I hadn't seen him in five years.
And the last time I saw him, it wasn't good.
He looked at me like he hated me.
It burned a hole through my heart.
I walked up and saw him sitting there, outside the bar.
His hair was longer.
It was as long as mine.
He saw me.
And suddenly all there was between us was a smile.
Like seeing the kid you spent your childhood with and hadn't seen in a decade.
My worries drifted away as he wrapped his arms around me and I buried my face in his chest.
He looked the same.
And really different.
I don't know how that works.
But it was true.
We sat at the bar and he started talking.
'Me first?' He asked.
"Yes. Tell me everything. When last we talked you moved to Alaska. Go."
He started telling me about the last five years and I was listening.
But I also kept tuning out as I just looked at him.
The lines in his face, the way they crinkled around his eyes, they started to look familiar.
The calm tone of his voice as he went on reminded me of the comfort that used to bring.
The tattoo that peaked out from his hoodie along his wrist and remembering the one on his back and his leg.
And the new tattoo on his finger I realized wasn't familiar.
It all came flooding back.
All of it.
That lovesick girl, desperate to win his favor.
And failing, miserably.
He kept talking, more than I expected, but I guess there was a lot to tell.
Five years of story.
Then it was my turn.
"I'm really into rock climbing now."
'What? No way.'
"And I really like legos."
'Who ARE you?' He smiled.
We were so different.
Different than we'd been five years ago.
But how then did our past selves connect us so strongly?
"Were you surprised to hear from me?" I asked.
'No. You've reached out to me several times throughout the years.'
I blushed. I guess I had.
'And I almost wrote you.'
"What?" I asked, surprised.
'My sister texted me and told me she saw you. So I almost wrote you an email.'
I KNEW she would say something.
That's why I was so grateful that I hadn't rolled into Starbucks in my pjs looking like a hot mess that day.
'I'm really sorry,' he said. 'I'm sorry for the way I treated you. My heart wasn't open to you for a long time. But it is now. That's why I look at our time together differently. You're a big part of why I went to Alaska.'
"I'm sorry," I looked down at the bar.
'No. I should thank you. Thank you. I'm so glad. I'm so glad I went.'
"Do you know we meet every five years? We first met in like 2004, 2005 then our lives went apart and we met up again in 2009, 2010. And here we are again."
'Wow. I didn't even put that together.'
"So we have to promise to meet up every five years."
'I can do that,' he said.
We talked about our past relationships.
'So really, I ended up doing the same thing to her that I did to you. I moved to Seaside. My life is just me running away from girls.'
I laughed. But it felt really nice to know I wasn't the only woman who drove him away.
We realized we were both just as unsure about our futures as we'd been five years ago.
That's just how life is.
Uncertainty.
Delicious Uncertainty.
But I realized how much I wanted to hope again.
Hope the way I did when I was that lovesick girl.
'But people change,' he said. 'Sometimes people become someone else.'
And maybe I wasn't that girl anymore.
Maybe I was someone else entirely.
But maybe I hid my hope because I'd been alone for so long and it was easier to stop believing.
Maybe it was hidden to pretend that part of me no longer existed.
But if she didn't exist, why did seeing this lost love from a life time ago make me want to cry?
'Let's go this way,' he said.
The pathway to the main door was blocked by a crowd of people.
So we stepped outside the back, into the blanket of stars, that covered a circle of trees connected by twinkling lights.
It was breathtaking.
"It looks like a scene in a movie. I feel like you should reach for your guitar you have hidden behind a tree or something."
And then it knocked the wind out of me.
Like the smack that hit my heart when he'd burned a hole in it so long ago.
I had been SO in love with him.
I had loved Sheldon.
I did love him.
But I don't think I'd felt being in love with the kind of intensity I'd felt since Mr. Volcano.
I'd forgotten.
My heart forgot what that felt like.
We hugged goodbye.
And I climbed back into my car and suddenly I couldn't breathe.
It felt like I'd been numb for years and was thawing at a painfully fast rate.
The hole in my heart was healing and I hadn't even realized it was still open.
God.
I wanted to love like that again.
Wholly.
Completely.
With trust.
Trust.
I wanted to find a man who would trust me.
Because I was ready to trust.
I was consumingly ready.
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