benjamin button: the epilogue

When last we left, our heroine was headed to Kentucky for Benjamin Button Weekend with Mr. Second Chance.

Other than being too brief, the weekend was great -- we laughed, we talked, we had Dairy Queen, we toured the Maker's Mark distillery and swished whisky around in our mouths for the required three full seconds before swallowing.

But then, there we are Saturday night, having a late dinner after catching a movie. And somewhere in the middle of my enchiladas supreme I find myself in one of my signature out-of-body experiences, watching myself dive head-first into the middle of a conversation about things that happened between the two of us six years ago. I'm tip-toeing around an all-out interrogation, and the urge is almost insatiable. These questions are rising up in me, and I want to demand answers. "Why did you say this one particular thing five years ago?" or "What were you thinking when you did XYZ to me?" WHEN YOU WERE NINETEEN?

Yes. Seriously.

On the drive back to our hotel from the restaurant that night my mind was reeling. I started thinking of specific moments, teeny, tiny little slivers of nothing that no one would remember, no one but me, because I've spent the last six years of my life dissecting them over and over and over (and OVER). What about that one Hughes Street party? I asked. I described exactly what I'd been wearing, and exactly what he'd said to me. Wasn't he flirting with me then? I'd wanted to know. So wasn't that something? What had it meant? I don't think he even remembered it, and I wouldn't blame him if he didn't. And then came another party. And another two-minute conversation that I remembered verbatim, and really the only reason I'm recounting any of it is to point out that he was talking to some girl who didn't matter then and doesn't matter now who I was wildly jealous of and on some level, when I allow myself to be 19-year-old me for just a second, I still am.

It was a distressing glimpse into my psyche. And it was the beginning of a realization that took me the length of the drive home Sunday to wrap my brain around fully: for whatever embarrassing and inexplicable reason, I have not let go of those things, not one bit. If my heart opens up, even a smidge, that tiny window is all it takes for those feelings and anger to come bursting out.

The absolute worst was the moment when I found myself wanting to bring up some other random moment from my memory and it hit me that the reason wasn't to ask a question or demand explanation (which is bad enough). It was simply to point out that he'd done it. It was to say, remember the time you said this horrible thing to me? Yeah, I remember it, too. Feel bad about it. Hurt, like I hurt.

I laid this all out on the table for Mr. Second Chance last night, and I told him that I hadn't imagined that any of it would be an issue, because it just genuinely hadn't occurred to me. I had been stuck in good, happy memory land and for most of the weekend I was still there. But those few moments of sheer, unadulterated crazy were terrifying.

They scared me because obviously I'm not over those past hurts now, and who's to say I ever will be? Even if I did question him demand answers and get to a point of fully understanding every motivation and every whim behind those decisions he made at 19 or 20, will that make it any better? Knowing why your house burned down doesn't make it any less gone. At best it means you wouldn't let the same fire start again.

I wonder, is that what I'm trying to do? Start the same fire, because I don't understand why the first one started, or burned so fast and so ferociously? I had a wonderful weekend. I laughed and acted silly and talked about any and everything and felt genuinely reconnected with someone whose friendship I have missed. But realistically, I don't know that I can truly start fresh in this relationship. I don't know that I'm capable of simply putting the past behind us and creating something new.

I told him all of this, went through every concern and every doubt. And what I got back was, "I'm not ready to give up on this." Which frankly, was impressive, if not a little inspiring, considering that one of the things that irked me when we were together was his lack of passion or drive for, well, anything. I told him that I worry that we will keep talking, keep growing our relationship in the ways that you can from several hundred miles away, and come October -- when our next possible rendezvous would occur -- I'll feel no differently than I do now. Or, even worse, he'll drive all this way to come see me based on the hope that maybe I could, and it won't work. As much as the little voice in me wants to throw things back, wants to point out awful things he did in the past just to be hurtful, in reality I don't want to hurt him.

So that's where we are. I left Kentucky with more questions than answers, but it looks like the story isn't over just yet. I cannot tell a lie -- I'm very worried that I already know the ending. But I'm willing to keep reading.


cheers,
elizabeth