Boom - every guy's fantasy come to life.

One day, my crush, Dylan, invited me over so I could buy some weed from him. Usually, he just lets me in, I get the weed, give him the money, chat with his roommates for five minutes, and then I leave. But this time, Melissa came with me. And this time, he invited us in to smoke with them. Correlation? Beats me. You take a guess.

So we get in to Dylan's apartment and sit on his couches. His best friend, Tyler was sitting on the long couch when Melissa and I first walked in. I'm good friends with Tyler.  We get along easy because we're both easy to get along with. Also, we share a mutual love of the same two things - beer and football.  Their roommate, Sam, was also there sitting on the recliner.

I sit on the smaller couch and Dylan plops down beside me. Melissa takes a seat on the couch next to Tyler. Sam and Tyler are talking across the room to each other while Dylan and I have our heads bowed towards each other, conversing quietly.

The only one not really talking is Melissa. And another thing about Melissa is that she loves attention. And I mean, if she's not the center of it, she's uncomfortable. She likes to pride herself on being "one of the guys" and down to earth, but she doesn't see herself clearly because she is neither of those things.

I don't like to kid myself - I can be "one of the guys" and I can down to earth if the settings are right. If we're sitting around watching football, I'll be the loudest one there screaming at the TV. If you ask me how I'm going to decorate my apartment, I'll shrug and pick up some unmatched but clean furniture from a thrift store. I don't give a shit about those things.

But Melissa isn't like that. She flits around pretending that she likes football but I can see how disinterested she is by the end of the first quarter. She's a penny pincher so she'll give you slyly condescending comments whenever you splurge on that really cute shirt from that expensive boutique in the mall that you really can't afford. She always has to be the best, the brightest, and the greatest. And it kills me.

So apparently, what was killing her was that we were smoking out of a bong. Melissa only likes bowls. Me? As long as it has weed in it, pass it to me.

So every time it came to Melissa's turn to take a bong hit, she'd wave it off. And then the guys, being the gentleman they are, would ask her why she wasn't smoking. She told them that she only likes bowls and then whipped hers out asking them to pack it. So they did.

And then she started complaining that she wasn't high. I took three bongs rips and I was done. I was stoned out of my mind.

We stopped smoking for a while and we just listened to music and bummed around, talking. And when I say talking, I mean that I was talking to Dylan while Sam and Tyler talked to each other.

Melissa, once again, was uncomfortable because no one in that room was paying any mind to her. So when Sam asked me what I wanted to listen to, she jumped in before I could say anything.

"Well, I love Eminem. Could you play him?" she asked.  Sam gave me a look before slowly turning his head to Melissa.

"Sure," he said slowly. "Which song?"

"Well, my favorite is Lose Yourself. I can rap every word to that song," she professed like not every single one of us in that room could do the same thing.  We were all nineteen or twenty. That song came out when we were like eleven or twelve - the time when you ditch your parent's music and start listening to the "cool" shit on the radio.

And, usually, I'm not one to diss someone's music taste because it's not like mine is all that spectacular. It's actually one of my biggest pet peeves. I don't think you can judge someone solely on the music they listen to. But with Melissa, it just gets on my nerve. Like I shit you not, I told her once that one of my favorite lyrics ever were from a song called Clairvoyant by The Story So Far that goes, "This is your life, there's no way to run from it - the doubt in your brain or the pain in your stomach. I only have but one complaint at the moment - don't paint me black when I used to be golden." And she honestly says, "Yeah, I don't know how some musicians come up with that stuff. Like Taylor Swift. When she said, 'It's a love story, baby, just say "yes."' Like, how do you write something so relatable?"  Like, bitch, seriously? What the fuck. That's judgement material.

Anyway, Sam plays Lose Yourself. And she proceeds to rap every word like she's the shit while me, Tyler, Sam, and Dylan give each other looks when she's not looking. It was actually kind of hilarious.

After that, he plays another song by Eminem without really saying anything. While the opening music starts, Melissa says, "Oh, my God, this sounds like that one song by Eminem. Have you ever heard Mockingbird?"

Sam gives her a "no shit" look before saying, "Yeah, this is it."

It was all I could do not to laugh. She starts tumbling along the lyrics of Mockingbird, trying to save face which was just more funny.

After Mockingbird, Sam was understandably bored with the direction his music had been driven and started playing the kind of stuff that he had been playing before. So we all just went back to talking.

And then Melissa had no attention so she asked everyone if they had tattoos. Dylan, Tyler, and Sam all said no. And then there was an awkward silence where I think she expected them to reciprocate asking if she had any tattoos, which they obviously had no intention of doing. So she took it upon herself to say, "Well, I have one."

And then Tyler said a dismissive, "Cool," which also made me want to laugh but I held it together somehow.

Sam, however, took pity on the poor girl and asked, "What is it?"

Back in February, Melissa and I got the same tattoo. It's a small word in script with a bird flying off the end. So white girl. I'm not exactly proud of that tattoo, but hey, it's alright. The only difference is that Melissa got hers on her bikini line and I got mine under my left breast.

Given the opportunity she was seeking, Melissa said, "Here, I'll show you." She then proceeded to stand up off the couch and pull down the side of her jeans just enough to see the top of her "v" and her tattoo. Which, I mean, was kind of slutty. She has had a boyfriend for about six months at thing point. Don't go flashing your cooter to random guys you've only met once.

Anyway, they all saw it and said some variation of "That's cool."

Then Dylan said, "Hey, Isa has the same tattoo!" I'd shown him mine a few weeks back when we were hanging out on a smoke break.

Melissa did a dismissive wave and let the "Yeah..." that came out of her mouth just kind of trail off.

Then Tyler turned to me and asked me all sorts of questions about my tattoo: did it hurt? Was it expensive? Where did I get it? Every time I answered one of his questions, Melissa would give her variation of the answer to that same question. And every time she started talking, Tyler and I shared a look.

And I know that this story makes me sound like a terrible friend, but I just can't take her shit anymore. It's so nice to have someone who was born on this high horse be taken down a peg. And a few weeks later, although I didn't know this at the time, we wouldn't even be friends anymore. So what's the point in faking it?

Eventually, Melissa and I left Dylan's. She went back to her apartment and I went back to my dorm.

The next weekend, I was at work with Dylan when he invited me to come over on Sunday to watch football and kick back a few beers. We talked about it for a few minutes and hammered out some details. Finally, as the conversation was ending, he says, "Isa, can you just promise me one thing?"

I scrunched my eyebrows and gave him a confused look because I had no idea where he was going with that. Nevertheless, I said, "Sure."

He looked almost apologetic when he said, "Please just... don't bring Melissa."

But there was no need to look apologetic because my cheeks hurt from grinning so much when I said, "Promise."