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A "Relationship with a Countdown

A Seven Year Ticking Clock

By Ally APublished 4 years ago 10 min read
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Most people change or evolve after time. Sometimes, others evolve more than some but no matter what there is change. I find this to be extremely true when you meet someone ate the young age of 18/19. I'm going on 26 years soon if I was the same naive, outrageous, irresponsible hoe that I was at 18, I would be so, so, so...worried. Well when I was called out for having "changed" aka matured by a potential husband that was the red flag that sank the ship.

So I'm 18 or 19 when I meet him, a freshman in college up in Boston. I'm doing what every college kid does. Going to class, studying, meeting boys a lot of cute boys, making new friends and going to parties any day of the week. And then I meet this one guy, he's tall, athletic, and smart, surfer, and I met him while hanging out with all of my friends so he's assumed to be wicked chill. Young naive me thought I had just locked eyes with my future husband. I really thought, but technically we never even date.

That first year in Boston and meeting him was a rollercoaster. So right I had to act like I was his girlfriend but he got to act like a bachelor. There were countless disputes over all things from me hanging out with my friends to who he was allowed to hook up with to the fact we weren't actually dating. He constantly reminded me we weren't dating whenever he messed up. I'd be at a party and just talking to a guy that was my friend would turn into a massive fight. I remember one party he said he wasn't going to, he ended up showing up at. Nothing changed for me, now he was there cool another person I know. Well he claims to see me flirting with other dudes (totally inaccurate). When I was done " flirting" with the dudes I went to say "hi" and even maybe get a kiss, I was denied, denied really, really hard!

When I first ended this situationship when moving to Los Angeles. I should have blocked and deleted him from my life, physically and mentally. Stupidly I didn't, which was so beyond stupid on my part. After freshman year in Boston, even though the year was great academically and socially, I didn't see myself getting much out of staying in Boston. It was hard leaving my friends and not knowing the next time I would see them and even him. He fed me lie after lie and young and naive me believed every ounce of it. Although once we never hung out all that summer and never called the month or so I moved out the LA I was over it. I cannot iterate how stupid it was to not seal that door close because it only lead the ship to sink.

The years went by, life went on like it does. By his standards we kept in touch, but like all that it was not blocking him on all social media… not really keeping in touch. So he’d randomly hit me up on snapchat, like HELLO red flag! Any guy that is only using snapchat to communicate is red flag city! Do not ignore that red banner. Finally he did decide that texting me was better, probably because I could look back and remember what we were talking about. This happened once when I was like 23 years old then just wasn’t into it, I had other life obstacles to cross. Then about eight months ago we started chatting again. At this time I was living in New Jersey and he was living in Florida and it was the holidays. So I couldn’t just jump down to Florida I had a whole scroll of things I had to do, however, I said I’d escaped down after the holidays.

During this time of texting ( and only texting, only shitty texting) looking back at it there wasn’t much conversation. I was so busy I just didn’t notice. The conversations were a lot of “wyd” “what’s din” “u r yum,” don’t even get me started on how lame the attempts to sext were. I had better sexting conversations when I was 15. This lack of intellectual conversation continued until we had plans to hangout. Originally we were going to hang out in February but the idiot never took off of work, which was somehow my fault… okay. This is coming from a grown 28 year old man, my fault for his intentional mistake of not taking off. Instead of getting upset or anything I just reschedule, which was easy because I never bought tickets or made any arrangements. The new plan was to hang out his birthday weekend, so mid March, about a month of waiting for everything to fall into place. That was what we thought.

It’s mid- March and the unpredictable happens, Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic hits the US. It really hits New Jersey and New York hard. Within the first few weeks all of Manhattan is shut down. Time square is literally empty not even a street rat in sight. Basically meaning I couldn’t leave the tri-state area, travel was not stopped but only permitted if it was 100% necessary. What did that mean for his birthday weekend, our plans to hangout? We had to cancel and put them on ice. That night when we cancelled our plans we finally for the first time in the six years we’ve known each other we Facetimed.

Odd right? Well it’s true. The dude never thought it was weird that we never talked on the phone or video chat, like its 2020 everyone Facetimes. There was always some excuse, the most used excuse was work was so long and hard today I am so tired, but in way less words. The exact excuse was more like this “ Work long, I sleepy.” No I don’t want to believe it either, and yes of course it got to the point where I was begging for calls and factimes that I literally slapped myself back into shape. Why was I begging for this loser’s attention? From there it was hostile. I was so fed up. He was feeding me lies continuously still but this time I wasn’t biting.

In attempt to reel me back in the numbnut told me that we would hang out over the summer because he was going to be working in Connecticut and we’ll have to hangout, too close not too. Then somehow the conversations get worse, trust lacks even more and probably on both sides now, and arguments are rolling in at all angles. On top of the petty arguments he’s telling me I’m not acting right, and by right he means the way he wants me to act. The way he wants me to be is to drop everything and be totally consumed in all things him… the problem with that is he’s given me nothing to even work with to try and pretend to be.

Finally its summertime and I have zero expectations of ever hanging out, this time I’m just entertaining the idea because the country is social distancing still. So he embarks on his road trip from South Florida to Connecticut, so I assumed okay you’d drive through a few states ad day. Anyone who has driven along the east coast knows it doesn’t take more than three days to make the whole drive, unless you stop and explore. I was given zero information about this road trip but at the end of day one on it he was in Tampa Bay… Tampa F&^*ing Bay! Then was in Jacksonville then Kentucky. Kentucky is by no means on the way to Connecticut from Florida. All the meanwhile he’s telling me that I’m not into, I don’t care blah, blah, blah, which may very well possibly true. He was attacking me this way because apparently he was suppoed to be around New Jersey the only weekend the entire summer I couldn’t hang out. Turns out he was in Ohio that weekend, yup again not really on the way to Connecticut from Florida. A few days later I think maybe a week later he was passing right by, he didn’t even say anything, and for days I heard nothing from him. So maybe after a few drinks I called him out. Got a lame excuse.

After so long you become numb you don’t get mad or upset you don’t get excited, you don’t feel anything to do with the situation. Once he was assumed to be in Connecticut and I guess with some free time he had, he scrolled across my tweet about having a massive crush on a guy and my attempt to flirt with him. He immediately texted me and went off. Eventually he picked up that I straight up didn’t care and owned everything. That actually got him even madder. No matter what I said he wasn’t listening, and I plain just didn’t care. Even though I hadn’t talked or had any contact with this super sexy guy in like 10 months it didn’t matter. Again we weren’t even dating so like, huh? He tried every trick in the book to try to make me feel bad, but this wasn’t the first time we’ve been down this road. The only difference was this time I had zero emotions and was acting like he did/would. He wasn’t a fan of that, which guy ever is? I thought after that night was the last night we would ever talk. I was wrong.

The following morning I woke up to a text “how u sleep” as if nothing had gone down the night before. The method this time now was to replicate his behavior mock his every move. The shenanigans worked in a way. I might have started a small ripple but oh well. I was so over the whole situation long ago, he on the other hand still thought he had a trying chance.

About a week maybe two go by and I am about to go spend the week with my family down the shore. I was about to be super busy or on the beach just doing things. It’s about four days in and we did a girls night or it was Italian dinner night with the whole gang (yes we were still practicing social distancing guideline). So I was talking to people helping clean up, or serve plates, just being a helpful young body. This meant I wasn’t checking my phone nor was it even on me, to be totally honest I think my phone was dead or close to dead. Anyway, I missed his text right when he sent it. I saw and read the message while walking home late that night but since it was late never answered. He slid into my DMs and called me out for, and like a savage I liked it and that was it.

How this story ends right now is… That text is still unanswered, the best part of it all, he deleted his old Instagram and made a new private one. I don’t think I was intended to find it or what but the account is connected to his phone number, which I am about to delete.

The relationship was a toxic mess and ladies (and guys) if your gut is telling you something isn’t right listen. Your gut is always right, you might not know it but time will prove it was right. I also had friends that were giving me advice and telling me what they were seeing/feeling about the situation, turns out they were right and I should have listened. Ill admit I was blinded I couldn’t see what they were seeing for so long, but now I do. So my advice is to considerate, that’s all. If they’re really your friends they wont take it personally.

Lastly if you see any comparisons with your current relationship, get out of it. No one should be made to feel like shite, manipulated, controlled or told they’ve changed when really you’ve grown into a beautiful and strong person with values.

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About the Creator

Ally A

Hi, Im Ally! Thank you for wondering over to my profile. I'm here just expressing my thoughts, much like a diary, but also to use this as a creative outlet. There a wide range from fiction to non-fiction writing I hope you enjoy

xoxo

A

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