Tragic Crush Tales #10

        Crush E is my latest in a series of men that have completely wasted my time of the past few years. I seem to be attracting a lot of that lately. Every time I find it surprising that men over the age of 23 still play games and then play victim when you call them on it.
        I first met this guy through Instagram. That was my first mistake. How on Earth did I think I could possibly take anyone serious on Instagram of all places. I don’t even remember how or why we started talking, but we hit it off really well. I got along with him, thought he was funny, handsome, and that we had a lot in common. Unfortunately he lived in Chicago and I’m not in a place financially to be able to move back just yet.
        We started talking around Halloween of 2015 and quickly exchanged numbers. We texted a lot, but for some reason he sort of vanished around Thanksgiving. I’ve said it before, but I’m not the kind of girl who likes to pester someone. We all have lives, families, work, etc. If I message you a few times and don’t get a reply I’ll assume you don’t want to talk to me anymore or you have shit going on and will get back to me when you can give me your undivided attention. Well we started to get into the first few weeks of December and I still hadn’t heard from him. I shrugged it off since we had only talked for a few weeks. We didn’t have anything serious going on. There was a guy who would come into my job all of the time and I could tell there was an attraction so I gave him my number and we went out. The date was absolutely terrible. I didn’t have to dwell on it too long because days later E popped back up and it was as if nothing had changed. We made jokes of my bad date and our closeness grew stronger as the days and weeks went on.
        I say days and weeks because as we were ringing in 2016 E went off on his merry way again. No response to messages until he gives me this long tirade, a week into the new year, about how he needs his space and that I’m forcing a relationship on him and that he only wanted to be friends. Blah, blah, fuckin’ blah. From the moment we first started talking the flirting was on both ends, but all of a sudden I was forcing my flirtatious behavior on him and making him soooo uncomfortable *sarcasm*. I found it strange and also upsetting because a week prior we were telling each other how we were hoping this was meant to be and couldn’t wait to meet each other one day. It wasn’t a one sided conversation. I wasn’t talking to myself. Without going through every incident with this dude let me just say he disappeared often only to return with his victim speech about how I was forcing my affection on him knowing that he didn’t want a relationship. He’s the most confusing man I’ve ever dealt with because I couldn’t understand how we’d both be flirting then all of a sudden it was only me that was the aggressor.
          That brings us to a few weeks ago when I discovered why he always wanted to shame me as the bad guy. There was someone else. Instead of being an adult and telling me that he wanted to proceed with this other woman I had to find out via Instagram. Many times I asked him if there was someone else and he’d always say there wasn’t. When I confronted him this last time his excuse was that they were only talking and not officially dating until very recently. So because they didn’t have the “Will you be my girlfriend? Circle ‘yes’ or ‘no’“ talk that means that it’s okay to still talk to me on the side and not be upfront and let me know that you’re starting to have feelings for someone else? You can’t have your cake and eat it too. I’m not someone’s back up plan. I’m an actual person with feelings. You think that crossed his mind? No. When he discovered that I wasn’t going to fall for the “we weren’t officially dating when you first asked me” excuse he had to pull another one out of his ass. He decided to go with the old high school excuse of “I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to break you heart.” Because lying to me or not telling me will make me feel so much better. Thank you, E. Thank you so much. Lying only exists to make the liar feel better about themselves. Never has it ever made the person being lied to at ease. Now, let me say this. As I’ve gotten older and have had my heart broken a few times it gets easier and I mean way easier for me to move on. I’m too old to be crying over some dude and especially one who feels it’s okay to disrespect me. That being said, when he told me that he felt telling me would break my heart, I laughed. It was so arrogant to me. We’ve never met. You’ve played with my emotions like a yo-yo for about seven months and you’re wondering if your fickle feelings broke my heart. Not to mention my father passed not even a month before this (another reason I feel a decent human being would’ve been up front about his actions) and you think your bullshit lies even rank on my list of fucked up things to happen to me this year? Honey, please. I just experienced a heartache like none other and it’s not over Mr. “I don’t know what I want in life so I’m gonna sit here and waste your fucking time and then make it all be your fault. You made me flirt with you. I’m the victim here.” He still tried to find excuses. He brought up three dates I went on during a few of his many absences. Although all three dates turned up bad and he knew about every last one he still wanted to run with that excuse. To me it would’ve been much easier to just say “I wasn’t really feeling you anymore. Sorry I didn’t tell you in APRIL when I first started talking to this other girl (yes, he had been talking to her for three months while we were also talking), but it is what it is.” That would’ve been a more adult response instead of looking for any and every way to make me look like the bad guy and refusing to own up to his bullshit.
        This all sucks because a week after I found all of this out I was in Chicago for an event. While planning this event I was really looking forward to meeting him and getting to be with him. That’s why being up front with me would’ve been a great idea. That way I wouldn’t have been planning a trip with my heart set on that. It could’ve been just about my event, getting together with old friends, and making new ones. Trust me that I still did all of that and had the most amazing time, but that’s not how it all started when I had my heart set out on this. At first when I said my peace and everything was said and done I said to myself that I hoped this woman would do him like he did me (and some girls before me, apparently, but I really don’t want to get into that because I honestly don’t give a fuck). I hoped that she’d stop responding to messages, give him the cold shoulder every three weeks, talk to a few other dudes, make him feel like he’s some thirsty dude that’s just fawning over her, tell him that he’s moving too fast while at the same time egging him on. Then I thought about it. No. Nobody, not even him, deserves to have their feelings played with like that when we’re all out here just trying to find companionship and a soulmate. Instead I want her to show him compassion, communication (which he lacked SEVERELY), loyalty, partnership, and warmth so that he knows what it feels like and in turn can learn from her and know how to give it back. He wasn’t for me and that’s fine. All I wanted was a little honesty and didn’t get it. I’m not missing anything.

- Asia Aneka Anderson, 2016©

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