The Encounter

I wrote this story as a therapeutic tool in May. I ran into her this past week but it was nothing like this story. In fact, no words were exchanged at all. Just eye contact...

But here is the fictionalized account from May. Be kind.

--

I was looking down, slowly deciding whether to set my life's soundtrack to Oscar Peterson or Henry Mancini. Mancini spoke to the mood I was in – nostalgic, secluded, and wanting to take in the beautiful scenery of the city only in slow motion. Oscar spoke to the mood I wanted to be in – that of a black-and-white movie in which the protagonist has the confidence to conquer the fast-paced city around him.

Either choice left me in my own bubble not conscious of the faces around me and only their existence.

She must have seen me coming. She was stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, standing still, waiting for me to literally bump into her on 37th street – an area that not near school, home, or work for either one of us.

“Hi.” Not my most eloquent of openings, but I was impressed that I could even open my mouth to say anything.

“You look good.” This was a small victory for me. I had joined a gym not more than a year ago and I secretly hoped to run into her so she could realize just by looking how great my life was, that I had a healthy glow, and that I was happy without her.

“Thanks. I've been taking care of myself.” I couldn't bring myself to say how good she looked. She did look good, but if I had said it aloud, it would have been an admission of defeat that she has been doing well without me.

We were high school sweethearts. I fell in love with her the day I met her, and while it took me a year and a half to let the words roll off my tongue to tell her, we both knew it within minutes. We had both been section editors of the newspaper, yet we never actually spoke since my section was already turned in before her's was even started. We were named co-managing editors, and in our first meeting together, the connection was tangible to everyone in the room. She pretended to care about a state law relevant to an article she was writing only to hear me talk. She asked me to email her the law just to have an excuse to get my email address and start a conversation.

I made excuses, too. The first time I spoke to her on the phone was while baking a cake for my mother's birthday. I needed a frosting recipe and figured maybe she'd have one. We spoke for two hours, and the cake never got frosted – but I didn't care; I just wanted to talk to her and needed the right opening.

For the following two years, we were inseparable. When she left for college, thousands of miles away, we were hopeless romantics, planning our lives to become what bad chick-flicks are made of. The distance proved too much and, after a year, we broke up. We were together for over three years and in love for even longer.

We had been apart for as long as we had been together, and it still was unreal to me that she was now engaged. “Congratulations. When's the wedding?”

“We're not sure, yet. His mother always wanted a winter wedding. You know I never cared, and my mother transferred all her dreams to my sister years ago.” I, of course, knew this from the days when we stopped taking it one day at a time and started realizing what we had.

I made note of the ring. I was pleasantly surprised at how simple it was. The woman living on the Upper East Side – on the rich side of 3rd Avenue – seemed to have kept the ideals of the girl she had been, looking forward to inheriting her mother's fake diamonds and wearing them proudly as a symbol of her modesty.

“Well, if you need a band...”

She cut me off, thinking I was going to offer my own service. “I don't know if that would be a good idea.”

“No – that would be too awkward. But here's my card; I just started managing a couple of bands and I could get you a good rate.”

She thanked me, but I could tell it was empty. I couldn't help but think she was going to throw the business card away as soon as my back was turned, throwing me out of her life yet again. I wondered if she would tell him she saw me.

“Well, I should be...”

I cut her off. “I tried to call you when I found out, but I couldn't bring myself to press send.”

“It's okay; I don't have that phone number anymore. But I'm glad you didn't email me. You really should just st...”

“I miss you.”

Silence.

“I still think about you.”

“I know. I miss you, too, but I don't think about it anymore. I can't. But I really need to go. And you need to stop thinking.”

“Just tell me you're in love with him and I'll stop. Tell me you love him for everything he is and not for everything I'm not. Tell me you're truly happy and don't ever wonder what could be – not even what could have been but what could actually be now that we're in the same place again – and I'll leave. I'll just get out of your life forever. I'll never run into you again.”

Maybe she couldn't answer those questions because she wasn't sure of the answers. Maybe she was as shocked as I was that those words came out of my mouth. Maybe she didn't because she knew it was an empty promise, and that living only 3 streets apart – no matter how many avenues away – and going to school with only 5th Avenue between us made never running into her a promise I had no authority to make. Maybe she still believed we'd fall in love again if given the chance and that she would just never give us the chance.

I didn't hug her and hold her close as I'd always imagined I would; she didn't give me the chance. She just smiled as she turned and walked away, whispering only, “goodbye.”