cupid's wicked revenge
Current Mood: 
nostalgic
Current Music: Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger - Daft Punk
Yeah, l'above (points to Daft Punk's sexy song) is le sex. I suggest you get acquainted.
So, V-Day has passed. I have been inspired to be writing, not spending time with the boyfriend like I should. Shit, there's like, what, a half-inch sheet of ice underneath this wicked Pittsburgh snow. I don't feel like ice skating. Any type of water + me = lethal combination. It sucks not having classes AND not being able to go play, hence all this bitchin' work I have to do. Boo on work.
But Bryan was nice today. Gave me a nice rose. The gifts were earlier. The Cheesecake Factory on Friday was wicked. I just wasn't in the "together" mood. He can go suck my left nut if he doesn't like that. :-P He'll still love me anyways.
So yeah, guess what else is a bitch? My stupid Internet. It only works at this time of morning (which happens to be about WHAT? 3:25 AM?) and it's hella slow any other time. Damn Ethernet. I plugged an e-mail to the IT department, and they still haven't shown up. I'm about to raise hell. 2 online classes + slug for a connection = Sarah's got the salt!
So, I got in the mood for fiction, so it was awesome :-D I uh...I started on a sequel for A Hallmark Greeting (if you've read it) called Cupid's Poison Arrow. And I restarted Clarity, with the thought of having a license to be fabulous. :-D Oh yes, I'm on a roll. If only I could be this dedicated to my work...
So yeah, I'm feeling festive. Read and be merry.
Why do women always take so long to find cards? They will stand there for 15 minutes on end, staring at the same greeting card on the shelf, debating on whether to purchase it. If that’s not the scenario, they stare at bunches of different cards, wondering which one is the perfect one. So annoying.
“Oh, just buy it already!”
The stare that I got from the stranger who was picking up the card was quizzical, angry, yet endearing at the same time. I had dared to go where no other male had dared: to state the complete and utter obvious. I felt bad for the poor girl as she huffed away after staring at her card for a few more seconds, and then headed in the direction of the checkout.
I quickly grabbed my greeting card and followed, not even looking at it. I already knew it would be perfect.
*****
Getting home and looking on my bed, I noticed there was an ornate bright red card from Jess, one printed out from the Internet from Avery, a smaller valentine with the cartoon “Robots” on it from Mack and another one with the Fairly Oddparents from Zoe. Scooting them quickly on the floor, I flopped back on my bed and rolled over onto the side with the open spot, so I could get under the covers and forget this day existed.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not anti-Valentine’s Day. I am not one of these people who would preach that Valentine’s Day is just to boost the economy and the greeting card industry. It does help them, and they make damn good chocolate throughout the holiday. A true Valentine’s Day is really meant to be with the one you love. If you don’t have a person to love…it’s just another day. There is a sort of magic in the air in that day. I can feel it. I’m just not in the mood for it this year.
There’s no ‘behind the scenes’ story to this. There’s no magic girl in my life that disappeared and left my heart curious as to whether I would ever love again. There was never a date that went awry on Valentine’s Day and never a crowded restaurant staring at me, wondering if I was going to be the gentleman and pay the bill she left me with. There has, however, been a nasty breakup and on Valentine’s Day I reminisced on it. Wasn’t very fair to think about it because girls hurt me. I’m not going to go into it; I hate thinking about it as is.
The “book” was over in the corner, waiting to be opened. I keep a book that I pull out on Valentine’s Day every year. The multiple girlfriends that I’ve had and lost within the years are littered around inside in picture form and I just look at it. Stare at it to be completely accurate. I’ve tried to be completely numb looking at it, but I would be lying if I wouldn’t be depressed by it. The faces on those pages, smiling, giggling, rolling around in the grass, the girls sitting on my laps, having their arms wrapped around me, really got to me after a while. It made me long for something so utterly deep and passionate, something I feel like I’ve never really had before.
Fairytale dreaming is not right for me. I’ve always had silent expectations about women and my love life. I mean, I’ve never considered myself a Prince Charming, but I was as well known. Sometimes I would use that to my advantage. Every time I would see Jess reading a romance novel, I would stick my tongue out at her when she wasn’t looking, but when she wasn’t in the room, I would pick up the book and see where she was at, secretly flipping to the part where the people hooked up. It isn’t like, a perverted thing. I just sense the magic that writers write about. I’ve even caught myself reading fanfiction and praying that I could feel that intensely about a person.
No matter how much I wanted to believe it, my eyes never lit up when I saw a particular girl that I liked come into a room. I’ve been immediately attracted to certain girls, but I never felt that overwhelming feeling of passion when I looked at them. I’ve never felt this never-ending need that another girl made me complete and that there were fireworks going off whenever I kissed a girl’s lips. Not trying to say that every relationship was completely passionless; I just didn’t feel that true, deep connection.
To be perfectly honest…sex for me wasn’t really about love. I’d only had it twice and it wasn’t the most romance, intimate thing to me.
I wanted to feel that spark. The one where you can’t look away from the girl or you’re afraid you’re going to lose her. If you let her out of your arms, you’re afraid she’ll dissolve right into the air around you. You would try to do anything perfect and even if you weren’t, she would still adore you.
I was so close to feeling this way, but she got killed in a car crash. She wasn’t known to be the most responsible person, especially with her liquor. I was lucky to be alive after that car ride. Her pictures were still in that book, as I got up from under the covers and grabbed the dark black leather-covered binder. Flipping over to past the middle, the strawberry-blonde haired Evangeline stared back at me. Her bright green eyes were seen clearly through her dark pink glasses. The sun was shining through her hair and her face was close up, cattycornered, and you could see my dark form in the background. Right below this picture, I kept one of us where we were both sitting on the rickety wooden swing out in the yard. We were laughing at each other about something and I remember precisely the subject. Spongebob Squarepants.
Pity I couldn’t get the chance to get to know her better. The next few pictures were of a few days later, her demolished VW Bug and a couple newspaper clippings from the local paper. I had only dated her a week. She was probably the one in the book that I would never forget, even if I got Alzheimer’s.
Flipping over to the next page, we had the tall, brown-haired Miranda Lambert. Her form in the picture was just as entrancing in real life. She was never the best-looking girl on the block, but she had a hell of a personality and enjoyed music nearly as much as I did. I caught a few of her tinkering with her guitar and dinking around on the piano, her figure completely engrossed in the creative process. Her pictures usually involved a flighty face, her brown eyes always focused on something else in the room. The few pictures that she had with me, she looked rather distracted, like she had something else to do. Turns out she was seeing another guy at the same time and was trying to figure out whether or not to keep dating me or not. She chose him.
Next page: my most recent ex-girlfriend, Corrine. Corrine Smalley. A tiny Italian girl with deep brown hair, almost black, and the most beautiful almond-shaped eyes I had ever seen. One of the two women I had ever slept with, she was tender, passionate, and could cook a hell of a Christmas feast. She submitted a tape to Food Network’s “Next Food Network Star” and actually got chosen to fly up to New York for the contest. She didn’t win, but they offered her a few guest spots on talk shows and finally got something permanent up in Northern New York as Head Chef at a new restaurant called Lula. Corrine and I parted on good terms because we had two completely different and nagging professions that needed us.
I shut “the book” and looked down at its leather cover, worn and slightly graying from my touch. I decided then I needed to take a walk.
*****
Miss “It-Takes-Me-Forever-To-Pick-Out-A-Decent-Valentine-Card-That’s-Sappy-Enough-For-Even-The-Most-Saccarhine-Piece-Of-Candy” was riding with a taller man on the subway. Her long curly blonde hair, thick and golden, lie on her shoulders and she tucked it behind her ear with a thick-gloved hand. Much to her dismay, it did not recede behind her ear, but cascaded back to where it previously lay. She looked young, too young to be with a man that much older than her. I distinctly saw a kiss of affection on the cheek, however. I can’t interpret too far though, for it wasn’t a lip kiss.
Electric spark plugs could have been wired to my nipples at that point and then activated. That’s how shocked I was about what I was feeling. My heart felt alive, for no reason even. God, I yelled at the girl in the middle of Target and I expected her to talk to me. I wanted her to do more than talk to me. I wanted her to know me from the inside out.
Feeling the subway come to the stop, I scooted away from the person sitting next to me when the man from my other side stood up to leave. The man gave me a quizzical look, and then continued reading his New Yorker magazine. I tip my top hat to you, kind Sir.
“I wouldn’t be so apathetic if I weren’t so lethargic,” I quoted Family Guy and looked over at him as he scooted even further away.
I heard a light little giggle as the girl’s eyes met mine. She let out a shy little smile in my direction, flashing me her slightly blinding white teeth and brushed her hair behind her shoulder, this time staying tame.
I smiled back non-discreetly.
The subway ride lasted for another 12 minutes until I went to get out of the subway, her and her “male pal” following me out. Going out to find a local park, I smiled at the memory of it all. The seesaw that I banged my head off of as a kid, resulting in 5 stitches in the back of my head, the swings that could never swing high enough, the plastic slides that even if you slid down them once resulted in a week’s worth of static electricity in your favorite t-shirt, it was all there, just waiting for me to pick up where it left off. My most vivid memory, however, was the many skids on the blacktop rollerblading with my brothers. They would escort me over to the benches, and I would always get those wood chips stuck to my socks after I took my blades off.
Pulling out a cigarette, I sat down at one of the park benches and quickly lit it, turning off my Ipod and enjoying the tranquility of the sun going down. My backpack was now sitting beside me, occupied with the card I had purchased in the store, “the book” and my digital camera.
“Mind if I bum one off you?”
The man and Miss Over-thinks were standing to my side, her long brown coat hugging her tightly in the bitter February air.
“Um, sure,” I handed the man one of my Marlboros and offered one to the girl, “You?”
She just shook her head gently and they sat down on the other opposing bench, their breath visible in the early evening air.
“I’m going over to the smokers porch,” the man said and started to walk away.
“Okay,” her voice was slightly deep yet sweetly feminine as she turned around, looking at me expectantly. Her curiously got the best of her and she came over, sitting next to me and looking onto my Ipod screen, wondering what song I was listening to.
She started humming the beginning bars to the song I currently had on pause and started singing quickly afterwards, “Hello, I love you, won’t you tell me your name? Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game.”
I started singing with her, “Hello, I love you, won’t you tell me your name? Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game.”
Then we started really getting into it, singing to each other playfully. When we were finished, we were laughing heartily and she flung her hair back behind her.
“Amorella, by the way.”
“What?”
“I’m telling you my name,” she was still stifling her laughter, “Amorella Cameron Harper. Everybody calls me Ace though.”
“Zac Hanson,” I shook her hand quietly and she took it with thin hands and a wide smile.
“Weren’t you the drummer from Hanson?”
“Yeah,” I smiled sheepishly, “I am still the drummer from Hanson.”
“Really? I used to listen to your stuff, but I was more into country. My sister loved you guys.”
I didn’t reply, but went on to the next subject, “Sorry about freaking you out in the store back there a couple days ago.”
“That was you?” she looked at me wide-eyed, “You’re a punk,” she punched me playfully in the arm.
“Yeah, guilty,” I raised my hands up in the air, “Spare me from your whipping.”
“Oh no, you get the wet noodle, mister,” she giggled, snorting lightly. She stopped, looking at me like I was going to judge her, then receded her hand back on her lap.
“I really didn’t mean to yell. I was frustrated.”
“Shopping for your girlfriend?”
I looked around to her, “No, no one really. Don’t have one. Why, were you shopping for your boyfriend?”
“No,” she blushed lightly, “Don’t have one either.”
“But what about…” I nudged my neck over to her dark-haired companion.
“My brother, Vance,” she said softly, then her voice raised abruptly, “Wait, you think I’m incestual now?”
“You know how us Southerners can be,” I smiled back gently.
“I’m not Southern,” she looked at me seriously, “I’m from Vermont.”
“Oh…” I paused slightly.
“Don’t let that get you down, it’s a lot colder up there right now,” she looked away from me slightly to Vance.
I took out the digital camera slyly while she was looking away, “Hey, Ace!”
“What?” she turned around and I quickly snapped her picture. I looked at the screen quickly after I took her. Her blonde hair was slightly in mid-air, her nose a tiny bit pink, her wide brown eyes in surprise, and her smile; still vivid and gorgeous.
“You really are a punk,” she pouted, crossing her arms, “I don’t like you anymore.”
“Did you like me in the first place?”
She looked over shyly, ignoring my question. She noticed my “book” was sticking out of my backpack, “What’s that you got in the bag?”
“Nothing.”
“Hey, you took a picture of me when I wasn’t prepared, I deserve to make an ass out of you now.”
“No, don’t take it,” I was starting to get a little serious, but she had quick arms and snatched my backpack, grabbing the book. She flipped through pictures quickly, shocked at the ones of Evangeline, enamored of the ones of Miranda and spellbound of the ones of Corrine. Looking back up at me softly, I responded, “Happy now?”
“I’m sorry,” she looked down, ringing her hands together in worry, “I shouldn’t have done that.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” I was seething at her in the moment. I wished I had never ran into Amorella at the moment, then this would have never happened.
“Are these your-”
“Girlfriends, deceased and/or better off without me,” I replied harshly.
“It is Valentine’s Day, I should have expected something like this. I am sorry I intruded. Has anyone seen this before?”
“No, and I intended to have it remain that way.”
“No need to be bitter about it,” her voice was getting softer. She now grabbed something out of her graphic purse and handed it to me, “Here, for your trouble.”
“What is it?” I took it from her harshly, afraid I might have given her a paper cut.
“I’ve been saving it for a rainy day…I figured it would come in handy sometime.”
I opened up the small white envelope and saw a simple Valentine’s card. After glancing through it, I saw loopy cursive writing on the left side and read it:
To Someone Special,
I just knew it was you from the start. I may not know much of you, but I know you mean something to me if I give you this. They always say there’s one person who would die for you. If you’re ever feeling low and down and out, pull out this card and remember that I cared enough to give an almost complete stranger a piece of my heart.
With all my heart,
Amorella Harper
That…was…freaky.
“It comes with a box of little candy hearts if you want them.”
I looked at her softly, my hands still shaking from holding the card. She looked up at me curiously with those wide almond-shaped eyes.
“I got you a card too.”
I quickly reached for my backpack on her side, pulling out my red envelope and she opened it, reading it, not knowing what to say.
I don’t know you, but I do. You’re meant to get this card. Even if we only end up being strangers who briefly meet on a crowded street, at least I know one person’ll remember me for one brief moment. That’s you. Thank you.
Remember me,
Z.W. Hanson
She looked back up to me in questioning, puzzlement, and overall confusion. Then her smile grew as she said, “Here, take a picture of me again. This time, I promise I’ll be prepared.”
My eyes diverted back to the camera, which was still laying in my other palm and I raised it lightly to my eye, “Okay, ready?”
“Yeah.”
“Say…The Doors!”
“The Doors!” the flash overtook my memory.
*****
I never put her pictures in “the book”. The book, safe to say, has been removed of all its pictures, put in a shoebox and placed deep in the attic, where I may never find it again. The book has been burned with the help of Ace later that day.
We parted on good terms, like I always say we do. I tried to remember, as I climbed back into my bed, as I took a new appreciation for those Valentine’s Day cards lying strewn about on the floor, was the whole ordeal with Ace a dream?
The memory of her kiss on my lips and her phone number in my pocket beckoned ‘no, it was real’. Maybe next time I’m shopping for a card, I’ll take my time looking for it.
The End
And what I have so far of the sequel.....
Cupid’s Poison Arrow
God damn candy. God damn kids.
“MOMMY! Get me the big ones!”
“But we already got you the little ones.”
“I Want The Big Ones TOO!”
Sighing, I tried to steer my cart around them. My duty was to go into Wal-Mart and scope out the materials for Zoe’s in-class Valentine’s box. Tons of red, pink, and white construction paper, a kid-friendly pair of scissors (since she is prone to losing them) and a buttload of patience. I was just scoping out the candy aisle, looking for Lindor truffles (only the dark ones; those are the ones that Mom wants), stuck behind this whiny little boy and his mother, who wasn’t really helping the matters, considering she had just let the boy have both bags of candy, spoiling him completely rotten.
“Ooh, these cards play music!”
A teenage girl was now looking at the cards with the music chips inside them, playing various hits such as “All I Want” (I don’t know who sings it, some band from the 90’s), “Wild Thing”, and “Unforgettable”. I picked out the one with “Wild Thing” on the inside, knowing, as always, that it would be perfect.
Now, back to the task at hand.
*******************
After dumping off all the materials on Zoe’s carpet, I pulled out my IPod and decided to drown my sorrows in some music. Lying back on my bed, I pondered for about 25 minutes about the day ahead, when suddenly, a song broke me out of my funk.
“Who in the HELL put ‘Fergilicious’ on my IPod?”
My echoing voice scattered throughout the house as the listeners remained quiet. I knew for a fact that it was no one from my family, but Ace. Yes, Ace. The fellow cynic of Valentine’s Day who about a year ago flung herself into my life so ungracefully with her sexy rendition of “Hello, I Love You” who was now currently my best friend and liked to torture me with her random obsessions with romance and idealism bullshit. Contradictory, no? She does tend to be a bit of a cynic when it comes to Valentine’s Day, which is why our meeting last year made absolute sense. She was out with Vance, her brother, to make best of the day. Turns out a month after she met me, she called me and decided that being my friend was worthy of her time. She had broken up with her boyfriend a couple days before she had met me (as a matter of fact, right after she had the indecision about her card) and she was still feeling bitter about it. As a matter of fact, if I remember correctly, she was in all black, in her self-mourning phase, that day. What I was most surprised to hear was that she admitted that she never opened up that quickly when it came to “the piggish male species”. My response was that she wasn’t that open in the first place, because we both bit each other’s heads off that day.
What a match, huh?
“Fergilicious” was still pouring out of the earpieces as I put them back in and changed the track to “O Valencia” and got up off the bed. I needed to take a little road trip to visit Ace, across town to her ratty, completely unkempt apartment, which I practically lived in half the time. She kept a bed for me there, which was the neatest room in the apartment, even though I’m a guy. I have to keep a place clear to sleep, while she likes to sleep on some clothes. At first, I was disgusted, but I’m just used to it now. I live in her dysfunction, and it just makes Ace…Ace. I practically own half the apartment as I live there half the time I’m around. I decided to spend a couple days at my parents’ place in preparation for Jessica’s 20th birthday.
Gathering up my odds and ends I brought back to the house, I threw them in my backpack and slipped on my favorite gray hoodie. I felt my cell phone vibrating in my pant pocket and I checked it. A text message from Ace:
Wanna make Valentines? I got glitter! Teehee
I shook my head and strolled past my family, Mack and Avery playing bowling on their brand new Wii they got for Christmas.
“Leaving so soon, dear?”
The voice of my mother penetrated the music easily and looked at me with those all-knowing, all concerned “mother” eyes, her hair falling sloppily over her shoulders. She was watching the kids while they were playing, probably just having finishing loading the dishwasher.
“Yeah, Ace and I have a date.”
“I like that girl, I hope you really do have a date with her,” she smiled warmly.
“A date with some glitter.”
“What are you planning, Zachary?” Mom winked at me playfully.
“She wants to make Valentines apparently,” I replied, slinging my backpack more securely on my shoulder, “the book” tucked securely within the fabric and Velcro, “Maybe we’ll get really crazy and break out the love dice.”
“The PG ones, dear,” she laughed.
“Yeah…” I remembered the time Mom caught Corrine and I playing with the NC-17 dice in my room, something she would never let me live down. Suck me there NEVER AGAIN, Corrine. Especially not in front of Diana Hanson.
“So…make sure you remember to drop a line every once in a while, okay? Oh…and there’s something in your back pocket there.”
I flipped over my backpack, not even noticing the side pouch that had a lottery ticket. A LOVE lottery ticket. And a coupon for one free back massage.
“Ace…” I grumbled to myself.
“If it were any more obvious, I think she might have it written all over your backpack in that glitter she’s talking about.”
“What are you getting at?” I raised an eyebrow at her. Sometimes I didn’t get my mother at all.
Then my ringer went off. Ace decided to change her ringtone on my phone every month, which jacked up my phone bill, but as long as I kept the woman happy, it was all good. Ever since I changed my phone to the Cherry Chocolate LG Verizon model, it’s been smooth sailing. But now hearing “Get Your Freak On” by Missy Elliott pouring out of my phone almost made me laugh out loud standing there in front of my brother, sister, and mother. Last month, it was “Lover I Don’t Have to Love” by Bright Eyes, which people thought I was gay for. “I want a boy so drunk that he doesn’t talk” on my cell phone definitely wasn’t the type of image I wanted to send to Zoe, let alone Ezra. Ace, Ace, Ace…was going to be the very death of my social life.
“Better get your phone there, Zac,” Mom raised her eyebrow back and I pressed the send button, sending Ace’s pictured, which featured her leg stretched all the way over her head in her former gymnist’s flexible glory and I spoke, finally:
“Hey, you freaking brat.”
“Zac,” I heard my mother mumbling in the background.
“Did you get your coupon, dork-on?”
“Yes I did,” I smiled as I pulled out the coupon after placing the backpack on the arm of the chair, “I’m looking forward to being sexed up on your dirty bed.”
“Zac,” my mom smacked my arm, “Your brother and sister!”
“You’ve gotta do me first, though.”
“Oooh, now do I?” I wiggled my eyebrows to my mother, who was now shaking her head at my absurdity with Ace. I figured she might as well be used to it by now. Good grief, I’ve been practically living with her for 6 months now.
“Yes, you absolutely do.”
“Well that’s good to know,” I smiled into the phone. There are times that I admit that I am attracted to her, but I know things would just get weird with us if we ever took it to that last step. Knowing her friends, they would walk in on us when I accidentally “tripped and fell on her lips” or knowing MY luck, my mother would walk in when Ace “tripped and fell on my dick”. My damn luck.
So be awesome, and LOVE ME :-D haha Cause it's the remainder of love day.
Oh yeah, and that reminds me...I must look up some Avenue Q. You know a musical is awesome when the song you hear sung all day around you is "The Internet is for Porn". Grab your dick, and double click.
nostalgic
Current Music: Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger - Daft Punk
Yeah, l'above (points to Daft Punk's sexy song) is le sex. I suggest you get acquainted.
So, V-Day has passed. I have been inspired to be writing, not spending time with the boyfriend like I should. Shit, there's like, what, a half-inch sheet of ice underneath this wicked Pittsburgh snow. I don't feel like ice skating. Any type of water + me = lethal combination. It sucks not having classes AND not being able to go play, hence all this bitchin' work I have to do. Boo on work.
But Bryan was nice today. Gave me a nice rose. The gifts were earlier. The Cheesecake Factory on Friday was wicked. I just wasn't in the "together" mood. He can go suck my left nut if he doesn't like that. :-P He'll still love me anyways.
So yeah, guess what else is a bitch? My stupid Internet. It only works at this time of morning (which happens to be about WHAT? 3:25 AM?) and it's hella slow any other time. Damn Ethernet. I plugged an e-mail to the IT department, and they still haven't shown up. I'm about to raise hell. 2 online classes + slug for a connection = Sarah's got the salt!
So, I got in the mood for fiction, so it was awesome :-D I uh...I started on a sequel for A Hallmark Greeting (if you've read it) called Cupid's Poison Arrow. And I restarted Clarity, with the thought of having a license to be fabulous. :-D Oh yes, I'm on a roll. If only I could be this dedicated to my work...
So yeah, I'm feeling festive. Read and be merry.
Why do women always take so long to find cards? They will stand there for 15 minutes on end, staring at the same greeting card on the shelf, debating on whether to purchase it. If that’s not the scenario, they stare at bunches of different cards, wondering which one is the perfect one. So annoying.
“Oh, just buy it already!”
The stare that I got from the stranger who was picking up the card was quizzical, angry, yet endearing at the same time. I had dared to go where no other male had dared: to state the complete and utter obvious. I felt bad for the poor girl as she huffed away after staring at her card for a few more seconds, and then headed in the direction of the checkout.
I quickly grabbed my greeting card and followed, not even looking at it. I already knew it would be perfect.
*****
Getting home and looking on my bed, I noticed there was an ornate bright red card from Jess, one printed out from the Internet from Avery, a smaller valentine with the cartoon “Robots” on it from Mack and another one with the Fairly Oddparents from Zoe. Scooting them quickly on the floor, I flopped back on my bed and rolled over onto the side with the open spot, so I could get under the covers and forget this day existed.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not anti-Valentine’s Day. I am not one of these people who would preach that Valentine’s Day is just to boost the economy and the greeting card industry. It does help them, and they make damn good chocolate throughout the holiday. A true Valentine’s Day is really meant to be with the one you love. If you don’t have a person to love…it’s just another day. There is a sort of magic in the air in that day. I can feel it. I’m just not in the mood for it this year.
There’s no ‘behind the scenes’ story to this. There’s no magic girl in my life that disappeared and left my heart curious as to whether I would ever love again. There was never a date that went awry on Valentine’s Day and never a crowded restaurant staring at me, wondering if I was going to be the gentleman and pay the bill she left me with. There has, however, been a nasty breakup and on Valentine’s Day I reminisced on it. Wasn’t very fair to think about it because girls hurt me. I’m not going to go into it; I hate thinking about it as is.
The “book” was over in the corner, waiting to be opened. I keep a book that I pull out on Valentine’s Day every year. The multiple girlfriends that I’ve had and lost within the years are littered around inside in picture form and I just look at it. Stare at it to be completely accurate. I’ve tried to be completely numb looking at it, but I would be lying if I wouldn’t be depressed by it. The faces on those pages, smiling, giggling, rolling around in the grass, the girls sitting on my laps, having their arms wrapped around me, really got to me after a while. It made me long for something so utterly deep and passionate, something I feel like I’ve never really had before.
Fairytale dreaming is not right for me. I’ve always had silent expectations about women and my love life. I mean, I’ve never considered myself a Prince Charming, but I was as well known. Sometimes I would use that to my advantage. Every time I would see Jess reading a romance novel, I would stick my tongue out at her when she wasn’t looking, but when she wasn’t in the room, I would pick up the book and see where she was at, secretly flipping to the part where the people hooked up. It isn’t like, a perverted thing. I just sense the magic that writers write about. I’ve even caught myself reading fanfiction and praying that I could feel that intensely about a person.
No matter how much I wanted to believe it, my eyes never lit up when I saw a particular girl that I liked come into a room. I’ve been immediately attracted to certain girls, but I never felt that overwhelming feeling of passion when I looked at them. I’ve never felt this never-ending need that another girl made me complete and that there were fireworks going off whenever I kissed a girl’s lips. Not trying to say that every relationship was completely passionless; I just didn’t feel that true, deep connection.
To be perfectly honest…sex for me wasn’t really about love. I’d only had it twice and it wasn’t the most romance, intimate thing to me.
I wanted to feel that spark. The one where you can’t look away from the girl or you’re afraid you’re going to lose her. If you let her out of your arms, you’re afraid she’ll dissolve right into the air around you. You would try to do anything perfect and even if you weren’t, she would still adore you.
I was so close to feeling this way, but she got killed in a car crash. She wasn’t known to be the most responsible person, especially with her liquor. I was lucky to be alive after that car ride. Her pictures were still in that book, as I got up from under the covers and grabbed the dark black leather-covered binder. Flipping over to past the middle, the strawberry-blonde haired Evangeline stared back at me. Her bright green eyes were seen clearly through her dark pink glasses. The sun was shining through her hair and her face was close up, cattycornered, and you could see my dark form in the background. Right below this picture, I kept one of us where we were both sitting on the rickety wooden swing out in the yard. We were laughing at each other about something and I remember precisely the subject. Spongebob Squarepants.
Pity I couldn’t get the chance to get to know her better. The next few pictures were of a few days later, her demolished VW Bug and a couple newspaper clippings from the local paper. I had only dated her a week. She was probably the one in the book that I would never forget, even if I got Alzheimer’s.
Flipping over to the next page, we had the tall, brown-haired Miranda Lambert. Her form in the picture was just as entrancing in real life. She was never the best-looking girl on the block, but she had a hell of a personality and enjoyed music nearly as much as I did. I caught a few of her tinkering with her guitar and dinking around on the piano, her figure completely engrossed in the creative process. Her pictures usually involved a flighty face, her brown eyes always focused on something else in the room. The few pictures that she had with me, she looked rather distracted, like she had something else to do. Turns out she was seeing another guy at the same time and was trying to figure out whether or not to keep dating me or not. She chose him.
Next page: my most recent ex-girlfriend, Corrine. Corrine Smalley. A tiny Italian girl with deep brown hair, almost black, and the most beautiful almond-shaped eyes I had ever seen. One of the two women I had ever slept with, she was tender, passionate, and could cook a hell of a Christmas feast. She submitted a tape to Food Network’s “Next Food Network Star” and actually got chosen to fly up to New York for the contest. She didn’t win, but they offered her a few guest spots on talk shows and finally got something permanent up in Northern New York as Head Chef at a new restaurant called Lula. Corrine and I parted on good terms because we had two completely different and nagging professions that needed us.
I shut “the book” and looked down at its leather cover, worn and slightly graying from my touch. I decided then I needed to take a walk.
*****
Miss “It-Takes-Me-Forever-To-Pick-Out-A-Decent-Valentine-Card-That’s-Sappy-Enough-For-Even-The-Most-Saccarhine-Piece-Of-Candy” was riding with a taller man on the subway. Her long curly blonde hair, thick and golden, lie on her shoulders and she tucked it behind her ear with a thick-gloved hand. Much to her dismay, it did not recede behind her ear, but cascaded back to where it previously lay. She looked young, too young to be with a man that much older than her. I distinctly saw a kiss of affection on the cheek, however. I can’t interpret too far though, for it wasn’t a lip kiss.
Electric spark plugs could have been wired to my nipples at that point and then activated. That’s how shocked I was about what I was feeling. My heart felt alive, for no reason even. God, I yelled at the girl in the middle of Target and I expected her to talk to me. I wanted her to do more than talk to me. I wanted her to know me from the inside out.
Feeling the subway come to the stop, I scooted away from the person sitting next to me when the man from my other side stood up to leave. The man gave me a quizzical look, and then continued reading his New Yorker magazine. I tip my top hat to you, kind Sir.
“I wouldn’t be so apathetic if I weren’t so lethargic,” I quoted Family Guy and looked over at him as he scooted even further away.
I heard a light little giggle as the girl’s eyes met mine. She let out a shy little smile in my direction, flashing me her slightly blinding white teeth and brushed her hair behind her shoulder, this time staying tame.
I smiled back non-discreetly.
The subway ride lasted for another 12 minutes until I went to get out of the subway, her and her “male pal” following me out. Going out to find a local park, I smiled at the memory of it all. The seesaw that I banged my head off of as a kid, resulting in 5 stitches in the back of my head, the swings that could never swing high enough, the plastic slides that even if you slid down them once resulted in a week’s worth of static electricity in your favorite t-shirt, it was all there, just waiting for me to pick up where it left off. My most vivid memory, however, was the many skids on the blacktop rollerblading with my brothers. They would escort me over to the benches, and I would always get those wood chips stuck to my socks after I took my blades off.
Pulling out a cigarette, I sat down at one of the park benches and quickly lit it, turning off my Ipod and enjoying the tranquility of the sun going down. My backpack was now sitting beside me, occupied with the card I had purchased in the store, “the book” and my digital camera.
“Mind if I bum one off you?”
The man and Miss Over-thinks were standing to my side, her long brown coat hugging her tightly in the bitter February air.
“Um, sure,” I handed the man one of my Marlboros and offered one to the girl, “You?”
She just shook her head gently and they sat down on the other opposing bench, their breath visible in the early evening air.
“I’m going over to the smokers porch,” the man said and started to walk away.
“Okay,” her voice was slightly deep yet sweetly feminine as she turned around, looking at me expectantly. Her curiously got the best of her and she came over, sitting next to me and looking onto my Ipod screen, wondering what song I was listening to.
She started humming the beginning bars to the song I currently had on pause and started singing quickly afterwards, “Hello, I love you, won’t you tell me your name? Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game.”
I started singing with her, “Hello, I love you, won’t you tell me your name? Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game.”
Then we started really getting into it, singing to each other playfully. When we were finished, we were laughing heartily and she flung her hair back behind her.
“Amorella, by the way.”
“What?”
“I’m telling you my name,” she was still stifling her laughter, “Amorella Cameron Harper. Everybody calls me Ace though.”
“Zac Hanson,” I shook her hand quietly and she took it with thin hands and a wide smile.
“Weren’t you the drummer from Hanson?”
“Yeah,” I smiled sheepishly, “I am still the drummer from Hanson.”
“Really? I used to listen to your stuff, but I was more into country. My sister loved you guys.”
I didn’t reply, but went on to the next subject, “Sorry about freaking you out in the store back there a couple days ago.”
“That was you?” she looked at me wide-eyed, “You’re a punk,” she punched me playfully in the arm.
“Yeah, guilty,” I raised my hands up in the air, “Spare me from your whipping.”
“Oh no, you get the wet noodle, mister,” she giggled, snorting lightly. She stopped, looking at me like I was going to judge her, then receded her hand back on her lap.
“I really didn’t mean to yell. I was frustrated.”
“Shopping for your girlfriend?”
I looked around to her, “No, no one really. Don’t have one. Why, were you shopping for your boyfriend?”
“No,” she blushed lightly, “Don’t have one either.”
“But what about…” I nudged my neck over to her dark-haired companion.
“My brother, Vance,” she said softly, then her voice raised abruptly, “Wait, you think I’m incestual now?”
“You know how us Southerners can be,” I smiled back gently.
“I’m not Southern,” she looked at me seriously, “I’m from Vermont.”
“Oh…” I paused slightly.
“Don’t let that get you down, it’s a lot colder up there right now,” she looked away from me slightly to Vance.
I took out the digital camera slyly while she was looking away, “Hey, Ace!”
“What?” she turned around and I quickly snapped her picture. I looked at the screen quickly after I took her. Her blonde hair was slightly in mid-air, her nose a tiny bit pink, her wide brown eyes in surprise, and her smile; still vivid and gorgeous.
“You really are a punk,” she pouted, crossing her arms, “I don’t like you anymore.”
“Did you like me in the first place?”
She looked over shyly, ignoring my question. She noticed my “book” was sticking out of my backpack, “What’s that you got in the bag?”
“Nothing.”
“Hey, you took a picture of me when I wasn’t prepared, I deserve to make an ass out of you now.”
“No, don’t take it,” I was starting to get a little serious, but she had quick arms and snatched my backpack, grabbing the book. She flipped through pictures quickly, shocked at the ones of Evangeline, enamored of the ones of Miranda and spellbound of the ones of Corrine. Looking back up at me softly, I responded, “Happy now?”
“I’m sorry,” she looked down, ringing her hands together in worry, “I shouldn’t have done that.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” I was seething at her in the moment. I wished I had never ran into Amorella at the moment, then this would have never happened.
“Are these your-”
“Girlfriends, deceased and/or better off without me,” I replied harshly.
“It is Valentine’s Day, I should have expected something like this. I am sorry I intruded. Has anyone seen this before?”
“No, and I intended to have it remain that way.”
“No need to be bitter about it,” her voice was getting softer. She now grabbed something out of her graphic purse and handed it to me, “Here, for your trouble.”
“What is it?” I took it from her harshly, afraid I might have given her a paper cut.
“I’ve been saving it for a rainy day…I figured it would come in handy sometime.”
I opened up the small white envelope and saw a simple Valentine’s card. After glancing through it, I saw loopy cursive writing on the left side and read it:
To Someone Special,
I just knew it was you from the start. I may not know much of you, but I know you mean something to me if I give you this. They always say there’s one person who would die for you. If you’re ever feeling low and down and out, pull out this card and remember that I cared enough to give an almost complete stranger a piece of my heart.
With all my heart,
Amorella Harper
That…was…freaky.
“It comes with a box of little candy hearts if you want them.”
I looked at her softly, my hands still shaking from holding the card. She looked up at me curiously with those wide almond-shaped eyes.
“I got you a card too.”
I quickly reached for my backpack on her side, pulling out my red envelope and she opened it, reading it, not knowing what to say.
I don’t know you, but I do. You’re meant to get this card. Even if we only end up being strangers who briefly meet on a crowded street, at least I know one person’ll remember me for one brief moment. That’s you. Thank you.
Remember me,
Z.W. Hanson
She looked back up to me in questioning, puzzlement, and overall confusion. Then her smile grew as she said, “Here, take a picture of me again. This time, I promise I’ll be prepared.”
My eyes diverted back to the camera, which was still laying in my other palm and I raised it lightly to my eye, “Okay, ready?”
“Yeah.”
“Say…The Doors!”
“The Doors!” the flash overtook my memory.
*****
I never put her pictures in “the book”. The book, safe to say, has been removed of all its pictures, put in a shoebox and placed deep in the attic, where I may never find it again. The book has been burned with the help of Ace later that day.
We parted on good terms, like I always say we do. I tried to remember, as I climbed back into my bed, as I took a new appreciation for those Valentine’s Day cards lying strewn about on the floor, was the whole ordeal with Ace a dream?
The memory of her kiss on my lips and her phone number in my pocket beckoned ‘no, it was real’. Maybe next time I’m shopping for a card, I’ll take my time looking for it.
The End
And what I have so far of the sequel.....
Cupid’s Poison Arrow
God damn candy. God damn kids.
“MOMMY! Get me the big ones!”
“But we already got you the little ones.”
“I Want The Big Ones TOO!”
Sighing, I tried to steer my cart around them. My duty was to go into Wal-Mart and scope out the materials for Zoe’s in-class Valentine’s box. Tons of red, pink, and white construction paper, a kid-friendly pair of scissors (since she is prone to losing them) and a buttload of patience. I was just scoping out the candy aisle, looking for Lindor truffles (only the dark ones; those are the ones that Mom wants), stuck behind this whiny little boy and his mother, who wasn’t really helping the matters, considering she had just let the boy have both bags of candy, spoiling him completely rotten.
“Ooh, these cards play music!”
A teenage girl was now looking at the cards with the music chips inside them, playing various hits such as “All I Want” (I don’t know who sings it, some band from the 90’s), “Wild Thing”, and “Unforgettable”. I picked out the one with “Wild Thing” on the inside, knowing, as always, that it would be perfect.
Now, back to the task at hand.
*******************
After dumping off all the materials on Zoe’s carpet, I pulled out my IPod and decided to drown my sorrows in some music. Lying back on my bed, I pondered for about 25 minutes about the day ahead, when suddenly, a song broke me out of my funk.
“Who in the HELL put ‘Fergilicious’ on my IPod?”
My echoing voice scattered throughout the house as the listeners remained quiet. I knew for a fact that it was no one from my family, but Ace. Yes, Ace. The fellow cynic of Valentine’s Day who about a year ago flung herself into my life so ungracefully with her sexy rendition of “Hello, I Love You” who was now currently my best friend and liked to torture me with her random obsessions with romance and idealism bullshit. Contradictory, no? She does tend to be a bit of a cynic when it comes to Valentine’s Day, which is why our meeting last year made absolute sense. She was out with Vance, her brother, to make best of the day. Turns out a month after she met me, she called me and decided that being my friend was worthy of her time. She had broken up with her boyfriend a couple days before she had met me (as a matter of fact, right after she had the indecision about her card) and she was still feeling bitter about it. As a matter of fact, if I remember correctly, she was in all black, in her self-mourning phase, that day. What I was most surprised to hear was that she admitted that she never opened up that quickly when it came to “the piggish male species”. My response was that she wasn’t that open in the first place, because we both bit each other’s heads off that day.
What a match, huh?
“Fergilicious” was still pouring out of the earpieces as I put them back in and changed the track to “O Valencia” and got up off the bed. I needed to take a little road trip to visit Ace, across town to her ratty, completely unkempt apartment, which I practically lived in half the time. She kept a bed for me there, which was the neatest room in the apartment, even though I’m a guy. I have to keep a place clear to sleep, while she likes to sleep on some clothes. At first, I was disgusted, but I’m just used to it now. I live in her dysfunction, and it just makes Ace…Ace. I practically own half the apartment as I live there half the time I’m around. I decided to spend a couple days at my parents’ place in preparation for Jessica’s 20th birthday.
Gathering up my odds and ends I brought back to the house, I threw them in my backpack and slipped on my favorite gray hoodie. I felt my cell phone vibrating in my pant pocket and I checked it. A text message from Ace:
Wanna make Valentines? I got glitter! Teehee
I shook my head and strolled past my family, Mack and Avery playing bowling on their brand new Wii they got for Christmas.
“Leaving so soon, dear?”
The voice of my mother penetrated the music easily and looked at me with those all-knowing, all concerned “mother” eyes, her hair falling sloppily over her shoulders. She was watching the kids while they were playing, probably just having finishing loading the dishwasher.
“Yeah, Ace and I have a date.”
“I like that girl, I hope you really do have a date with her,” she smiled warmly.
“A date with some glitter.”
“What are you planning, Zachary?” Mom winked at me playfully.
“She wants to make Valentines apparently,” I replied, slinging my backpack more securely on my shoulder, “the book” tucked securely within the fabric and Velcro, “Maybe we’ll get really crazy and break out the love dice.”
“The PG ones, dear,” she laughed.
“Yeah…” I remembered the time Mom caught Corrine and I playing with the NC-17 dice in my room, something she would never let me live down. Suck me there NEVER AGAIN, Corrine. Especially not in front of Diana Hanson.
“So…make sure you remember to drop a line every once in a while, okay? Oh…and there’s something in your back pocket there.”
I flipped over my backpack, not even noticing the side pouch that had a lottery ticket. A LOVE lottery ticket. And a coupon for one free back massage.
“Ace…” I grumbled to myself.
“If it were any more obvious, I think she might have it written all over your backpack in that glitter she’s talking about.”
“What are you getting at?” I raised an eyebrow at her. Sometimes I didn’t get my mother at all.
Then my ringer went off. Ace decided to change her ringtone on my phone every month, which jacked up my phone bill, but as long as I kept the woman happy, it was all good. Ever since I changed my phone to the Cherry Chocolate LG Verizon model, it’s been smooth sailing. But now hearing “Get Your Freak On” by Missy Elliott pouring out of my phone almost made me laugh out loud standing there in front of my brother, sister, and mother. Last month, it was “Lover I Don’t Have to Love” by Bright Eyes, which people thought I was gay for. “I want a boy so drunk that he doesn’t talk” on my cell phone definitely wasn’t the type of image I wanted to send to Zoe, let alone Ezra. Ace, Ace, Ace…was going to be the very death of my social life.
“Better get your phone there, Zac,” Mom raised her eyebrow back and I pressed the send button, sending Ace’s pictured, which featured her leg stretched all the way over her head in her former gymnist’s flexible glory and I spoke, finally:
“Hey, you freaking brat.”
“Zac,” I heard my mother mumbling in the background.
“Did you get your coupon, dork-on?”
“Yes I did,” I smiled as I pulled out the coupon after placing the backpack on the arm of the chair, “I’m looking forward to being sexed up on your dirty bed.”
“Zac,” my mom smacked my arm, “Your brother and sister!”
“You’ve gotta do me first, though.”
“Oooh, now do I?” I wiggled my eyebrows to my mother, who was now shaking her head at my absurdity with Ace. I figured she might as well be used to it by now. Good grief, I’ve been practically living with her for 6 months now.
“Yes, you absolutely do.”
“Well that’s good to know,” I smiled into the phone. There are times that I admit that I am attracted to her, but I know things would just get weird with us if we ever took it to that last step. Knowing her friends, they would walk in on us when I accidentally “tripped and fell on her lips” or knowing MY luck, my mother would walk in when Ace “tripped and fell on my dick”. My damn luck.
So be awesome, and LOVE ME :-D haha Cause it's the remainder of love day.
Oh yeah, and that reminds me...I must look up some Avenue Q. You know a musical is awesome when the song you hear sung all day around you is "The Internet is for Porn". Grab your dick, and double click.