Debate and Discourse: AWESOME POST in "Crazy Girlfriend/Boyfriend Stories", by cloudeagle

PeregrineFalcon · August 2009

PeregrineFalcon has reported a post.

Reason:

This isn't awesome. Like, at all. It's fucking tragic.

But jesus, you don't just like something like this fade away without it being read.

My heart goes out to this man.

Forum: Debate and Discourse
Post: Crazy Girlfriend/Boyfriend Stories
Posted by: cloudeagle

Original Content:

This isn't about a crazy girlfriend (she was far from it) but a crazy situation. And it can certainly be argued that I was pretty damn crazy in this situation.

Right before my senior year of high school, I'm working at a training retreat for a positive peer pressure group in high school. Think Up With People only with 1.67% less cheese. Though somehow the membership of most of the more highly regarded cliques makes it a cool thing to be in. At any rate, it's there that I meet Jamie. She's a sophomore at the same school, very cute, utterly vivacious and almost always smiling. Fantastic girl. We hit it off pretty much immediately.

I'm elated. She's loads of fun and likes spending time with me! Silly me thought I was undatable! She seems really into me, and I'm really into her! Life is grand! But. (Of course there's a but.) She's very close to her parents, who are friendly but make it obvious that their daughter is their life. Not to mention the three of them are pretty active in a small Methodist church out in the country, filled with people who are also friendly but also seem quite protective of her. I quickly get the impression that if I step just one toe out of line I will immediately get drawn and quartered.

Add in the facts that I was inexperienced, I was fairly non-assertive and terrified to make the first move and I was horrible at reading signals, and the end result was that I barely touched her during the six months we dated. Did I want to? Hell yes. She was cute, I was hormonal and I was developing feelings for her. But I didn't. Sure, I hugged her, and I held her hand a few times, but in the entire six months we dated I didn't even kiss her. I was just too scared.

At the end of the six months she broke up with me, saying she didn't think things were working out. I was hurt, but I got over it soon enough and we stayed on good terms. Heck, we kept talking regularly.

Cut to the end of the school year. I'm on the newspaper staff, and the staff had just selected the current sophomores who would be on the staff next year and help out with the production of the last paper to get training from us. She's one of them. So we wind up working on the paper together after school hours one night. I have no idea what came over me, but suddenly I'm Mr. Suave. I'm flirty, I rubbed her shoulders, and at one point I picked her up and carried her down the hall. We both had a great time.

That night, she wrote me a note where she finally opens up to me about why we broke up. Namely, because I never touched her. She wanted me to touch her... badly, in fact. The fact that I didn't drove her crazy and made her think that I wasn't interested, and she was the type to expect the guy to make the first move. But that night, I had touched her more than I did in months of dating. She realized I was into her and capable of being physically affectionate, and she floated the idea of getting back together.

But I didn't get that note for awhile.

Spoiler:

I finally got the note when her parents gave it to me, two weeks after Jamie died. She had an exceedingly rare blood condition that literally prevented her body from making red blood cells. Every month, she'd make a three-hour trip to a Memphis hospital for a full blood transfusion. I knew about that from the beginning, and since she seemed healthy I didn't let it bother me (unlike other guys she attempted to date). But she knew that people with the disease died young... better treatment was helping them live longer, but the future was very uncertain. (When she stopped growing as fast, the iron that wasn't being flushed out of her body as a side effect built up and caused her to fade, all within two weeks.) How did she react to knowing she would have a short life? She lived life to the fullest. She had fun. And she wanted to have all kinds of fun with the right guy. A guy who absolutely wanted the same sort of fun but was too chickenshit to act on it until it was too late.

The crushing guilt stayed with me for quite a while, but I did learn from the experience.

PeregrineFalcon · August 2009

And as a follow-up a bit later, so that we don't despair too deeply ...

cloudeagle wrote: »

But things worked out for me, since I'm about to get married to a wonderful woman who does big and small things to make me feel fantastic.

CmdPrompt · August 2009

D:

D:D:D:

Pata · August 2009

That is the saddest thing.

Malkor · August 2009

fuck dude fuck

Olivaw · August 2009

Well I was sort of happy today

Thanks for ruining that for me

Dunadan019 · August 2009

this sounds exactly like 'a walk to remember'.....

Tossrock · August 2009

Dunadan019 wrote: »

this sounds exactly like 'a walk to remember'.....

or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pqiqrnZE44

I guess a lot of people fall in love with terminally ill women

PaperLuigi44 · August 2009

:cry: Christ, that's the saddest thing I've read in a long time.

ElJeffe · August 2009

Five stars, each one cold and dead, their brilliant fires long since extinguished, their warmth leeched into the vacuum of an uncaring universe.

I Win Swordfights · August 2009

Five stars and five hugs and five :(s

DrZiplock · August 2009

Damn.

Bobble · August 2009

Certainly I was D:, but bless her heart, it sounds like she got what she could out of her time. That's more than you can say for some who live 50 years longer. Also glad to hear you've made it.

The Black Hunter · August 2009

you got to touch her in the end and you had good fun, that is what you should think about man

gave her what she wanted in the end

Henroid · August 2009

Pata wrote: »

That is the saddest thing.

Agreed.

Feral · August 2009

Wow.

Just wow.

Blake T · August 2009

Wait, I'm sorry to be the guy that asks the questions at the end of something so sad. But why did her parents keep the note away from him?

The Black Hunter · August 2009

they were very protective

Bendery It Like Beckham · August 2009

... oh dear god D:

cooljammer00 · August 2009

I assumed they found it or something after she died? The way the post is written, I'm not too sure when these events occurred relative to each other.

Also, I thought this was going to be another cult story like that one guy who attacked some cultists at a trap meeting like it was a zombie flick.

proXimity · August 2009

It suddenly feels appropriate that I was listening to Barber's Adagio for Strings while reading this...

Snickers · August 2009

Prox: Exceedingly appropriate.

TL DR · August 2009

Tossrock wrote: »

Dunadan019 wrote: »

this sounds exactly like 'a walk to remember'.....

or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pqiqrnZE44

I guess a lot of people fall in love with terminally ill women

Exactly what came to my mind. Followed shortly by soul-enveloping depression.

darleysam · August 2009

Holy..

cloud, dude.. that's just heartbreaking.

ElJeffe · August 2009

The Black Hunter wrote: »

you got to touch her in the end and you had good fun, that is what you should think about man

I'm pretty sure he specifically implied that he never grabbed her ass.

Forar · August 2009

I... I was not prepared for that twist.

5 heartstring tugging stars.

Weapon X · August 2009

Gaah... I can't even... D:

5 Stars?

Thawmus · August 2009

As a shy person, I can empathize. I've had numerous women that I used to go to school with, tell me that they were interested in me, but were waiting for me to make a move. They're all married.

This story...is rather sobering...in that it shows others a very good reason to just seize the fucking day. The worst that happens is that you get BETTER at it.

ElJeffe · August 2009

Thawmus wrote: »

As a shy person, I can empathize. I've had numerous women that I used to go to school with, tell me that they were interested in me, but were waiting for me to make a move. They're all married.

This story...is rather sobering...in that it shows others a very good reason to just seize the fucking day. The worst that happens is that you get BETTER at it.

Well, the worst that happens is you wind up in a relationship with a dangerous sociopath who becomes jealously and violently obsessed with you, murders your loved ones, and chains you in her basement with the rotting corpses of her past lovers for the rest of your short and pitiable life.

But yours is also a viable possibility.

Thawmus · August 2009

ElJeffe wrote: »

Thawmus wrote: »

As a shy person, I can empathize. I've had numerous women that I used to go to school with, tell me that they were interested in me, but were waiting for me to make a move. They're all married.

This story...is rather sobering...in that it shows others a very good reason to just seize the fucking day. The worst that happens is that you get BETTER at it.

Well, the worst that happens is you wind up in a relationship with a dangerous sociopath who becomes jealously and violently obsessed with you, murders your loved ones, and chains you in her basement with the rotting corpses of her past lovers for the rest of your short and pitiable life.

But yours is also a viable possibility.