Chronology

I'm sitting at the edge of a round table, low to the ground. You're playing a video game and I'm watching: Cheering for you to win. You do and it's someone else's turn to play and you come sit next to me. I lean into you, resting my head on your shoulder, sliding my arm around your waist. Naturally I feel your arm encircle, warm across my back and with your free arm you reach over and take my other hand, cupping it gently in yours.
"Everything okay"
I nod and sigh. "Mmm-hmm."
"Just spent?" you say, leaning closer.
"Yeah... It was a long day..."

It chilly outside and you're standing in my doorway and we're saying good night. My stomach is fluttering madly as I reach up and cup your face in my palm and you lean down and nervously press your lips against mine, just the slightest bit of tongue, and you pull back and step away, smiling. I say good night again and you wave as I close the door between us.

It's loud. There is music playing and everyone is talking and drinking and you tell me that it's okay: I can drink and you'll drive us back home in my car. I ask if you're sure, because I know that you're afraid of driving, and you insist that it's okay and I'll have more fun if I drink. So you get me something alcoholic and we socialize and you're all over me tonight. Not to an excessive means, but you're kissing me out of your own ambition and you put your arm around me and pull me closer as we laugh and talk and have a good time. I don't have to prompt you tonight. You're doing it all yourself.
We walk out to the car in the snow, our breath clinging to the air in little smoke puffs. We drive to my apartment and you pretend to be scared. You tell me you'll come up for a little while, but it's late and you want to go to bed soon. I sit on the couch with you and wrap my arms around your arm, laying my head on your shoulder.
As you and my apartmentmate talk D&D the booze is going to my head and I'm drifting in and out of sleep. Finally you nudge me awake and tell me that you're leaving because I'm obviously tired and should go to bed. You stand up and help me to my feet and wrap your arms around my shoulders. I encircle your waist and lay my head against your chest listening to your heart beat and your lungs breath. Your heart beats faster the longer you hold me and after what seems like five minutes you sigh and say, "This was a good night."
I walk you to the top of the stairs. You tell me that it's cold outside and I don't need to walk you all the way down to the door. I wave and tell you good night.

It's the next day and we're hanging out alone in the apartment. We have to be somewhere in an hour and a half. We are sitting at opposite ends of the couch, our legs meeting and laying next to each other in the middle. We're talking: About anything and everything we can think of to talk about from people we know to the events in our lives to the events of the world around us. Some moments we sit in silence together as the sun sets, turning the living room a bright, vibrant orange.
It's getting close to time to go. You tell me that we need to be there in fifteen minutes, so we should probably go now or we'll be late. You have to go to the bathroom, so I stand by the frame of the hallway waiting for you. You come out and look at me and give me a hug. You bend down and kiss me and we stand in the hallway for five minutes making out. You've never kissed me this intensely before and it's nice. Finally you say that we really need to go because we're late and I say okay.
Tonight we are affectionate and everyone comments on how cute we are together. It's Saturday night and as we're talking I mention that you should stay the night tonight. You smile and say maybe and we continue playing games.
We're driving back to the apartments in my car and as we pull in I ask if you want to stay or not, as it will effect where I turn. You get quiet and clear your throat and tell me that you don't think so, because you don't think you're entirely comfortable with the idea. I tell you that's okay and you tell me that you're sorry and you feel like you should just be a man and suck it up and stay over. I tell you that it's fine and that I'm glad that you're telling me what makes you uncomfortable. I don't want to pull you out of your boundaries before you're ready. You apologize again and I reassure you that it's all right as I kiss you good night and leave you at your doorstep.
I don't bring it up again.

It's Thursday and you are at ASIC, like you are every Thursday. I have a concert and am going out for drinks with a friend afterwards, but I tell you I'll see you later when you come up to the apartment. I get home before you and have homework to do. After a while I hear the door open and close and the whole group of you stampeding in. You stop at my room and I walk to the door to meet you.
"How is your homework going?"
"Good. I'm halfway done."
I look up at you.
"Nope. No kisses until you finish your paper. Call it an incentive."
I pout and you crease your eyebrows.
"Well, I mean... If you wanna make out now we can, but I figured..."
I smile and cut you off. I still feel a little buzzed.
"No. You're right. It's more fun this way."
"We're watching Serenity, so just come out when you're done."
You hug me again, quickly, and go into the other room.

I come out finally and during the movie you pull up a chair next to the arm chair I'm sitting in and, without my prompting, you put your arm around me, attempting to pull me next to you as best you can. As we're watching the movie you rub your hand up and down my neck from where it sits on my shoulder.

The movie is over and everyone has left and you walk me into my bedroom. The light in the corner is still on and you close the door behind you. You walk over to me and wrap your arms around my waist and pull me up to your lips, your tongue wasting no time to enter my mouth. I cling to your neck and try to pull myself closer to you, pressing my body against yours.
You come up for a breath and you're pushing me away and you shake your head and you say, "I can't do this."
I look at you dazed and dizzy and confused.
"I- I mean I just can't... I can't do this anymore..."
You walk me over to the bed and sit down with me, but I can't hear you. There is a buzzing inside my head and a ringing and my eyes are not obeying me and I can't stop crying and sobbing and I ask you why and you say its because you're not comfortable and that you can't do it anymore. I ask you if there's just nothing there and you say, "Of course there is! I'm not gay! I just can't do this with you." I try to put on a brave face even though I can't stop crying and I ask you if you're sure and you say yes. I don't argue. I walk you to the door and tell you that I'll change my Facebook status tonight and you say okay.
I close the door behind you, waving good night and I collapse on the stairs, beating my fists against the carpet. I cry and sob and my head is still buzzing and my ears are still ringing and I can't think or breathe or speak and I swear that I am screaming although I'm sure I am totally silent. My apartmentmate is on the couch sleeping.

It's after Spring Break now and we've been broken up for a week. I sit with you at a table in the pub and ask you why you broke up with me. I've been thinking about it, about all of our moments and something doesn't feel right. I know that there is something that you're not telling me.
"I'm just not.... sexuallyattracted... to you. I don't know... I guess I'm just not really a phsyical guy... Or I just have REALLY high ideals."
I hear what you are saying, although some part of me can't believe it. You are not physically attracted to me and it's because of my looks. That is why you broke up with me.

It's been a year now and I think that I'm over you until I see you face to face again for the first time in 6 months. Your hair is still red and your smile is still crooked and your brilliance still outshines every part of you. I think that I'm over you, but when I see you for the first time, my heart skips a beat and my stomach flutter and I know that I am screwed.
I am crazy right now. I am taking a medicine that is altering my emotions in a bad way, but I'm not going to realize it for another two months. I am over-worked and over-stressed on top of that. It will be two months before I figure out what's wrong with me and change it. By that time it will be too late.
I know that you do not have feelings for me, or at least that you say you do not and that you are sticking to your conviction of that. I would like to try going out with you again, but I realize that this will not happen, so I do not act on my feelings for you at all. I am careful to not get too touchy with you or to get too flirtatious with you or to even look at you with fawning eyes.
I will not jeopardize our friendship because I am in love with you.

My apartmentmate hates me and is no longer speaking to me. I sit with you in the computer lab as you communicate through another friend of ours all of the ridiculous and unwarranted reasons why I am the world's biggest bitch. You tell him to tell my apartmentmate that he's an ass and you're going to go over there and duke it out with him if he doesn't shut up and stop being a baby.
I can't stop crying and you tell me that this is bullshit and that he has nothing. I am not in the wrong.
It's time for class and you walk with me, asking if I will be okay. I shrug and nod and you offer me a hug, something that is unusual for you. You flinch when I touch you and there is something stiff and awkward, but I appreciate the sentiment and know that you are trying.
I am at work and I can't concentrate and I get a message from you asking how I am. I tell you miserable and about how I can't focus on anything because I'm so upset. You ask me if I can give you a ride back to your apartment before I go to my next job.
You tell me that you do not want to play sides, as you've talked to my apartmentmate more and that you are willing to play mediator to find some middleground for us to meet and figure this out. I tell you that I don't think it will work and that I'd rather just give up and let him have his way and think that I'm a bitch. You accuse me of only wanting the moral high ground. Later when we meet you ask if I am okay to drive or if I need you to.

We're in my car and I am still crying. You're calmer now, not so eager to get involved and stand up for me. You ask me what is bothering me and I tell you about everything, about how I feel like everything's falling apart and how I can't seem to get a grip on myself. You tell me that it's just you in the car and that you just want me to pour it all out to you. You tell me to just cry and let it all out because you're there for me. So I tell you about how I feel like I'm breaking apart and how I can't figure out what is going on and how I feel like no one seems to notice that I'm slowly crumbling. I tell you that I feel like I can't deal with anything and I don't understand why.
I will be late for work, so you get out of the car and tell me to try to have a good night.

It is a week later and it is Spring Break and I am sitting with one of our friends, lamenting because I think that I am in love with you, and I don't know what to do about it. I tell her that I want to cut you out of my, because that will be easier and because some part of me doesn't think that it would bother you in the least. She tells me this is crazy and that I know that it's crazy. You obviously care about me. Look at how you sprung to my defense when things started going down with my apartmentmate. She says I am being silly and that if I cut you out of my life it would hurt you, even though you wouldn't show it. I believe her and stop worrying. I let her convince me that you care, even if you don't have feelings for me. I'm still crazy, but I'm closer to figuring it out.

It's been a week and we are all back from Spring Break again. It is Thursday and I stop in at ASIC to say hello to everyone and watch a show or two and you are very distant. When it is break I ask if you need a ride up to the apartments and you assure me that there are a lot of other people there and that you're sure you can find a ride up, but you'll let me know if you don't. This is odd to me and it upsets me, especially since you haven't been talking to me all week. I leave without saying anything.
When I get home the dishes that have been sitting in the sink since Sunday are still not washed. They are not my dishes and I can't walk into the kitchen with almost vomiting from the stench emanating from the sink.
I text you to say that I am insanely angry. You do not text me back. Later I look out the window and happen to see you disappear into your apartment. You have walked back because no one there could give you a ride.

It is the next day and everything is done. You and I and our friend are hanging out. You were reluctant to stop over, but since there was nothing else to do as a last resort you decided to. I have asked my apartmentmate to sign a vacancy form so I can live with someone else next year. He refuses, telling me that he's "just fine" with our living situation (in which he doesn't speak to me unless I ask him a question, and then responds with hostility) and that he's "comfortable where he's at" and that if I have a problem I should "learn to deal with it" because he's "not going anywhere unless there's a police officer with a form that says he has to move."
I cry and scream and call him names and tell him he's a bastard. I don't regret this. He's an asshole and I don't feel sorry for him anymore. I will find out later about some of the lies he will tell about me and parts of the story he'll leave out so that I seem like I'm completely in the wrong and he didn't do anything to deserve my malice. I'll be very disappointed to find out much much later, from another friend, that you're listening to him.
You come online and ask me how it went. I tell you terrible and that I just think that I'm going to try to get out and find somewhere else to live and you say that you think this is for the best. I tell you that I am just completely miserable right now.
You respond: There's nothing I can do for you at this point.
I am speechless, breathless, even. There's a lot that you could do from me that doesn't involve you even involving yourself in the situation. I need a friend who will at least cheer me up, send me a link to a funny website or tell me a snarky joke to try and make me laugh. Even just tell me that this is unfair. I need a friend like the friend you used to be to me even after we broke up. I said that I was miserable, not that I wanted you to save me. I need you, and you are telling me, too bad, because you're afraid that if you act too nice to me I'm going to get the "wrong impression." I need you, more than I have needed you this entire time, to be my friend, and you are not there.

It's the end of the year. You are a graduate now and I am driving you to the bus station after our final week as a group of friends in college.
"College was fun," you say, shrugging.
You give me a hug in the parking lot. You are stiff and won't hold me for longer than a second or two. I tell you that I'm terrible with goodbyes and that you should get over it and don't let go.
You made sure on the phone when you called to ask if I'd still give you a ride that I knew that it was only because I was the only person that you thought would be awake and willing to drive you that early.
There are a lot of things I want to say to you right now, but I bite my lips shut and wave. I consider running across the parking lot, hugging you again and telling you that I love you, but I make myself get in my car before any part of me can entertain the idea. I'm driving back to work, which I am now 30 minutes late for and I can't stop crying. Finally, as I pull into the parking lot I stop and I call you.
You answer.
"Look, I know that you know, but I really do love you."
Silence.
"I mean, I know that it's nothing new to you but..."
"I know... I'm sorry..."
I feel foolish, but I press on. I tell you that I hope that someday I get a second chance with you and that if you want me someday there might still be something there. I tell you that I feel like a coward because I couldn't say this to your face and had to be "cool" and call you from the parking lot when I was well away. You tell me that you feel like a bit of a coward yourself, but you do not say why.

We don't talk anymore. You messaged me when you needed to organize yourself so that all of us could congregate as friends again, and that week there were moments and passing quips, but we don't have conversations anymore. We don't speak.

The more that I think about it, the more I want to forget you. I just want to write you out of my life the way that you seem to have written me out of yours. I don't want to sit around and pine for you, when you've been gone for this long. I don't want you anymore. I don't want you to be constantly on my mind or invading my dreams anymore. I don't want to look at every boy I meet that has "potential" and think that they're not you. I don't want to be in love with someone who doesn't love me.
You've changed so much from the person we were when we were together, and I'm in love with the side of you that you try to hide from everyone, especially me. You know that all I've wanted from you is the truth, and you won't give it to me. That's all I wanted. I can live without you. I can live if you don't love me and I can love someone else someday. All I asked you for was the truth so that I could have my closure, and you stopped speaking to me.
And if I show any of this to you, then in your eyes I am weak, overemotional and possibly psychotic... And so I let you continue to let you hurt me and don't say a word because you can't deal with emotion.
And I want to tell you that I'm done with you. I refuse to let you do this to me any longer and if you continue to push me, I'm not going to try to stay in your life anymore. I'm going to walk away from you, and do whatever I can to delete you from mine.
You can't break me.