He, Sakura and Myself; we all watched the film adaptation of Chuck P.'s 'Choke'...gotta say, not bad.
The whole time I could help but think of Bella, for more than just the obvious reasons. Yes, I wanted to fuck her brains out in a church, on the pews, while staring at the crucifix. But more importantly, because I had shown her Chuck P. and of all the books of his she could have bought first, she chose 'Choke'. I felt like I needed to watch it with her.
Also, she joined mine and Betty's tradition of watching movies at my house.
So that means the small little heart flutter had subsided, I was back in the friend zone. But I didn't mind it.
No, it had become easy to forget her admitting to having feelings for me, and so I was able to go on the way friends ought to.
A huge weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. I felt at ease, no longer feeling the need to produce. My heart stopped beating, and all that was left was my brain and flesh. Even though the flesh lacked any sort of interaction, being human still made me crave certain things.
So, more or less, all that was left was my brain, working and working. Without the aid of my heart, it started to feel a little bit like work; all this writing. Yet poetry seemed to flow, the separation of heart and mind had become apparent to me - at least in the writing sense. I still loved to write, and loved the friend who loved to read, but at that time I became extremely exhausted and frightened.
I feared that the end had come and passed and I was living much the way characters live in between books or movies. That part of the story where nothing is written but development still occurs.
I knew these times would be some of my most cherished, even as they unfolded around me. I knew I'd look back, in my head whenever a certain song, movie or book would be mentioned. What I wasn't waiting for was when I feeling would rise up and bring me back to these times, after everything had changed. The fall marked the change in times, I knew that even before summer had begun.
I would hopefully go back to school and 'start' my life.
What I planned to do was go to RCC for a few years, get my GE out of the way, take some language, art, and botany classes then transfer to the school I really wanted to go into; Chapman University in Orange. My mother used to live a few blocks from there, and I knew even if I still lived in Riverside I could just take the train there and back [it was only blocks away from campus] so commuting wouldn't be an issue.
I hoped to become a writer, a professional one. Even if it didn't support me, I would feel accomplished if I had tangible works in book stores.
I knew people didn't read anymore, and I knew that bookstores would become more and more a thing of the past as the years rolled by, but still I wanted it. To be a writer.
But during that summer, I don't know, I just felt...scared. I was afraid that it wouldn't ever work. That since I had been out of school for so long, I'd never go back. That I'd keep putting off paying my debts, because that's just what I did. I feared that I'd end up a has-been, with no money, who still worked at CVC. That life scared the living shit out of me. Even if I ended up with Bella, the love of my life, I still would feel trapped and worthless.
I thought, for a while, that music was what made me most happy, the greatest form of expression for me, but I was only partly correct. Just like everything, my ultimate joy came in threes; Writing, Music, and Art.
Film.
That's why I had to go to Chapman, or at least felt an overwhelming urge to go there. I had been there once before, on a campus tour with my mother, the summer before my senior year of high school. That place changed my life, it was different than any other university I had ever been to. The rooms were so small, so I knew I would be noticed by my professors, therefore not allowing me to fail. I wouldn't just be a name on the role sheet [at least not for some professors, anyway].
And then I saw their film department, and my heart started beating. It was really the first time I felt at home.
And so, I knew...I had to go to Chapman. The feel was so ineffable, I wish I could go into more detail about the fine establishment, but that'll have to wait for another chapter. Now its back to the summer of '09.
Cut to that summer, me being scared shitless of the life I was beginning and the life I wanted to begin. I was jumping on a moving train, and I knew the transition would a painful. I really didn't want to lose any of the new friends I had made, I had lost enough that year. I was always a very outgoing person, I had tons of acquaintances but only a few friends.
And that year I think I made more than ever before. That's why, at first, I was so afraid of losing Bella. She really had become one of my best friends. I was glad we didn't end up with each other for a while, I don't think it would have worked out any other way. It never does for me, anyway.
My heart, flesh, and brain usually get along well with a girl, at first...but slowly they begin to separate. But with Bella, us becoming friends, it really made every aspect love her. I still, to this day, thank her for that.
Sometimes she still asks me how we ended up together, as if she had forgotten, or to make sure I hadn't. Sometimes she asks me what I love most about her, as if she couldn't tell just by seeing the way we interact. Sometimes she read the old letters I'd written to her, or look through the old photo albums, as if it was some kind of movie that only the two of us knew.
I remember I would leave her little poems when we worked together, let's say she was pulling add or something. I would leave a poem some place obvious, but not too obvious that way only she would find it. And I always wrote cryptically, and used nicknames so that if, for whatever reason someone other than her found it, they would discard it. It took her a while to catch on, I don't think she even notice the first few ones until I asked her about them.
Then she saw them.
I remember one day we were mad at each other, because I was being rude and was treating her like an idiot, I was being a very big smart ass that day. It made me sick, knowing I made her upset [see I was testing to see how much I still felt for her, and her for me, so I tried really hard to be an ass so I could see]. So it was confirmed [at least to me] that there was still that something there, but we unofficially agreed to ignore it, I suppose. And because I had seen how deeply I cut her with my words, and how deeply it cut me to see her in those angry shambles, I repented and wrote her a poem. It seemed to cheer her up, because for the rest of the evening she was content, it seemed. We ate dinner and there wasn't a second of tension, so I was happy, and knew that as long as I was open and kept writing, she'd stay my best friend. Of course I knew if I turned into a dickhead, for whatever reason, make it a girl, or stress, whatever, that she'd give me the boot. But it was still nice to know I didn't have to wonder about our friendship being authentic. I just wished she would have been as open as I was. I mean it came, eventually, and never as too much, but it came and I was obliged.
Yes, I was falling in love with my best friend. The one person I felt I would never ben good enough to be with. But hey, at least I was in love, its better than being alone, right?
-Sir Jestro
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