On Friday night I did something tremendously stupid; I made Elizabeth cry. I was leaving for home after delivering her back to UCLA, and instead of enjoying our last goodbye with kisses and promises to talk later that night, I leaned against my car and glared at her, barely speaking. She did her best to engage me, attempting to understand why I was so upset. She asked questions punctuated by wiping tears from her face and breathing in choked-up gasps. I answered with hollow sentence fragments, emotionless and void of compassion. She sat in front of her new apartment building to watch me drive away, but I insisted she leave first. I honked my horn twice, some feeble attempt at a goodbye, but she had already passed through the complex gate. She was gone, and I had driven her away.
There can be little doubt that I am a harsh, callous, and demonstrably mean person. The lion share of humanity pisses me off in one way or another, and it is only the select few who I keep close to me that are immune from judgement. The same idosyncracies don't bother me when observed in the members of my inner circle. My immediate family are the only three people on the planet for whom I have stronger feelings than her; she outranks my grandparents. From our first kiss I have promised her that barring a swerve into alcoholic two-timing kleptomania, she can do absolutely nothing to disappoint me.
Two nights ago, I failed to keep that promise, and I made Elizabeth suffer for it.
Maybe I was pissed off at our failed dinner plans. Or the ticket I got for parking on the street overnight (something that was entirely my responsibility, no matter how much I wanted her to know where Jesse should park Jesse's car). Whatever bullshit excuse I create, nothing stands up against the base expectation of the way she deserves to be treated, particularly on our last night together for probably a month.
The real stink of it was that all of my loathsome attitude evaporated after fifteen minutes on the road. Had I excused myself from dinner and gone to the restroom, I could've slapped myself around, pounded my head into the steel toilet stall door, and figured out that I was spending the last hour with the girl I love, who is nothing but nuts for me, like it was a dinner with my parents over a shitty report card.
I argued with myself over calling her from the road for over an hour. I wanted desperately to go back and undo everything I had just done. I wanted to throw myself in front of her building like Cusak with a ghetto blaster over his head. Love, I get so lost, sometimes...
I'm so sorry Elizabeth. I was childish and agitated and stupid, and not a single angstrom of what I did was your fault. You deserve better in my hands, and I swear I want nothing more from you than the opportunity to make it right."
We haven't spoken since Friday night and it's driving me insane. I sent her a couple texts yesterday but got no response. I've watched her away messages, frantically searching for signs of hope. I pull my phone from my pocket every ten minutes, praying to find a missed call. I have that feeling in my stomach like I've been dumped and can't let go. Thom Yorke keeps yelling, his voice echoing in my head. You did it to yourself, and that's what really hurts is you did it to yourself just you, you and no one else...
