“Unknown (To You)”
I really thought it was going to happen. I thought that on my 25th birthday I’d be at a Delta Spirit concert at Thalia Hall, I’d be wearing a red dress, he’d realize he was wrong and swoop me up by the waist and kiss me as the music swelled.
I don’t actually even know what I did on my 25th birthday.
There were two things working against me. The first, was a global pandemic. The second, he was never going to realize he loved me, because we didn’t love each other.
I never actually loved this man, the one I desperately wanted to meet me in the swells of Thalia Hall. I was never close enough to him to love him, but I wanted to. I wanted to get close enough to him that he was my person. I don’t think he even wanted to wish me a happy birthday when I turned 25. I can’t remember if he did.
On paper we were terrible. In reality we were terrible. When it was just the two of us though; just the two of us, inches apart, reading each other, it felt so very true. I think because it felt so right I thought it could be something special, but that’s not how life works.
One night in November, when I was 24 and it had just started to get cold outside, we were on my couch and everything felt like it changed. We were centimeters away from each other in the sleepy state that comes after making out. I looked at him and said, “I know right now we can’t be in a relationship. I’m not ready for one, I’m focused on writing. And you can’t be in one, you’re focused on your music. But, I hope one day when we both reach our dreams we can be together.” He said, “I’d like that.” I would’ve let him sit shotgun to my writing in that second if he simply asked to be there.
We’re both much older than we were on that night in November, and I barely write anymore. But, his dreams have started to come true.
Every time he gets more successful, every show he plays, every tour date I see announced, a layer of dread is added to my gut. He is winning, and I am not. I know that when he really does achieve those dreams of his, I’m not going to be the one he calls. I used to wish that he was the one I’d call if my dreams come true, but he won’t be.
I’ve seen him live out some of those dreams and they’re painful. Each time the fact that we’ll never be and we never were going to be is reaffirmed.
I was 26 the last time I saw him in concert, and I’ll never see him play again. My friends went to a Lollapalooza after show. I wouldn’t have normally gone but it was my at my all-time favorite venue and the headlining act was too good to pass up. It was nearing midnight on a Tuesday, when it became obvious that this dream guy of mine was the opening act.
That night was the first time I noticed that he was successful in his endeavors of actually pursuing something big and wonderful. I was drinking beer in the back of the venue.
While I was trying to focus on the beautiful soul the headliner was laying out on the stage for all of us to embrace, I saw the man I once wanted to love approach me. In the universe’s most disgusting tricks it looked like he was walking to me while the music swelled.
The lyrics that lined up with the next moment were sharpened knives and arrows and daggers. The artist on stage literally sang, “say that you don’t want me, say that you don’t need me, tell me I’m the fool” as the man I was once hoping to love walked directly past me. He went instead to the arms of a girl whose beauty I could never compete with.
She was adorable and sexy and gorgeous all at the same time. Her hair bounced with ease and fun. She kissed him right there in front of people, and I knew he knew that’s something I’d never do. She was wearing overalls and a crop top with the elegance and confidence that has always slipped directly out of my fingertips. I was so angry with myself and him at the same time.
I whipped my head back to look at the stage, the lovely British man was still bearing his soul, telling me in a perfect bass voice he knew the exact pain I was feeling. Instead of feeling comforted by that though, a couple in front of me started making out with fervor and passion.
He’ll read this someday, and all of the small clues hidden within this piece will be so large, he’ll know it is him that I am talking about. He’ll know I wanted to be his, and it’ll hurt just like that moment at that concert.
To be completely frank, and maybe it was my imagination only, I think he wanted to come to me for a second; I think I saw it in him. It was like a parallel universe opened up, and for a second, it was me that he wanted to see as his dreams were coming true.
I’m 27 now and I wouldn’t want to talk to him if he did walk to me as the music swelled. So, that’s not how the story ends.
The story ends with us seeing each other at bars, at stores, at concerts, at weddings, at reunions, at beaches, at intersections. It also ends with me knowing all the things he thought I didn’t.
