Likewise: I don't apologize

Love is:

coming home hungry to a plate prepared with tamales when previously
there
had been nothing to eat in the house. Thank you, WomiE.

Vinny came back from his glamorous two week vacation in Jersey—spending money he didn’t consider paying rent with and having the time of his life until he grew poor and had to return home. I clearly enable his foolishness. Vinny hitched a greyhound bus to commit scandal and wreckage to the east coast early one Monday morning with a backpack harboring my studio-sized headphones, which he stole from me, and didn’t return for two full weeks. Dare I say his absence was bliss. During which time the apartment got rearranged drastically—laundry got handled, dishes got washed, the sofa got moved, Jerome and I pushed around Vinny’s weight bench and there was a spirit…a quiet sort of gaiety in the unit that didn’t exist while Vinny was home and now that Vinny’s returned I think he recognizes it too. I digress.



It was brought to my attention that there will be people to hear the news of I and Jerome reuniting under the guide of Requited Love and applaud. Likewise, there will be a duck pond full of people who will hear of the news and either break glass or vomit. There were undoubtedly casualties in this reunion. I myself set fire to a number of bridges and everyday I find yet another to burn. Jerome and I have appreciated those who’ve been moved to applause but just out of the nature of it being a year-long separation, other relationships made, other relationships had—by no fault of our own or his own or my own—the thought of me will now leave several tongues purple and spoiled afternoons to someone “new” in WomiE’s life.

I will be the collateral damage in their sarcasm. They will, in passing, approach Jerome on the street or over other social networks and say things like, “so you left me for her”, and scowl leaving a plume of bitchassness in their exit-dust. This, of course, will be people who will only know of me through this reunion—recognizing me instantly in a crowd of people as the guy who stole from them their potential happy ending.

What I offer to the community of ducks in this pond who will take the news of WomiE and I poorly is that we’re making a home for ourselves everyday. Every morning I drive him into work and every evening he picks me up from work. Today we wore matching t-shirts and sometimes our underwears match. I don’t apologize for Jerome coming home. In fact, the only thing I’m sorry for is that he didn’t feel comfortable enough to come home sooner.

I woke up one morning and Jerome was already in the shower and the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes were his slippers…in our apartment. What brings me to pause sometimes is knowing that these early years of breaking up and getting back together but always remaining in love are the foundation for something magnificent in our future. I can feel it. I look at Jerome and see children being raised, apartments in skyscrapers, taxi’s and loveseats and portraits. We will be severely old and gray folding towels and matching socks together… and you know what?—its beautiful… and its natural… and I love it.