When I first met him, whenever I saw JD, he would tilt his head and tap his cheek twice. I knew he was going to turn his head at the last moment causing me to kiss his rough lips instead of the smooth, plush cheek he had alluded to. I knew because he did it every single time. I humored him mainly because the resulting peck on the lips was not romantic, not indulgent, and completely un-invasive. It was hardly a kiss at all. And certainly not the kind of kiss that I thought meant anything. How could it have meant anything when he did it to every girl he knew?
One day he asked if I wanted to take a walk. JD parked in the strip mall parking lot and we hoofed it to the nearest nature path. The sun cascaded at intervals through the trees onto the black tar road. He asked me questions about movies I loved, bands I loved, and people I hated. The street became a path and then, after a few yards, turned into a dirt trail. He asked follow up questions, and prodded me to talk even more about myself. I was feeling quite lucky to have found a friend so interested in my ideas. The trees grew thicker and the sun was dotted out by towering branches leaving a green glow under the canopy of so many limbs. JD didn’t ask if I had a boyfriend (which I did). He didn’t ask about my romantic endeavors. He didn’t even ask if I liked him. The entire conversation was completely platonic. He gave me absolutely no indication that he might be entertaining any “ideas” about our friendship.
When we got to a part of the woods that overlooked a stream we stopped walking for a moment to admire the view. A solid mass of mosquitoes settled over us and the air smelled like a stagnant toilet. JD took my hand. I let him hold it for a second, squinting and searching his face as if I could find an explanation somewhere in his expression. The next second his mouth was covering mine in a completely un-platonic, over-indulgent, immensely-romantic, and entirely-invasive kiss.
I might have allowed it to continue, just to see if I felt something, but the venue was less than idealistic, and our walk in the heat had brought out JD’s less attractive qualities. His sweaty shirt clung to his plush body and he radiated body odor. Mosquitoes were biting my bare ankles and growing higher up my body by the second. I pushed him away and told him that he must have misunderstood something. He apologized. I had thought that we could continue walking and talking as we had been, but he clearly had only one reason for doing any of this. And once he realized it wasn’t going to happen, he just wanted to leave. On the walk back he didn’t ask me anymore questions. He had never actually cared what I liked or hated.
Why didn’t I know what that boy wanted? At that moment, I wasn’t being blinded by booze, hormones, loneliness, or emotional trauma of any kind. And yet, I failed to see it coming. My dad could have told me any number of boys were only nice to me for one reason. When I was a teenager, I couldn’t think of anything more insulting. “They aren’t like that. Are you saying a guy couldn’t possibly see me as anything more than a piece of ass?” Back then I had way more guy friends than girl friends, and it was truly an affront to propose that they had ulterior motives in being my friends.
JD didn’t come around too much after that incident. When I did see him, he didn’t tap his cheek, and he didn’t ask me about my day. He wasn’t rude, but he didn’t put forth any further effort to get to know me, or get close to me. He disappeared from my life suddenly and forever within a month or so. I have a theory that JD was really just a fast-fowarded play-by-play of what some of the guys I called friends eventually did. Some took months or even years cultivating a friendship with me only to reveal they had “other feelings” too. Some I dated, some I didn’t, but the end result overall was that once the romantic feelings were snuffed out, the friendship wasn’t far behind. Some of them drifted away quickly, but others tried to make good on their investment by remaining my friend for years after, at least until they found a woman who filled both needs: friend and lover.
Of course, there’s another theory. JD was just a jackass, and many of those who know him will vouch for that. And part of growing up is getting married and leaving friends and flames alike, in the wake of a new life of kids and carpools. I’d rather go on believing that life simply steers people in opposite directions sometimes after years of steering them parallel. It happens, and if the friendship fizzles out, it doesn’t mean that it didn’t mean anything, or that it wasn’t sincere, or that it was only fueled by hope of some sort of consummation. It just means that chapter is archived, and a new one has begun.
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