Let's Be Mature About This BN (15 page)

He sauntered into his bedroom and glanced around. His eyes landed on the figure of Apollo on one of his night tables. Apollo stood with his arms raised towards the sky as he sang to the sun, smiling, his head turned upwards and his white marble eyes gleaming. Gavin walked over and picked up the statue. Then he hurled it towards the wall. It crashed through the dry wall and fell with a thud to the bottom of the hollow within the wall.

Gavin stared at the hole in the wall slightly amazed at the consequences of his anger. He thought to himself that this anger was better than pathetically crawling into his bed to die like he’d done a couple years ago. He got into bed and fell asleep. When he awoke the next morning he was furious.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

My mother and I stood staring at the telephone as it rang. “It’s Gavin again isn’t it?” my mom asked. I nodded. “Why don’t you pick up and talk to him?”

“Because…he’s angry…and he thinks he can change my mind.”

Beep. “Sydney, answer the phone. I know you’re there. You need to talk to me. Why weren’t you clear, Sydney? You should have made it clear that you didn’t trust me enough or love me enough to ever consider me being the father of your future children. Or that there
are
no future children! Is that right? I’m not going to let you do this to me Sydney. I’m not going to cave and be weak and pathetic like with Elise. I’m going to fight this and you are going to hear me out! You can’t stomp all over me and leave. Answer the phone, Sydney.” Beep.

The phone immediately started ringing again. My mom put her arm around my shoulder and hugged me to her. I laid my head on her shoulder.

Beep. “Sydney. I don’t understand. You know I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I don’t understand why you…Make me understand what I did wrong.”

My stomach and my heart sank. I know he loves me, and I love him, but that’s not it. I don’t know how to make him understand. Even if he did understand I don’t want him to throw his dream of having a family away just because of me.

 “Am I not responsible enough, or something? You don’t want a family? At all? I don’t get it. Your mom had you, and twenty years later you’re the love of my life. Don’t you want that for another person in the future? Sydney, tell me what it is! Dammit, I’ll try to fix it!” Beep.

I went into my room and got my cell phone off of my night table. I dialed.

“Hi, um, Jay? This is Sydney. Gavin…I broke up with Gavin. I think you should go check on him.”

***

“Gavin?” Jay called as he walked into Gavin’s apartment. The door had been unlocked. “It’s Jason!” He breathed in the strong smell of cleaning products. He scrunched his nose and scanned the apartment. Every surface was immaculate. The hardwood floors were polished to a glossy shine. Jay walked carefully onto the waxed floors trying not to slip and fall. The apartment looked like a model home. Gavin ran out of his bedroom, startling Jay. “Hey man. What’s going on?” Jay asked. He noticed that Gavin was sweating profusely. His forehead was dripping with it.

“Why are you here? Did Sydney call you?”

“Yeah, I heard the bad news.”

“Why is she calling you and not me?!” Gavin shouted.

“Whoa! Chill out, Gavin.”

“Oh, don’t tell me to fuckin’ chill out. What the hell do you know about what I’m going through?”

Jay was silent. Gavin disappeared back into his bedroom. He didn’t know exactly how Gavin was feeling but as always he would be there for his best friend. Memories of having to force Gavin to eat a year ago came to mind. The way Gavin was acting was much different then that episode. This was scarier. Jay slowly walked towards Gavin’s bedroom. When he looked inside he saw why Gavin was sweating. Gavin was on his hands and knees scrubbing the floor. He watched as Gavin dipped the brush into a bucket of soapy water and continued scrubbing. Jay shook his head.

“When did you become such a clean freak?”

“I’m just doing a little cleaning just in case Sydney drops in.” Gavin tossed the brush into the bucket and stood up and smiled. Jay locked eyes with Gavin. Gavin’s eyes looked different to him. They looked glassy.

“Gavin, are you feeling okay?”

“How do you think I feel?” Gavin snapped.

“Sorry,” Jay mumbled. Then he noticed the big hole in the wall. “Dang! Gavin what did you do?”

“When I got back from proposing to Sydney I just kind of went a little crazy,” Gavin chuckled, barely smiling, staring at the hole.

Jay’s jaw dropped. “Dude, you proposed to Sydney?”

Gavin nodded slowly.

“Wow.”

“Yup. ‘Wow’ is right. Didn’t quite go as I planned, but don’t worry about me, Jay. I’m a fighter.” Gavin pretended to be a boxer and made some jabs at the air. “I’m going to get her back, man. She’ll turn around. I left her some messages on her answering machine and I left her some on her cell phone. I think she might drop by real soon.” Gavin ran a hand roughly through his damp black hair.

Jay walked over to Gavin and put a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t know why this stuff happens to you. I wish you would lay off the serious relationships already.”

“You want to know why this stuff happens to me?” he said through clenched teeth. Jason took away his hand and stepped back. “It’s not because I won’t be a Don Juan like you. The problem is she’s
scared
like you, Jason!” he roared “I don’t need your fucking sympathy! I need you to fix it! Help me fix it!” Gavin clutched at his stomach. “Ahh,” he whimpered. He slapped a hand over his mouth and ran to the bathroom. Jay grimaced at the sound of him vomiting. Jay waited for Gavin to be done, then went into the bathroom and handed Gavin a cup of water. Gavin couldn’t drink it; he was too busy sitting on the bathroom floor crying.

Jay took the cup back out of Gavin’s hand and placed it on the counter. He sat down on the floor next to his best friend. Gavin wiped at his face but the tears kept on falling. “It’ll be okay, Gavin. Promise me you’ll go see Dr. Ramirez tomorrow morning.”

Gavin nodded. “I didn’t mean what I said. I’m sorry you’re always the one to deal with me like this, man.”

“You’d do the same for me.”

***

How do I explain how much this hurts? Well, my heart literally hurts. I can’t go an hour without being wracked with anxiety and the queasiness that comes with fear because the reality of not being with him keeps hitting me. I can’t go anywhere without seeing something that reminds me of him; of us. I'm perpetually on the verge of breaking into tears and I've bitten my fingernails down horribly. I haven’t spoken more than three whole sentences the entire week and that was after my mother cried and begged me to reassure her I wasn't going to hurt myself in anyway. She didn’t even cry when my father left. Every night I cry myself to sleep and I don’t think I’ve slept more than three hours at a time. My hair is a mess and I’ve been living in sweats. I’m ashamed to say I’ve forgotten to take a shower a few times. I pray every night that God help me get to the other side of this intense sharp-edged hurt that I feel.

I've been trying to rationalize having a child. People do it every day. I could do it if I had to. But then I know I wouldn't do it well. There's too much bullshit in this world and I've been scarred. Why would I want to subject an innocent child to this world? There is nothing anyone can tell me that could change my mind. I couldn't live with a child's despair, my own child's despair, on my conscience. I believe in God, but no amount of prayer is going to save a child from my mistakes or the evil people in this world. And despite Gavin’s wish a child of ours could live to experience the love we’ve shared, not everyone in the world gets to feel true love. The wheel of fortune just doesn’t work that way. Just look at what happened to us.

I find myself thinking if I'd just throw away my convictions I could be with Gavin again. And I almost do, because it hurts so bad to not have him with me. So damn bad.
Why would I bring someone into this world to feel a hurt like I'm feeling? To feel such disappointment?

So many questions.

Don't you love him?
Oh, of course, with every single cell in my body.

Can't I just talk this out with him?
But he's angry at me. I don't blame him but I'm scared of him yelling at me, talking to me like those messages he left. On the other hand, I'm afraid of him agreeing with me, saying that he doesn't want kids and then regretting it years down the line. Or, I'm afraid I might give in, marry him and have his kids, and regret it years later as well.

Aren't I too young to be married anyways? Isn't this happening too fast? We've only known each other five months!
Maybe. Probably. I've just been fooling myself thinking I can handle being in a truly serious relationship. It's all I've ever wanted and I don't know what to do with it. He's all I've ever wanted and I ran away.

I...I need him. I pride myself in being this strong individual but I need him. I'm not sure he needs me. He might want me but does he need me and all the issues, all the stupidity and naiveté that I bring to the table?

Even though it hurts so incredibly bad I’m not going to be selfish and go back to him. I have to be mature about this. There are many fishes in the sea. I’m sure there is a girl out there that is closer to his age, that’s prettier, that his family will accept, and who’ll want to have his beautiful children. I just hope I never ever have to run into them in the future.

***

“Dr. Ramirez will see you now.”

Gavin stood up and walked into his psychiatrist’s office. “Hey Dr. Ramirez.”

“Hello Mr. Caselle. Nice to see you again. What can I help you with today?”

Gavin sat down on the leather sofa across from Dr. Ramirez’s desk. He watched as Dr. Ramirez smoothed his eyebrows and pushed up his glasses. Gavin smiled at the familiar gesture. “Well, there’s been another break up.”

“How long was this relationship?”

“About…five months.”

“Only five months, but it seems like it was very serious.”

“Yes. Yes it was.”

“Why do you think it ended?”

“She rejected my marriage proposal.”

“Hmm. I’m sure that was very hard on you.”

“Yes.”

“She said no to the proposal so you ended it with her?”

“No. I tried to talk to her but she wouldn’t answer my phone calls. And when I proposed she told me she didn’t want to get married because she didn’t want to have kids with me.”

“What do you mean? Do you mean she didn’t want to have kids specifically with you? Or in general?”

“I don’t know. I guess in general, but that still includes me doesn’t it?” Gavin said annoyed.

“Once the reality of that rejection set in, what did you feel?”

“I felt…angry. I put a hole through a wall in my apartment. With a statue. A marble statue.”

“Well, that sounds as if you were quite angry. What did you feel next?”

“The next day I was still angry and I felt really anxious and then I felt everything crash down on me. I felt dizzy and sick. And then I felt really horrible. I cried for almost an hour.”

“You cried. That’s great. I think that it’s good that you allowed yourself to cry.”

“Why? It didn’t fix anything.”

“Remember when you were clinically depressed a year ago?”

Gavin nodded.

“Not once did you cry. You were still very restricted by your dad’s teachings. I think it is good that you cried. You will be able to move on and feel much healthier.”

“I don’t want to move on. I want to get her back. She had issues with her dad leaving her family when she was younger. I need to convince her that I wouldn’t do that. I love her.”

“I think that it would be best for you to focus on yourself right now. Don’t focus on her problems because only she can fix them.”

“I
am
focusing on myself. She makes me the happiest I’ve ever been and I’ve never even slept with her! Doesn’t that say something? If I convince her that she can trust me and she decides to be with me then I’ll be happy again. Isn’t
that
good for me?”