Jenna's House of Idiosyncrasies Version 10.0 [Focus.]

Loooooong, slightly masturbatory essay. I apologize in advance.

“Jenna,” He stuck his chin out and whined with faux exasperation, “why do you hate me so much?”

Everyone's got that one friend who uses some variation on this phrase as a way to tell you to just lighten up when you are trying to get them to do something completely reasonable. Like stop drinking when they've clearly had enough. Or get in the car when it's 5 in the morning and obviously time to head home. Or to please, just put some clothes on. While you're just trying to get through to the end of the night, your friend basically says to you, Stop being so uptight. You're totally harshing my mellow.

“I don't hate you, I love you.” I was practically yelling. “Sometimes I hate myself I love you so much.”

When you hear something like this in a movie, it's tender. The main characters are somehow star-crossed, the universe aligning against them. When I said it, it was nothing but angry. I didn't just love him, I was in love with him, a fact he had been allowed to remain blissfully ignorant of for at least a year. I was tired, I was frustrated, and I had just been a reluctant witness to some overt sexual activity. In a hot tub.1 I was feeling raw, frayed at the edges, and even as I felt I was finally speaking the truth, I was also acutely aware that I was speaking in tired clichés, playing out my own mini drama.

And why not? I couldn't have dressed the set better myself. The whole of the deck we were sitting on was covered in the remnants of a wild party: plates, cups and glasses everywhere, abandoned food, half-filled beers, empty packs of cigarettes, and even discarded clothes. The sun was coming up, I was the one and only person on the property who had remained clothed until this hour, I was finally sober, and I was ready to go home. The man sitting to my left (whom I'll just call Edward), the only other person still awake, the person I was trying to get into the car so we could leave, wore a towel. I had admonished him to get dressed several times up until this point, and had been playfully punished (spanked) for my trouble, which, granted, I normally would have found hot, but the only thing I was interested in at that moment was getting in my own bed and going to sleep.

I finally got him in the car, and on the ride home we unpacked the events of the party. The way everything had started out so normal. A back yard with food and drink and even at least one child. Trying to figure out where the wrong turn occured.

“Mrs. Robinson2 had her arm around me, and her hand in my back pocket.”

“Yeah, I was there. You pulled me into your other side.”

“'Cause you needed to protect your territory!”

“My territory? You're my territory now?”

“Damn straight.”

This exchange emboldened me a little, that's for sure, but I still never would have said what I said under less pressing circumstances. However, the hour was quite late, I was still frazzled by all I had seen, and on top of all that, I was burning with jealousy and distrust.

Unwisely, I decided to confront Edward a few minutes later about his own scandalous activity at the party with a person I'll call Anna. He feigned ignorance. “I think she made a pass at me, I guess.”

“She made a pass at you, in the bathroom, for twenty minutes?”

I told Edward that I didn't like Anna anymore, that “her stock, for me, has dropped”. In my exhaustion, I completely forgot that I may be asked to justify this assertion, and I was.

“I'm not going to tell you. It's embarrassing.”

“C'mon, just tell me.”

“No way.”

“Tell me!”

It went on like this for awhile, until I confessed. “Anna asked me if I was dating anyone, and I told her that what I really wanted was to get something going with you, but that it hadn't happened.”

Then she proceeded to take a second run at my date, no longer hiding out in the bathroom, but instead making explicit sexual overtures towards him, while they were the only two in what had been, briefly, a sex-free hot tub. Right in front of me.

I took the opportunity to hide out in my car until she got in her own car with her husband, and left3, so I have no idea what happened. I spent the time sitting in my car listening to the The Films' ‘Jealousy’ on a loop, crying as Michael Trent's anguished wailing washed over me.

And I can’t tell no one
‘cause I got no reason
To be acting the way that I am

When I retold this story to Edward on the way home, I left out the sobbing.

Edward barely acknowledged the real meat of my story, instead tentatively offering, “Yeah, I think she put her foot in my crotch.” He said this in a way that made it sound repugnant, but I didn't believe the charade, and replied in a tone that indicated that I knew there was more to it.

“Oh, did she?”

“Isn't she married?”

“Maybe they have some kind of understanding.”

Moving right along, we talked about other happenings of the night, like the guy who ultimately ended up, ahem, entertaining Mrs. Robinson, the ridiculous tattoos some of the naked people had, and the general creepiness of it all. Then, apropos of nothing, he went there. I think he just couldn't help himself.

“So... you have the hots for me?”4

I took a deep breath. “Yes.”

“Why?”

Given that he knew how he felt, and I knew how he felt, I can't decide if this question was a sadistic move, if he was just stalling for time, or if he was actually looking for talking points to use in what would be his argument against this. For some reason, I went ahead and answered this question, and volunteered several reasons. I'm not going to reiterate them; just think of what you would say to someone you're crazy about and pretend I said that.

Still drunk, he started sliding into a speech about how I wasn't his type. “I like a girl with big hips, you know, something I can grab...”

Sensing this was perhaps not the best strategy to go with, he verbally turned on his heel at that moment and offered up the still classic Our Friendship Is The Most Important Thing argument.

“...the reason I don't get involved with you is because what we have, Jenna, is too special.”

I hate when someone uses my name in a sentence like this. It makes me feel violated somehow. I should have been crying by this point, but I was feeling put on and exhausted and just wanted him to cease talking about this. I cut him off as he continued with more of the same spiel about our special friendship. “You know, whatever, just stop.”

And then, we were yelling at each other like an old married couple, which I must admit is ironic. I can't even remember what it was about, because I think it had mostly to do with the pure tension in the car and little to do with the actual content of the conversation.

Then silence, until we got to his place. I went inside, briefly, to unload all the stuff in my purse that I had grabbed when he went into the hot tub—his watch, his cigarettes—onto his coffee table. Even then, upset as I was, I was still taking care of him.

“Okay, well I guess I'll see you later.” I turned and started to walk out the open door.

“Jenna, where're you going?”

I turned to face him, and he was looking at me with hurt, puppy dog eyes. I asked, truly exasperated, “What do you want from me?”

He looked thrown by this question. “I don't know.”

I studied his face for a moment and realized he was being sincere. “No,” I said slowly, “you really don't.”

I turned and marched out to my car. As I unlocked it he yelled out his open front door to me, “You don't know either!”

“Oh yes I do!” I yelled back as I climbed into my car and slammed the door. He slammed his door. I drove away. The whole thing was so ridiculous, so melodramatic, that I couldn't even cry about it. I just went home, made myself some breakfast, and tried to forget about the whole thing.

When I saw him next, two days later, he acted as if he didn't remember, which honestly wouldn't surprise me, given all the tequila in his system. But when I casually questioned him on it, his affect kind of freaked me out.

“You were pretty far gone. How much to you remem—?”

“—Everything.”

I wanted to discuss it at the time, because I didn't like the way we'd left things, but he quickly changed the subject. This is the pattern with us. Stuff goes down in the wee small hours, and then we go on like nothing ever happened.

Edward spent the whole first part of this party telling everyone I am his best friend, which would actually be just perfect, if I felt like it were true. I just don't feel it. This whole episode is almost pointless to write about. There's no funny conclusion, I didn't learn anything, and my feelings have not gone away the way the usually do after I go into confessional mode. All these long, useless paragraphs do is record completely overwrought conversation and high school style drama so that hopefully, soon, I can read this back to my slightly older self and realize how stupid I was to fall so hard, and let myself cultivate the completely fucked up situation (mostly in ways that I have not even talked about) that lead to this meltdown. I've expended a lot of energy fawning all over someone who I knew didn't feel the exact same way. I let myself be led around by little morsels of attention and physical affection, knowing that nothing real was ever going to come from it.

And I would go right back to that fucked up situation if he'd have me.

1. 1. When describing the scene to someone a couple days later, I could only stammer until I blurted out, “Have you seen Caligula?”
2. 2. Many of the names in this story have been changed to protect the wicked.
3. 3. Seriously a pushover move. I should have walked right up to the edge of that tub and said something then.
4. 4. I have to note he said this in a way that was almost comically incredulous. When I told this story to Maggie, she actually let out a huge gasp here and exclaimed, “He didn't know?!?”