Worst Night Ever
October 12, 2006, 1:22 p.m.
I really need to write an entry. I think I’ve actually been avoiding it for the last couple of days. This will be choppy, because I let some time pass before writing it down.
On Saturday, Philip and I went to the comic shop and everything was great. On Sunday I had to work, so he drove me back into the city (even though he didn’t want to) because I didn’t want to have to take the metro with all my stuff. After work, I was supposed to metro to see him- but I was closing in the café, and that takes forever, and by the time I got to the station the trains had stopped running. (Mostly not my fault). Apparently they stop early on Sunday. I had just called him to tell him I was on my way, and left a voicemail. I called not 4 minutes later and left another voicemail saying I couldn’t take the train there. The first message was delivered, but the second one wasn’t. (Clearly, that is not my fault. Keep track of all the little things that happen that aren’t my fault. They’ll start to add up). After awhile, I got a hold of him, but he had already driven to Branch Avenue to pick me up. He said he’d come into the city to pick me up there so that we could still see each other that night (and do Midnight Waffles, as planned). He didn’t sound too excited to make the trip, but who could blame him? The battery on my phone was getting a little low, but I decided not to plug it in because I didn’t want to take the chance that I’d set it down and not notice it ring. (This will also be important later). I decided it would be a better idea to hold onto it until he arrived and called to let me know. So, I’m sitting there clutching my phone, and I flip it open for no real reason- and I have THREE missed calls from Philip. Evidently, my phone (which gets a perfectly good signal in my apartment) just thought it would be cool to not ring at that particular moment. (Not my fault). I called him back to see if he’d called because he was there already (he was, and he’d been waiting). He answered, he told me he was circling the block and that I WOULD be downstairs when he got there. Then he hung up on me. And that was pretty much the first indicator of how things were going to go.
When he picked me up, he looked angry, and he wasn’t talking. I was just really happy to be with him again, though, and excited for midnight waffles. I’d spent the entire workday thinking about how much fun it would be. I figured that he had just been really inconvenienced, and that it was pretty fair of him to be frustrated, and that he would probably get over it soon. That’s what I get for being optimistic, I guess.
After awhile I tried to talk to him, but he snapped at me and told me he didn’t want to talk. He just kept looking angrier as we drove, instead of calming down. I tried to touch his leg but he just didn’t react at all. I was pretty sure he’d skip midnight waffles and drive me back to base, but he turned into IHOP. Of course, by that time I was pretty sure that he would just be mean and ruin Midnight Waffles anyway, so I wasn’t that disappointed when it turned out to be closed. (Not my fault). Mostly, I was just afraid that he’d get even madder.
We drove back to base, and I showed them my id- the same id they’ve been taking for weeks. We were informed that we would not be able to use that id. The guy working the gate didn’t care if they had written passes with it before, and he didn’t care if it was a Naval id. he picked this particular night to stop accepting it as a valid id card. (Not my fault). While we were parked waiting for the security guy to make his verdict on my card, Philip asked me in this really nasty voice how work had gone. I didn’t know what to say, so I said it was ok. He yelled at me that he was glad it had been worth it. I was so upset; I just could not believe he was making this about my job. I mean, yeah, my job is the reason that I had to be in the city on Sunday. But it’s also the reason we’ll be able to take a really cool honeymoon, and the reason I could buy him his whole new Hordes army. It’s not the reason that the metro closes early on Sundays, or that Cingular didn’t deliver my voicemail promptly, or that IHOP isn’t open 24 hours on Sunday, or that the security guy at Andrews won’t accept my Naval id. SO, when the guy came back and said we absolutely could not use that card I told Philip that my state id might be in my bag in his apartment. So, he told the guy he would drop me off at the visitor’s center and go look. He drives into the parking lot of the Visitor’s Center (which is closed at night), kicks me out of the car and says “You better hope that id is in your bag or I’m driving you to the Branch Avenue station and you can just stay there until it opens tomorrow morning”. And the way he said it, oh my god. I almost believed him. I didn’t want to, but I just kept thinking about how stupid I was not to charge my phone. I didn’t want to risk missing his call and I did anyway. And I just kept thinking “would it be worse to ask to borrow his phone so that I can call my dad, and have to tell him what Philip has done to me, or sleep outside at the metro station without even having a sweatshirt?” Oh, yeah. Philip asked me before I got out of the car if I had anything warm, and I said no, and he said “Well, too bad. I guess you’ll just freeze”. So, I just waited, and shivered, and cried a little bit. Mostly I waited. He came back after awhile, and he had my id card.
I was ambivalent. I mean, I didn’t have to sleep outside or call my daddy to rescue me. But now I’ll never know if he really could have done it. Right now enough time has passed that I don’t think he could have, but at that moment- when I saw my id in his hands- I really didn’t know. I just had no idea.
So, he drove me back to his room and we got out and went straight to bed. No talking. I just lay under the covers and cried. After awhile, he rolled over and put his arms around my waist and said he was sorry. And honestly, for the first time ever, I didn’t want him to touch me. I didn’t react. I was paralyzed. A part of me wanted to hug him and forgive him right away, but a bigger part of me was incredibly, massively, justifiably angry. Another part was still so shocked and how much he had scared me that it couldn’t really believe that his apology was sincere. That part was afraid to touch him or yell at him in case he got angry again. Most of me was hurt. He looked me in the eyes and told me to freeze and sleep outside for the night. He didn’t care that all I’d done was bring an id that had always been accepted in the past. He didn’t even care that I would be cold or unprotected. How can you do that? How can you behave that way for even one second to a person you love? I have never, except for that night, had doubts about our relationship. And it’s kind of funny that I didn’t even have those doubts when he was actually doing it. I didn’t start feeling them until he was apologizing. After a few minutes I realized that I loved him, and I always will, and that absolute forgiveness would come- so I put my head on his chest and curled up with him.
And I kept crying. I didn’t feel better at all. I was crying because he did it, and because I had been so scared, yeah- but mostly because I was STILL too scared. I couldn’t tell him that I was angry or hurt. I couldn’t talk to him. I think I was mostly holding him to make him feel less like a stranger, not to comfort him.
It took me a really long time to fall asleep. After awhile, I started to feel more like I should. I forgave him. Completely. And we woke up holding onto each other still, which was nice. Usually we slip apart in the night but I guess that time he didn’t let go. And in the morning he took me to IHOP. At first it felt weird, and I still had parts of the previous night stuck in my head. He told me that when he’d driven back out of the city after dropping me off, he’d been stuck behind traffic for 2 ½ hours. Well, I hadn’t known that, and it would have been really frustrating, of course- but it’s hardly my fault and it does not at all justify what he did to me. But he was sweet, and loving, and apologetic. And there were these really cute kids in the IHOP lobby and they made me think about Nathan (a kid from the comic shop) and what a great dad he’ll be. And he was so sweet and cuddly… it started to feel more like us. And I felt better. And the rest of the day went all right. We still haven’t really talked about it, and I don’t really want to.
Unfortunately, on Monday my laptop screen broke. For a design major, this is not ok. Basically, I would have been completely screwed without Philip. He took my laptop apart to try and fix it. He ultimately couldn’t, but he did loan me a really nice LCD so that I can work at home and actually helped me figure out how I might be able to work at school with my laptop (by commandeering screens there). I inconvenienced him hugely, and stole one of his screens- but he was completely nice about it the entire time. And even though I kept saying “thank you”, there was no part of me that feared he would flip out from frustration again. It might just be that he was more aware than I thought of my residual feelings about his behavior the night before, and that I sensed that somehow. Maybe that’s the only reason I knew he’d keep being nice. But I think I knew he’d keep being nice because I still trust him, which means that there really was no permanent damage.
We shared dinner Monday night, and cuddled a little. It ended up being kind of nice. I’m looking forward to more cuddling this weekend, and forgetting about this completely.
I’ve just been putting this off because I hate to write negative things about Philip, or my relationship. It really pains me. And I wanted to think about it before I tried to spill. But I did need to get it down before I could stop thinking about it, and I didn’t want to wait so long that I over thought, or be burdened longer than I had to be.
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