Endless Madness

Jeremy Andrews was a legend in his own time.

Try to imagine a young man with a toasted caramel tan, rippling muscles, dark brown hair, and brown eyes five shades lighter. Try to imagine a young man with an excellent brain who got high grades in school. Now imagine a young man who likes being a lady’s man. That was Jeremy Andrews.

One time, I was at a writing workshop that was being hosted at his school. It only took students who had achieved exceptionally high grades in the creative writing portion of the language arts government exams. He had blown off his class, left all his books at his desk, and was waiting for me outside the library when I was finished. A studious young man who ditches his studies for a girl… Well, that’s cute.

He was a major problem.

The first problem was that he was like a weather vein. When it came to girls, he knew which way the wind was blowing and he had no problem changing directions to go along with the weather. This always made me think I couldn't possibly be special to him if he didn't mind being passed from girl to girl. From his perspective, he was winning no matter what girl he was with.

The second problem was that I lived very far away from him. I only saw him occasionally when our social lives intersected on the middle ground between us. This was hard for me because I never got much time to get used to what he looked like when he was so imposing. We spent hours talking on the phone, but I could never get used to his yellowish eyes which were so different from the other boys who took me on dates.

The third problem was that he played a completely different kind of game than the other boys. For starters, the other boys didn’t say what they wanted. They would just stand around being gentlemanly waiting for the moment when they were positive they wouldn’t be rejected if they asked for a date or if I’d be their girlfriend. Jeremy was bored with all that and didn’t mind breaking the conventions over and over again. I couldn’t believe the outlandish crap that came out of his mouth. He took my breath away.

The fourth problem was that I was too overwhelmed by how attractive he was. He wasn’t necessarily pretty in a conventional way, but something about him just suggested that he wasn’t at his best unless he was ripping a girl’s heart out by the strap of her bra. I was a few ticks too young to jump headfirst into something like that. As a matter of fact, that sort of thing scared the spit out of me. I was the type of teenager who had nightmares about getting pregnant on repeat. The best way to combat that sort of thing was to wake up and remind myself that I’d never had sex, so I was not pregnant. It was four in the morning and everything was fine… until I was looking into Jeremy Andrew’s yellowish eyes and he had that adorable half-smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. Then I was experiencing a hot flash and looking for the exit.

I also couldn’t believe how quickly he would take a hike if it didn’t seem like he was getting anywhere with me. That had to be the fifth problem. I had guys who would linger on the sidelines for years. Jeremy had the phone numbers of a quarter of the girls in my grade at my school and would call another one if the first one he called was blowing cold.

He must have asked me to be his girlfriend a handful of times before I realized I was completely unable to give him what he wanted, so I tried to set him up with my friend, Careen. I dolled her up to the nines and took her to a dance he would be at and wholeheartedly plopped her in his arms. He turned out to be the kind of guy who wrapped his arms around her and whispered, ’Thank you,’ at me over her shoulder.

That convinced me that whatever he felt for me couldn’t be that important and Careen fell for him like a window washer falling off a scaffolding.

As shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone, he found a girl he liked who was closer to home than Careen and he started dating her instead.

That was when my relationship with Jeremy entered an interesting phase. When he wasn’t chasing me down, when I wasn’t a conquest, when he had another girl satisfying his romantic needs… I was in love with him.

Now, I can guess what you’re thinking. That he suddenly had the appeal of forbidden fruit. Well, that wasn’t it.

I just didn’t enjoy being chased down in that hyper-predatory way.

If a guy told me I was beautiful, I remember squashing the urge to say, “You know, someone told me I was beautiful every single day the year I was in grade nine and you don’t have to come up with a better compliment. I own a dictionary. You have to show me that what’s going on inside you isn’t a big fat waste of my time.”

Whether that was Jeremy’s plan or not. That was what he did. When he was bored or lonely, he’d call me and we’d have a conversation that wasn’t about romance. We’d talk about science, school, games, and we’d read books at the same time so we could talk about them.

That was what I wanted, a connection of souls, not to satisfy the romantic ideals of a teenage boy who had a scalp belt around his waist of his previous conquests that looked like a hula skirt.

I had to be secretly in love with him.

Once, during this time, I met him and his girlfriend at a dance. He and I started talking, but over the loud music, I couldn’t hear him very well, so I turned to his girlfriend and asked her if it was all right with her if I took him out into the hall to hear him better. She laughed at my consideration. They’d spent hours kissing before the dance and she was delighted for someone to occupy him so she could talk to her friends.

I took him out into the hall and we talked for hours next to a huge mirror that showed me how I felt listening to him talk. He may not have seen the love on my face, but I did. Since he had no interest in pursuing me romantically, he did something he was incapable of doing when he was single. He opened his mind and his mouth up to who he was when he wasn’t being Casanova. It was glorious. By the end of the night, the Ice Princess, who usually only saw his faults, was thawed and warm.

If he had taken me by the hand and led me out of the building and for a little walk to achieve a little privacy, I would have let him kiss me for hours without a single thought of his girlfriend.

However, I made no move on him. I’m a patient person and I wanted to see how things would unfold.

That Christmas, he and his girlfriend had broken up. He phoned me up. Not to go over the hashed-out mess of his breakup. He always broke up cleanly, but just to chat with me.

I remembered my wish in front of the mirror and that special night and we chatted until we agreed to date. For a week, I was very happy. We talked on the phone every day and it was magical. He called me Petite Diablo as his nickname for me (little devil). He picked a song to be our song.

My friend, Careen, heard the news calmly and asked me if she could date him when I was finished.

Regardless of my feelings for him, I couldn't keep dating him. It didn't have anything to do with Careen or any other girl. The problem rested completely with me. I didn't know how to explain that I was uncomfortable. He was a gentleman when he dealt with me, but something was wrong I couldn't explain. He wanted to hold me or touch me every second. It made my skin burn, smothered my breathing, and made me feel claustrophobic enough to panic.

I didn't know why and any attempt to explain my feeling was interpreted by him as rejection. I had always known that I was what they called frigid when it came to dating. That wasn't just with him. I had blown things with other dates because, put simply, allowing someone into my personal space was a heart-thumping nightmare. Most of the guys I dealt with were better at handling it than Jeremy and it was a secret about me I had tried very hard to protect. I remembered Jeremy’s arm coming around my waist from behind and the muscles in his perfectly tanned forearm rippling as his fingers reached for mine and my panic. He didn't do a thing wrong and I was having a panic attack.

Why was I afraid? Of all the guys I had ever known, he was the most like me. I didn't feel sad about disentangling him from Lacy anymore because she couldn't have handled him. I was having trouble handling him myself and I was twice the devourer of hearts she was. But I felt that whenever he was nearby and he didn't have a girlfriend standing as a shield between us, I was in trouble.

So, I broke up with him and I still remember his voice as he managed to hiss the word, “Why?” He was so beautifully angry, and I was sorry I didn't know how to explain what was happening inside me when he was around.

The man I was with was supposed to make me feel safe and, for what felt like no reason, I didn't feel that way.

Months later, I showed up late for the biggest dance of the year and Careen came running up to me squealing like a pink pig, “Guess who's here? Guess who's here? Guess who's here?”

“Brad Pitt.”

“No. Jeremy.”

And my heart fell.

Her cheeks were flushed and I could feel her heart pounding with excitement without having to take her pulse.

“Have you seen him much?”

“We went to some of the classes together.”

I growled. I hadn't missed the classes before the dance because I was a bum. I missed the classes because I was at my brother's wedding reception.

“What about Ryder?”

Careen had a boyfriend-type guy in her life. His name was Ryder and he was one of the nicest guys I had ever met. He was like the single daisy in the vase, except maybe with a visible halo over his head.

From the look on her face, she had forgotten all about Ryder and now she was only thinking about Jeremy and how ridiculously attractive he was to her. He was all muscle like a leopard and though Ryder was nice, he wasn't leopard-skin nice.

I tried to talk her down. “Careen, Jeremy doesn't really care about you. Remember what happened last time when he left you in the lurch and landed himself a girlfriend closer to home just so he would have easy access? I doubt he liked her more than you, but he changes gears easily and it might be better if you didn't blow off Ryder for a guy who you can only maybe have a relationship with. Right? See what I'm saying?”

“Nope,” she laughed. She did not see what I was saying.

Disappointed that I couldn't convince her, I perked up and looked around for Jeremy. He was standing with a bunch of kids two groups over and I took him by the hand and led him out of the room into a makeshift courtyard outside the gym.

I remember leaning my back against the brick wall, with Jeremy standing over me and a crystal clear gibbous moon shining over his right shoulder. I told him how sorry I was that I had broken up with him, which was true. That I was over a very painful unrequited love that had been plaguing me, which was a lie. And that I was very happy to see him, which was neither true nor a lie. I did like seeing him. I didn't like seeing him mess around with Careen.

He looked at me and said, “If you're asking for a second chance, you can have it.”

I could have bonked him over the head. Convincing him to hang out with me and leave Careen alone was supposed to take hours. He was playing harder and faster than I was and I hadn't been ready for it. If I had been smart, I would have agreed to be his girlfriend immediately. That would have kept him away from Careen and kept her safe from his easy-come, easy-go attitude toward girls. I did not want to see her get hurt by him again. But I wasn't ready and he was quickly bored with me and went back to Careen. As I said, I had limits to how much of a distraction I could be when I couldn't stand to be touched.

So by the end of the dance, I was in the hallway with Careen, Ryder, and Jeremy. Jeremy asked Careen to dance with him for the last song and they disappeared onto the incredibly dense dance floor. I got up and danced with Ryder. I was thinking of leaving Careen to whatever she would do, but dancing with Ryder changed my mind. He was so anxious about her. He was bouncing on his toes to look over my head to find her and Jeremy dancing. He was one of the nicest guys I had ever met and I couldn't let Careen do this for whatever fifteen minutes Jeremy had to offer before he found someone new.

The song ended and Ryder went one way to look for them and I went the other. I found them. I had lost sight of Ryder. There were too many people. The dance was over, the lights were on and we were all being shepherded out of the gym. In the atrium, I was walking in front of Jeremy and Careen was walking beside him. He was intentionally bumping knuckles with her, as a pre-play before holding her hand. I was looking at the glass over the door and I couldn't stand it. I had to do something, so I grabbed both his hands and pulled them around my waist. He cuddled right up and Careen wanted to murder me. And I? Well, I was having trouble breathing. What I was doing was a direct violation of my feelings. My chest felt like it was steam cooking my brain. After all, no one could feel cold in the middle of that hot press of teenagers.

We got outside and I let go.

Careen glared at me and wished for my death and I agreed with her. Death would be awesome. Standing in a circle we all chatted about who we were getting rides home with and when those rides would be leaving. Jeremy's ride wasn't leaving for hours, and neither was Careen's. Mine was leaving immediately, and as a matter of fact, they were calling me.

For a moment, I couldn't figure out what to do. I hated losing so badly that when I went to hug Jeremy (as was the custom for teenagers leaving dances) I got on my tip-toes and kissed him. It was probably the least thrilling kiss he'd ever experienced as it was both closed-mouth and incredibly brief, but doing it nearly gave me a heart attack as I parted from him and ran to the car of screaming teenagers waiting for me.

I think my heart rate only settled because of the breeze coming through the windows at a hundred kilometers an hour.

The next morning I was walking by Careen's house and popped in to see how it went with Jeremy after I left.

She was livid. “I can't believe you have the nerve to come by here,” she yelled from the top of the stairs while I stood by the door.

“Yes, I know. I'm a cow. What happened after I left?”

Long story short, she talked to Jeremy until their rides left and his conversation sounded very much on the fence as to whether or not he should go for Careen or me. Then she had come home and spent the rest of the night on the phone with Ryder breaking up with him. They finished at five in the morning. She was about to go back to Best of Especially for Youth and spend Saturday with Jeremy.

My bet? He was going to choose Careen instead of me because he knew I wasn't really available anyway.

I couldn't go to watch the impending train wreck. I had to work, so I put one foot in front of the other and went to the library to work my shift.