The Ideal World

Everything’s a state of mind. Even Stevie Nicks said it in “Dreams,” “Dreams unwind; love’s a state of mind.” Sometimes nothing changes, and the mind alters your surroundings. Heaven burns, and fire gives you the chills. Lying with my Stevie, something broke in me – or was it just a mending – something clicking together, something gone right for once? Deep within bliss with my lover, hopelessness crashed in waves cresting over beauty in the water, frothing with layers of sandy resentment and bubbles of relentless joy. I don’t know. Maybe I do have something wrong with me. 

*******

“Do you really love her?”

I had just gotten off the phone with Stevie. I find it illogical to end a phone conversation with your lover without the tag line, “I love you.” As does she. I was sitting on the floor in my room. Stevie’s best friend Melissa, one of the very few people that knew about our relationship, was over my house when Stevie called, talked with me a few minutes about our plans for the weekend, and bid farewell with a sweet, “I love you.” I don’t know why Melissa was questioning my almost-standard reply of, “I love you too.” I never knew it was a question.
“Um… yeah. Duh.” That was about all from me. I chose not to dignify the question with an elaborate response.
“No, Chris. Think about it. Do you really love her? Can you stand to lose her? What if she were to dump you this minute? You speak of hot guys you just wish you could date, not loving or even liking them, but just wanting the appearance and the normalcy. Actually, you speak about them at great length. Enough ‘what if’ you could date them. Why don’t you just go with them already.”
“Because.” I was silent, and I felt Melissa’s judgment through her caring, gorgeous, but completely heterosexual eyes. Not as beautiful as Stevie’s, of course, but not choice objects to be used as weapons, either. “Because I know her side of it. I couldn’t hurt her. I don’t wanna sound stuck up, but you know she practically breathes me. You know how it is.”
“That’s not love,” Melissa quickly and quietly countered. “That’s her love for you. I asked you if you love her. You still haven’t answered my questions. Why wouldn’t you just go with all those guys who lust after you?”
“I don’t know. I couldn’t.”
“Why won’t you tell even me your true feelings, let alone her? I might be her friend, but I’m your friend, too.”
“I don’t know.”
“What if she heard about your attempted ‘flings’ with some guys?”
“I don’t know.”
Melissa was quiet for a moment. “What if she dumped you?”
“I don’t know.”

*******

“What’s wrong, baby?”
“I dunno…” That was the millionth time I had answered her with “I dunno” or “nothing.”
“Will you talk to me, already?!”
“Well, it’s Ed… he’s so nice…”
“Oh great. Another wandering-away for your heart. Lust. How nice. And what are you gonna do about him, if I may ask?”
“I don’t know.”
“That doesn’t sound too convincing. Would you really leave me for him?”
“I don’t know.”

*******

People seem to love the phrase, “I did my best; I have no regrets.” As if! Like people could – for real – live an entire life with no mistakes, nothing to be altered? Wow. I’m even starting to think in girlie-girl language. Forgive me. I think I’m trying way too hard. Trying to be like THEM… I always have hated the collective “them.” Funny how I would surrender my proverbial “place in heaven” for “them.”

*******

I thought Stevie was strong. I thought her soft spot had a shield. I thought that she didn’t care enough for it to hurt her. I didn’t think I’d ever see her cry.
“Stevie, what the fuck is your problem?!”
“I don’t know?! I don’t know?! How fucking convincing! Fine! Go be with them! Have a blast! I think I’ll get my poor little trashy misfit dyke self out of here now.”
“Yeah. Maybe it would be best to just be friends for a while…”
She looked at me incredulously and just left. I saw her shoulders shake as I stared after her. I would have called Ed, or Drew, or Ken, or anyone else- had I even cared. Had they cared about me. It was all bullshit – something never to happen anyway and something I’m sure I didn’t particularly want to have happen. It’s like winning a contest to a Britney Spears concert. She makes me physically ill, but I’d only want to go to talk about how lucky I was. 
I might have called my best friend. Either that or she just showed up on her own. That is more likely. I’m not sure. 
“Hey. Saw Stevie. She looks like ass. What’s up? Haven’t seen you in a while. You spend too much time with that dyke. Don’t throw out your best friend for some butch girl like that.”
“Wait, Jen. I thought you *weren’t* homophobic. Before you start insulting any of my other friends.”
“How many dykes are you fucking hanging with? Don’t get turned, Chris. You’ve got way too much at stake.”
“Yeah, and our friendship is one of them, I guess, if God forbid I happen to be… GAY! Jeez, what’s your issue?”
She looked at me oddly. “Yeah. That’s if you WERE gay and I was friends with you. But since I already knew you weren’t, I don’t want you to fuck up your rep.”
“Awwww…” I meant it. I was touched that she cared. I was still stuck in my fallacy of “normal.”

*******

I got some dude to go with me to a school dance. His name matters not. He matters not. Stevie still wasn’t talking to me.
I would almost love to say that something dramatic either broke things completely or acted as the deux ex machina and just patched everything up quite smoothly. Like that the guy raped me, or Stevie saved my life in an accident, or I turned normal and went back to her crying repentance barefoot in the snow like a King Henry to the pope – and she gave in and forgave. And took me back. No. That only happens in the ideal world. 

*******

He and I were watching various porn videos, some interspersed with lesbian scenes. Some were strangely affectionate, considering that is not the normal nature of lesbian porn for guys. I tried not to stare or let any signs of horniness show. I guess I should have shown some horniness to the straight sex parts. Oops.
“Hey babe, you ever fuck a guy before? You couldn’t be a virgin.”
“Uh, no. Actually I never have been with a guy.”
“Never got laid? Come here…”
“Actually, I’m still really not ready. It takes a lot for me to give up as much as that. Sorry to be all philosophical and stuff.”
“It’s OK, babe.”
Another lesbian scene came on. I really wish guys could control their horniness. And I also wish that guys didn’t believe they had rights to girls’ bodies. And I really, really wish the girl didn’t look so fucking like you-know-who, or kissed passionately like her, or moaned like her… Jesus.
“AY! Get the fuck off of me!”
He pulled his finger, which he had slid up my loose shorts, out of my pussy. His finger glistened. He glanced at my eyes, than quickly at the TV. I knew then that he knew.
“You fucking lesbian! Get the fuck away from me you deranged carpet-muncher!”
I didn’t know how Stevie could stand this shit, probably with significantly more frequency than I could possibly weather myself. As I ran, I wasn’t crying. I think I cauterized myself. Or it just hurt way too much for me to even feel it, like a dog whistle blasted right into a human ear. 

*******

Possibly I could go later and ask Stevie’s forgiveness. She is normalcy in life, I guess. I’d like to think that things will go back to the way they were. The perfect bitter sweetness, right after I was released from the mental hospital. My life was in shambles; my reputation was on the edge of the cliff. Now I don’t care. Figures. All because then I was with Stevie. Now I’m “normal.” And not with her. And not contented. 
It was me, not her, that was fucked up. Only I can help things at all, it seems. Or at least it was that way, if not anymore. Things would be fine now. Dreams wouldn’t unwind. Only if we were in the ideal world.