4:28pm
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I went from the hotel in Tennessee to my uncle's house in only a few hours. He and Joyce were really good to me and took me out to dinner and ice cream. It was so refreshing to be around family, my first real glimpse of freedom since this whole ordeal. I left Ken and Joyce's early on Saturday and got to my parents' house while it was still light out, on Saturday, Sept 1st. When I got close to home I felt like bursting into tears but I felt like I couldn't yet. I finally made it home and cried a little when I saw my parents.
After getting back, I was in this really weird headspace where I missed Florida but not Brian. I had heard from him a couple of times but had to block him because in one letter he'd be so nice and then he'd turn around and call me names again. Throughout this whole thing I kept hearing from Ryan.
When I was leaving he told me later that he felt like I had used him to break up with Brian. Of course, he would never let me talk about what was going on. When I filled in the blanks he "understood," but I think that was always in the back of his head, just like what he was saying about why he pursued me
(to get back at you) was always in the back of my mind. In September I fooled around with Mike, but it didn't feel the same as when I was with Ryan. By October I knew I was starting to feel something towards Ryan. You and I were trying to patch things up but I was still so afraid that you'd push me away again plus it felt too weird talking to you both at once so I picked him. I know! It goes against everything I stand for. But I still had so much anger towards you. I remember that time, a couple weeks after I got home, Beverly was trying to get us talking again. I think she was just tired of
hearing us bitching back and forth about each other. So we talked for a few weeks after that, but there was still a lot I couldn't let go of, a lot of hurt that you did to me and at that point you had just found out all this stuff that David did to you but you were still trying to make it work. I know that I hurt you, too. I pushed too hard and I wasn't the friend I should have been to you and I was projecting all of my own hurt onto you. For that I am truly sorry.
I felt like an ostrich, periodically poking my head out of the sand to see if it was okay to come out. If I felt myself being too close to you again I would just run away again.
I still to this day have no idea what possessed me to tell Emily about Ryan and me. I knew you guys talked but I didn't think she would actually betray my confidence. She would be nice and say reassuring things like it wasn't her place to say anything and she would start the conversations, not me. I vented to her a lot about you and I realize now how stupid that was. I hardly knew her and I already didn't trust her because I saw how fake she could be to others in the room. I guess while she was dangling information in front of you as to whom I was dating, she was telling me stuff like you didn't have any claim to him whatsoever, you can't call dibs on someone just cuz you like them, and then
proceeded to remind me about David, as if I didn't know. Like how he was married when you guys first started going out. Then she basically got us in that room together, let the cat out of the bag, then left. You were in shock probably at first and I felt like an ass for having said anything about you to her at all, good or bad.
I remember that at the time I was working with this woman who lived right behind a Wendy's on the other side of Elgin. It was a rainy spring morning and when I got up I thought about telling Ryan about it but I figured I'd wait until he got off work cuz I didn't want it on his mind all day. Excuse me for being fucking ignorant.
5:14pm
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6:21pm
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Well, I was laying on this woman's couch and I get a text from Ryan asking me what I'm up to. I'm like, "working," and then he went on to tell me about some girl who was texting him asking if we were dating (but I guess she tricked him first and said they met at the airport on NYE, which I guess really happened but anyhow.) Then he asked me why this was happening and I said, "because I told Chelsea
last night." Omg I got such an earful from him. He had me feeling guilty that I didn't tell him and he had accused me of trying to make him feel stupid on purpose.
Looking back on this moment, I should have dumped him right then and there. That was no reason whatsoever to get mad at me. I personally think he wanted it to be that girl or he did more with her than he told me about or something, I don't even know. Anyhow, you and I continued talking for a while after that until the summer ('09). Again I was beginning to feel like I could trust you again but I was scared. My cousin Kathy had just died (in May) and I was so afraid to tell you because I was afraid you would see Brian and tell him and then he would try and find me and talk to me. This was before you and he had even met at that bar. But yeah, this is what had gotten me so mad in the first place. I had been wanting to be a PTG host for years, but I had never gotten the chance cuz there was a protocol. You had to request it and say what themes you wanted and what days you were available. Well, when I saw that you were being a host it pissed me off because I thought for sure you didn't have to go through any of that. Then I saw you were acting like Emily and that's when I called you her lapdog. But in this same log, Stella was saying all of this stuff about how Emily had wronged her and of course I didn't save the log for that conversation. So I get this email from Stella saying she needed that log because she was being accused of being called a liar and then you asked me for it as well but I didn't have it. I have no idea what happened but I'm sure all that Stella remembers is what I said about you, not what she herself said about Emily, then acting like I was insane. Then a week later I took you off myspace and face book and blocked you, all of that. No wait, it was after that lapdog thing and then a week later you had just noticed that I did those things and that pissed me off even more. Plus I could see everything you, Brian and Emily were saying on his face book and that just hurt me so much.
But, please keep in mind that I still had not healed from the previous summer, plus now my cousin had died and I also had to take care of my dad again because Kendra couldn't. Plus there was a LOT of PTG fighting that was just insane. I don't want to make you feel bad here or that you HAVE TO explain yourself to me. I just didn't like how Emily ran things and I saw a lot of people too afraid to say much of anything. But yet they all went to whatever poetry room they were invited to so I couldn't do much. These were all people I wasn't too close to, anyway.
So then a few months went by (again) and then we started talking (but not really) on Twitter and by then we had both apologized for nearly everything that happened. We started the new year, 2010, off right. My relationship with Ryan, however, was at its beginning stages of going south. I guess if I have to write about it going south, I have to write about how it began. Now. I must write that I've pretty much told you bits and pieces of this stuff. But this is where I'm getting to the nitty gritty of it all and just writing it all out. When you read this you'll just be like, "OOH THAT'S that happened!" or "that's what she was thinking!" or "wow, she went through all of that and I didn't even know!" With that said, I'm going to describe to you in personal detail my relationship with Ryan.
Why it started at all to begin with.
I had started to feel something towards Ryan, probably towards mid October, maybe around my birthday. At this point we were talking every night and he was starting to hint that he liked me but not actually coming out and saying it. He asked me when I was planning on coming down there again and I said, "I dunno, when I can afford it," but I wanted to go down there, maybe get a hotel room and just be by myself (much like what I feel like doing now that I don't know when I'll be babysitting again). He suggested I stay there with him. I felt like that would be okay since I trusted him enough. Then he did something I truly did not expect--he paid for my ticket. I told him I'd pay it back but he wouldn't let me: "consider it a bday/Christmas present."
7:00pm
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