Dude, why'd you change your avatar?
I probably would have posted this in a thread of its own, but seeing as I use my real name on GAF, it probably wouldn't be a great idea. (Also because I'm a Junior Member and mainly lurk on GAF). It was either this story or the one where i dated a transsexual earlier this year.
Earlier this year, I met an awesome chick via a dating site.
Before we met, it was pretty flirty. She had a great profile, was pretty good looking and thought that I was a funny guy. All pluses in my books. We arranged to meet up at 11:00 o'clock after her shift at work. That worked for me because once it struck 12:00, it would have been my birthday on our date and I figured that even if the date was bad, being the birthday boy could work in my favour.
As soon as we met, we hit it off and had a great connection almost immediately. We got to talking about our lives and she told me that this was her first date in months and that she just got out of a 7 year relationship and wanted to take it easy. I was like, cool, I'm down with that. As our date continued, we talked about jobs and when it came to hers, she told me that worked with troubled women get back on their feet. Real serious shit. Prostitution, drugs, abuse that sorta thing. I, not being the best at dealing with real serious shit like that usually use humour to defuse things.
I say something to the effect of, "I'm suprised you're not an addict yourself, surrounded by all those junkies" Then she drops the bomb on me, that she used to use heroin for years, but she finally kicked it. I'm off put since we're both enjoying a couple of drinks and I didn't expect that a flippant joke to turn out to be something serious. Anyhow, I ask her if all this drinking is gonna enable her but she dismisses it and says that she's okay, that she's found Jesus and that she lives a clean life. I raise a glass and toast her sobriety (from drugs) and we continue chatting. After it hits 12:00, I tell her that it's my birthday and that so far she's the best gift I've received so far that day.
Since it's getting approaching closing time, I ask her if she wants to head out. She says sure. I tell her that since I'm paying, she better put out (a joke!) and we head to my car. Since she lives downtown and it's getting late, I ask her if she wants a ride home, and she says yeah, and then we make out in the car like teenagers. I drive to her place and we have a great evening together. I should point out that I'm not a smooth person and this never happens to me. Give props to the birthday boy
We proceed to continue to see her and it's some crazy passionate shit. The more I see her, the more I learn about her. And man, it's some crazy shit.
Turns out that for seven years, she was in an incredibly abusive relationship to some asshole. From what I understand, he got her hooked on smack and she ended up working as a prostitute in the city. Not only that, but she got involved in shady drug deals. When we were in bed together, she'd tell me bits and pieces. She never dated a nice guy, she told me.
"I know you're never going to come in the middle of the night and point a gun to my head".
The reason she ended up getting clean is that a cop arrested her and gave her a deal saying that she either had the opportunity to get clean or go to jail. She made the right decision.
After a while, one evening as I'm walking to her place, she tells me that it's time to have the talk. I'm all like, oh shit. Bad news. She asks me what I think this is. I tell her, we're dating and I want her to be my boyfriend. I tell her that her past doesn't mean anything to me and that the person who she is today is the only thing that matters to me. She tells me that she's okay with it and we go up to her place and we do our thing. After we finish, she starts crying, and I ask her, what's wrong, and between the tears, she tells me that she has to break up with me, that it's over. She then proceeds to tell me that I look like her ex boyfriend, the guy that did all that terrible shit to her, and that whenever she say me, she worried that I'd hurt her like he did. i try to explain that I would never hit or do anything of the sort to her ever, and that she didn't have to worry. She told me that even though she understood in her head, she couldn't get over our similar resemblance and told me to leave.
So I left.
I'm not a religious person like her, and I find that the world is not black and white, but rather shades of grey. But with that in mind, I think that man that did that shit to her is evil. Evil.
I hadn't planned on seeing her again, but at the urging of my friend, I got in contact with her again and asked her if she wanted to come to my place and have dinner (the plan the night I stayed over at her place for the last time was to cook her breakfast that morning and spend the day together). I figured that it would be a better memory of me than leaving in the middle of the night.
When she came over to my place, things had cooled a lot since we last saw each other. I knew things hadn't gone well for her since then. A week after she broke up with me, she was sexually assaulted outside her apartment and was pretty shook up by. It's fucking awful.
When we first met, I told her that if things didn't work out between us, that she had to tell me the reason why, how i could improve on myself as a person. I asked her what I could do when she was over, and she said nothing, that I was 18 out of the 20 things she wanted in a guy. The only downside was that the timing wasn't right and she couldn't date. She said that she wanted to be friends, but I said that's not what I wanted from her, that I was more interested in a romantic relationship.
So we parted ways. I haven't seen or spoken to her since.
You guys might be asking why I didn't want to be friends with her. Good question. in the past, I've tried to be friends with my ex-girfriends and even though I'm civil to the to their faces, in my heart my emotions are usually more complicated than that. It doesn't make matters easier for me when the girls I date usually end up marrying or getting in serious relationships right after they date me. Even though I never do, I always fear that one day they'll do something hurtful to me and I'll explode, letting loose all my corked up feelings about how things ended to them. So I'm civil to them, but I don't go out of my way to talk to the, or whatever.
I think about her more than any other woman in my life. When I'm downtown, i pray that I never see her on the corner, selling her body for cash. I hope that she stayed clean and continued to turn her life around. Sometimes I think that I made the wrong choice, that I should have been a friend to her, even though I wanted more. I'm not sure if it makes me a bad person or not, and I often wrestle with these feelings. I don't know, GAF.
Even though she probably doesn't believe it herself, she's a strong person and a personal hero of mine. I hope life treats her well. More than anyone else in the world, I hope she finds happiness out there. God knows, she deserves it.
I'll never forget you.
