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Once upon a time...
You know, I used to love telling this story. It's a good one,
without doubt, full of joy and small, goofy things. And it was a
powerful one, too, 'cause it was about how I fell in love for the
first time and meant it.
I say was, though,
because it's now ancient history. Because all that joy turned bitter
and lightness became heavy. It was bad enough to make me start
writing poetry.
But some stories need to
be told again every now and then.
So...
Once upon a time, when I
was a freshman in college, I met a girl. Actually, I'd met her the
spring before at a weekend for prospective freshmen at that same
college. I remember saying to myself that if I saw her again, I was
going to ask her out.
I never did, really. I
just wound up hanging out with her a lot, doing homework together
and staying up talking. We'd still be up long after everyone had
packed up and gone back to their dorm rooms.
One night, after a bad
party, we went back to her room. We read stories to each other, and,
somewhere around dawn, we kissed. We became a couple.
It's so funny for me to
look back on all that now. We were such kids, even though we thought
we were adults ready to take on the world.
We spent so much time
together that we used to joke we were married, even calling each
other husband and wife. Our friends thought we were weird, but we
didn't care. Love like that means that you don't give a damn what
anyone else thinks; it's just the two of you versus the Universe.
She was my first lover as
well as my first love. She was patient with me, eased me through my
hang-ups about sex. I started to enjoy my body for the first time;
we slept naked, and I can still remember running my hand up and down
her beautiful back, her skin like silk.
There's something about
falling in love that makes you feel very young and playful. We used
to read to each other, always children's stories. Every night was
another chapter of Winnie the Pooh or some Dr. Suess. Sometimes we
made up our own stories that were about a past history we didn't
have.
We thought we were meant
for each other.
It went on much longer
than it should have. The cracks started to show after a year, when
she became more pushy and I became more cowed. There was no more
give and take, no more joking about us being married. After two
years, I'd transferred to another college; we barely lasted another
semester.
She called me one night
and we broke up over the phone.
I see her at the weddings
of mutual friends and I just heard that she broke up with the guy
she started dating a few weeks after we split up. I joked with a
friend that she'd call me once, in the middle of the night, as she's
done a few times before. Once she called me from Scotland
("Everything here reminded me of you," she said), another time from
her parents' house.
I don't have much to say
to her anymore.
There's more to the
story, of course. I really could go on for pages if I were allowed,
telling about anniversary presents and the time we had dinner on a
rooftop. I could tell you about the river rafting trip and about the
time we took a bath together.
But I don't want to talk
about it anymore.
Her name is Lorraine. And
sometimes I still miss her.
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