How I Met You

This is the story of how and when I met you. A bit of backstory first and foremost, I wasn’t supposed to have met you. The one thing you weren't supposed to do was sweep me off my feet and all that jazz but what did you do? Just that.

The thing is, when I met you, I was already taken (some might say betrothed) to the guy that had taken my virginity, had loved me very protectively for almost a year and a half, and who had crippling anxiety and depression. Let’s call him Karl. No one else was going to care for him as much as I did so it was my duty, right? Despite his telling me that I couldn’t spend time with other guys while most of our relationship was spent being long distance. I had just finished high school when I met him and almost assumed it would be no more than a summer fling. But I liked him, things didn’t go wrong until I was away from him and he became possessive and manipulative. It was so slow that I didn’t even notice until I was in too deep anyways. Almost a year with a manipulative boyfriend is difficult.

There were several times where I thought, “I just need to break up with him as quickly as possible” but it wasn’t that simple. I had to think about his mental health above all else. A few things you needed to understand about Karl. He had started cutting again while dating me and I blamed myself for not being as faithful as he wanted me to be. No, I never cheated emotionally or physically but I broke one of Karls many “rules”.

It was late at night, I was tired, but most of all I was scared. A guy who played in a band I performed with was 10 years older than me, drunk, high, and my only way back to school the next morning in my mind. Everyone else upstairs was also drunk and/or high. I was only 18, I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t going to risk dying in a drunk driving accident and in backwoods Michigan, there are no Uber/Lyft drivers. I decided to just force myself to stay awake while this blubbering 28 year old fawned over me trying to get me to kiss him or whatever else he had planned. It was easier to just say no than to go ask to go home. He shook me awake the next morning, drove me back to my dorm, and sent me a long apology text over facebook. As I said, nothing happened that night. I would swear that to a judge, a jury, and take a polygraph test but my Karl just knew I had done something to interfere with our relationship. Hence the cutting.

I hadn’t really gone to therapy other than to talk about relationship problems and struggles with my sexuality but I started going to a LOT of therapy to basically be able to vent about how much I loved this destructive person. The thing is, I didn’t even know he was destructive until I told my therapist I was the reason he started cutting again. She chuckled slightly and said, “I wish you had that much power.” I was taken aback. If I wasn’t the reason he was unhappy, what was it? Sure he had self harmed all through high school but he had to have had some kind of trigger and if not me, then who? Or what? She explained that in most cases, self harm was a pattern and almost an addiction, releasing “happy” chemicals and all that. It still shocked me that he started again while I was dating him but I then realized, this wasn’t on me.

After that, it was another three month summer of being home and being with him. One of my previous friends rose from the ashes. He was also a previous boyfriend who had ghosted me (See Modern Love Story) but he was a friend nonetheless. Let’s call him Vincent.

Vincent was the first person I truly fell in love with and I had thought Karl was the second. I had never felt quite the same after Vincent. When he came back and apologized, he sent me an email (I had blocked him a couple years before out of anger and had forgotten to ever unblock) detailing what happened while he and I were together. Well worded, thought out, and truly remorseful. I decided to do what I do best. Forgive him but not forget what he did.

Karl would not have this. He told me I wasn’t able to talk to him, that I should just delete that message and never talk to Vincent ever again. My heart hurt hearing him speak like this. The only loud, screaming fight I’ve ever had was about trying to keep Vincent in my life since I had previously thought I’d lost him forever. I asked my parents, the friends that had been there through all of my emotional ups and downs, they all told me that I should forgive him and be friends with him if that's what I wanted. It is what I wanted. He had been a very close friend before he was a boyfriend.

Karl was sure the only reason I wanted him in my life was because I was still in love with him. I tried to explain that there are different kinds of love and that the only feelings I felt for him were of friendship. Karl wouldn’t have any of it. After a few months of staying Vincent’s friend, I was back at school and Karl spoke out again.

“I can’t believe you’re talking to someone else behind my back, this is why I feel like I can’t trust you.”

“I’m not talking behind your back, I told you he and I are still friends and text sometimes.”

“What do you even talk about if you’re such good friends?”

“It doesn’t matter. What matters is that you trust me to make decisions that won’t negatively affect our relationship. Can’t you work on that?”

“If you keep breaking the rules that have been set up, I can’t”

“I never agreed to any rules, you set up rules. I never wanted to not be able to sit in one of my friends rooms if that friend happens to be male. That’s not fair.”

“You know I’ve been cheated on before. I trust you, I just don’t trust other people.”

“You should know that even if other people try something, it’s not just their decision, I get a say too.”

“Whatever, I’m going to bed.”

He never signed off like that unless he wanted it to hurt. He wanted to punish and scold me for having friends of the opposite sex even though th school I went to is predominantly male (as are most engineering schools). Later that night, I called Vincent and told him I couldn’t have him in my life anymore, maybe not forever. He was understanding but I didn’t tell him the real reasoning for our parting until much later. (Spoiler alert, we’re now great friends and hang out on the regular. Our friendship is back to where it was when he and I were first getting to know each other.)

It was difficult to do but keeping Karl happy and making sure he wasn’t self harming again was my only goal. My anxiety was always set to high, making sure I wasn’t breaking any rules. Between school, work, and extra curriculars, keeping him posted with where I was all day everyday was exhausting. Forgetting to text goodnight was like causing his anxious dam to break. I’d wake up the next morning to dozens of texts asking if I was mad at him, if I was out with someone else, where I was, and many along the lines of “I can’t believe you right now”.

After all that I’d gone through with Karl, I thought he would start to appreciate all that I did for him to try to keep his anxiety at a minimum. A year and a half with someone makes you tell yourself that if you’ve made it this far, why couldn’t you keep with it. I had it ingrained in my mind that as soon as he and I got married and lived together, that kind of behavior would stop and I could finally have some peace. Then, you had to come and screw up that oh so “perfect” daydream.

Around mid November, I was working the popcorn stand for my school's film board. The group shows films every weekend on the largest projection screen on campus. My roommate, Sarah, was working at the ticket punching station next to me as usual and I was about to start cleanup since the show had recently started. I was fluffing the popcorn when I heard a man's voice behind me say, “Popcorn.” You said it in a way that was demanding as you threw down a dollar.

The first thing I noticed about you other than your height (6’ 4” is hard to miss) were your eyes. Blue with a hint of gray. I flashed back to reality and got on with it. Assuming you were just another person late for the show, I threw you a look that said, “Excuse me? Is that how you address people?” You look down sheepishly and utter “please” almost frightened. I roll my eyes, pick up the dollar, put it into the cash box, and start scooping your popcorn. I say with a slight laugh, “You know that stuff only works for Thor right? ‘Another! KSHH.’”

I mime throwing a coffee mug to the ground as the scene in the movie rolls in my head. You chuckle, and mention you’re trying to watch Iron Man (unbeknownst to you, is my favorite movie) and I mention that I have it. You say cool and walk away with the popcorn. You smile at me and something in my heart… twinges? If I were a biomedical engineer or a med student, I might’ve worried that it was some kind of arrhythmia or fibrillation but being a mechanical engineering major meant I was logically telling myself to snap out of it. As soon as you were out of earshot, I turn to Sarah and say, “Why must ones like that exist when I’m in a relationship.”

The next day, after putting that interaction out of my mind, I went to my shift for that day. Scooping popcorn is actually a lot of fun if you let it be. People came and went and part of me hoped I’d see you again but mostly I was too busy scooping to think about that. But you did come back. You bought popcorn again and you said hello and nothing else. You left and again, that twinge. I hadn’t felt that in nearly two years. I remembered the twinge from the first time I saw Vincent. I shake the thought from my head. No, it’s not the same. I’m dating Karl and can only feel twinges for him. Stop that nonsense, brain or heart or whatever.

I can’t help but ask the president of the Film Board about you. She always seemed to know everyone.

“Hey, do you know that guy who comes to get popcorn but doesn’t go to the movie? Tall guy, glasses?”

“Yeah, that’s John, he’s the president of one of the other orgs on campus, that satire newspaper.”

John… How boring but so intriguing at the same time. NOPE, KARL. Think. Of. Karl. He would be spastic if he knew you were thinking about someone this much. Just shut it down now.

More scooping and then the first show of the night starts. Knowing I’m working the next show, I have an hour and a half to kill. I pack up the popcorn stand and hang the sign that says “Be back soon”. Who walks up but you.

“Hey, are you guys interested in coming over and playing some board games? The group has open spots down the hall.”

I look to Sarah. Meeting my gaze, she says, “No, my shift is over and I have to go study.” Then your eyes fall on me with the same slightly pleading look they gave Sarah. Maybe it was a different look? Whatever, just answer the question.

“Sure, I’ll go with you.”

Your smile, that twinge. I should’ve said no.

You walk with me to the game room and introduce yourself. I introduce myself as well but the chatter around us increases so I don’t mind when you ask again for my name in a few minutes.

“So, Jane, do you know how to play Settlers of Catan?”

Feeling a slight weight on my chest, I replied that I had never played before. Expecting you to leave me to my own devices (AKA other games that I knew how to play with a group of strangers) I was taken aback when you asked me to join your game.

“I can teach you, it’s pretty easy once you get the hang of it.”

I follow you to the room across the hall with a few other ragtag boardgame players and you get down to brass tacks. I don’t think I’ve ever learned a board game that quickly.

Noticing the clock, it’s less than ten minutes until I have to be at the next show. I apologize to everyone and tell them I have to get going. You look especially sad and invite me back for next week. I nod and say goodbye before leaving the room and skipping back to the popcorn cart.

Two days go by, it’s now Monday. A flurry of classes keep my mind preoccupied and the ever present, never-ending texts from Karl do the same. I would have forgotten about you completely if I hadn't have seen you in the dining hall that night. I only quickly glanced before picking an empty table to eat by myself.

You had already sat down with someone else and you seemed to be making good conversation, I wasn’t about to intrude. You noticed me. You invited me to sit at the table with you. For the first time in my life, someone else was approaching me and doing the difficult task of breaking the ice. You were seeking me out it seemed.

Sitting at that table across from you and next to your friend, I talked to you. You just talked back. Your friend had to leave but you stayed. Sharing funny pictures that were saved on our phones, sharing stories of the semester so far, the usual friend behaviour. If you weren’t looking at your phones, you might’ve almost missed your shift at work. I might’ve missed that I had been sitting with you for almost 2 hours. You told me that you had to go so I put my dishes away with you and walked with you to the door that would lead out into the cold and snowy night.

Somehow, I got on the topic of the Lion King and said “Long live the king” and lightly punched your shoulder. You hobbled backwards making the sound of someone sarcastically hurt and said with a blank expression, “That hurt, I take hugs as compensation.” Alarm bells were nowhere to be heard. Before I even realized, I was in your arms lightly hugging you and there you were hugging me back. Then you set your head down on top of my head. Fuck.

The next day at lunch I decided to poll all of my friends. What does it mean if a guy puts his head on yours while hugging you? Well, of course, they all knew. “He likes you!” they all cheered. I wasn’t feeling exactly cheerful though.

Don’t get me wrong, hanging out with you had been amazing and fun but I have an overly anxious boyfriend to think about and I can’t break his heart. He’s working on his anxiety I assume! Despite the fact that I now knew you liked me, I had to push it from my mind. I was supposed to go to my first meeting with the satire newspaper. Yes, I knew you were the president and that you would almost definitely be there but that was not the point. I had been a writer for a while and wanted more of my stuff to be read. I still had a few hours to figure out what I was going to tell you because I knew if I was friends with you, my stronger emotions would get the better of me. Tonight had to be the night I told you I couldn’t hang out with you anymore even if it was by chance.

Sarah asked me what I was doing when she walked into our room. I was putting on some lipstick, was that a crime? She asked where I was going and I told her. She gave me a little side eye and asked what my real intentions were with a smirk. I told her being friends was too difficult so it would be the night of breaking the bad news. She then asked what I was going to tell Karl. I had already texted him telling him I was going to a meeting and wouldn’t be able to text for an hour. He was hesitant to let me have that long of time without texting but when I told him it was just for an extracurricular, he seemed less invasive. I told Sarah that I would be back later and left the dorm. It was a cold and snowy walk to the Arts building.

I found my seat in the back of the room and everyone gave me a warm welcome, John included. He was, of course, in front and kept the meeting running smoothly and hilariously as the group came up with article topics for the weeks to come. I came up with a lot of ideas that made the group laugh and I felt proud about how easily I had broken out of my shell around them all. Before I had even noticed, the meeting was over and I was going back to my room.

“Hey, Jane, would you wanna come to the library for a while? A few of us are going to go there and hang out.”

“Um…” My thoughts immediately went to my phone and its obnoxious vibration. Of course, exactly 1 hour after I had told him the meeting started, Karl had sent me three messages asking about my whereabouts.

“Sure, that sounds like fun.”

Your smile sent another sharp twinge. A twinge that made it easy to lock my phone and slip it into my pocket without another thought.

While walking across the campus to the library, the group split up into pairs and of course, you chose to walk beside me. You made conversation about something, I don’t remember what. I felt additional vibrations from my pocket, each one causing a bout of anxiety making it hard to keep walking. Your voice, your eyes, your worried look as you asked, “Are you ok?” snapped my back. I replied coolly, “Yeah, I’m fine, just a little chilly is all.”

I expected us all to go into the library but a couple of the group members retracted their decision and headed in the opposite direction to get their cars to head back to their collective homes. They kept dropping off until, it was just you. As soon as you and I made it to the library, you looked at me and asked to go to the mechanical engineering building instead. I was hesitant because of the still present buzzing in my pocket but I agreed. Walking further across campus, I saw the ME building approaching. You opened the door and walked in holding it open for me. The warm air was quite welcoming. You lead to the elevator and ask which floor. I shrug. I can feel your eyes on me as I stand next to you in the elevator.

I exit the elevator on the fifth floor and you walk out after me. The floor is completely empty. It is a little past 9PM so I’m actually glad students and professors aren’t here this late. Seeing as there aren’t any chairs, I slide down to the floor and you soon follow. You ask about my phone, still buzzing every few minutes and I tell you it’s my boyfriend. You aren’t fazed, I think I had already told you about him in some of our other conversations. You ask me about him. I open my mouth and a floodgate of emotions is broken. I tell you about how it’s been really difficult lately because of his anxiety and how I shouldn’t even be here with you because it would make him so mad. You just look at me for a moment. Then you ask the question that my friends, family, and therapist didn’t ever think of asking. Just six words. “How does he make you feel?” I didn’t even know how to respond at first. I looked from you, to the floor, and back again.

“He makes me feel anxious. I’m always worried I’m breaking a rule. I have to constantly check my phone and text back even when I’m trying to focus or study. My grades have been slipping a bit because of it and that scares me. I try to set up boundaries and tell him that I can’t always text him but then he tells me he can’t trust me. He wasn’t like this before, it only started after our relationship went long distance.”

You didn’t interrupt or tell me to calm down, you simply told me that you had a similar past relationship and that the only thing that made it better was to end things with her. I had thought I was alone and that my only lifeline in my relationship was Karl but here you were, another connection. Someone who had gone through what I was so desperately trying to understand and make good again. After talking more about details of both our relationships, you spoke in some funny accents and told me more about what you enjoyed. I listened and tried to absorb every moment and soon enough it was getting late so I told you I had to leave. You asked if I could walk with you to the library before heading back to my dorm and of course I said yes. The connection was built now and there wasn’t a way to turn that off. The twinges in my chest only got stronger and more often.

After getting to the library, you convinced me to sit for just a few more minutes. In that time, I asked for your phone number so I could reach you if I needed to talk to someone who understood again. Then, I was back outside to head to my dorm.

After making it back safely and changing into some comfortable clothes, my head hit the pillow and I expected to go right to sleep but I forgot I needed to tell Karl where I had been and the pure anxiety of that made it so much easier to text you. I told Karl that I was out with friends at the library, yes friends plural. It was the very first time I’d ever lied to him. How did you do that to me?

I decided to text you too, telling you that I got home safe. You asked me where I lived after a short conversation. After telling you, I looked at the clock to see it was nearing 1am. I told you that you should come over sometime and after only minutes, you told me you were outside. Knowing you as a sarcastic and sometimes very deadpan guy, I asked if you were serious. After receiving a picture of the door to my building, I realized you were in fact telling the truth. I pulled on some sweats over my normally skimpy PJs and came down the stairs to let you in.

I showed you where the common area was and found a couch to sit on and relax. My anxiety went up, just picturing Karl knowing what I was up to but I pushed it from my mind. I was too tired to have that negative mental stress. You sat close to me and talked for a while before both of us slowly began fading into sleep. When I drowsily woke up, you were laying across my legs with your head in my lap. My arm was around you even though I didn’t remember putting it there. I shook you lightly to wake you up and told you to go home. I needed more real sleep before my classes tomorrow and I wasn’t going to get it on this couch sitting upright. You said goodnight and left after another hug. The twinge was always strongest when you left and at 4am, I let the twinge linger without any thoughts of Karl.

The next morning, I awoke to my alarm and several texts from Karl as usual. I decided I would tell him today about you. It would do no good to keep these emotions and potential future problems inside. I head to class, and then check my phone and see you’ve texted me asking me to lunch. I’d love to go to lunch but I respond sadly that I have a class. Unsuspectingly, you ask which building my class is in. I tell you and then you ask how large the lecture hall is. You ask to come to class with me and I say yes.

After the class ends, I head to lunch and you head to your own class. I ask to join you but you tell me I shouldn’t come when a quiz is in the plan. I of course agree. After lunch, I head back to my room and decide it’s time to tell Karl about you. If not now, when? I tell him that I’ve met a new friend and that the relationship he and I have is a very close one now. Karl of course was furious and I just let him be. I didn’t want to feel guilty anymore. The one time I fully broke a rule, I felt no anxiety and no guilt. He told me he would talk to me later when he had time to cool down.

I’m usually very good at separating my logical thoughts from my emotional ones but after that fight, I was all over the place. I asked you to come over when you were free and after a couple hours, you showed up. I showed you the fight Karl and I had and told you I didn’t know how I was supposed to separate my logical and emotional sides. You helped me and made things so much easier. When Karl wrote back telling me he was ready to talk again, you were there to help me keep my emotions at bay and look at things logically.

“We’ve been dating for a long time now and the one ask I’ve had of you is to work on your anxiety about me around other people. I haven’t seen any change in that and if you don’t have any way to make a change, I can’t be with you anymore.”

“I guess I don’t have any ideas right now. Let’s talk when you come home.”

“No, I’m done waiting for change. If you don’t have something now, that’s it.”

“Ok, I guess I’ll just see you when you get home.”

I was going to be home the next day from Thanksgiving break. I don’t think he fully understood the severity of the situation. In my mind, that was it, Karl and I were done. You hugged me and told me everything was going to work out. I didn’t cry, just felt sad. Sitting on the same couch from last night, you put on some Youtube. I guess you knew that I loved watching stupid videos becuase that’s what you put on. Before long, your arm was around me and my head was leaning on your shoulder. I wanted so badly to kiss you but when I tried, you pulled away and told me that I should wait until I see Karl again. I told you it didn’t matter, he and I were done. You just kept watching the video. I tried again and again you pulled away, more playful this time. Then slowly, I tried one last time to kiss you and your lips met mine. The twinge changed to full on powerful rhythmic beats in my chest. You were the spark I needed to get my heart started again. Goosebumps flooded my body as we pulled our lips away from each other. We looked at each other. In that moment, you and I turned into we. As our lips met again, I knew we would be we for a very long time.

That is I met you and I wouldn’t have had it any other way.