Let's Try This Again

  Let’s Try This Again

  By Jordyn Woodtke

  Published 2016 by 3 Dreams Creative Enterprises, New Fairfield, CT.

  Copyright @ 2016 by Jordyn Woodtke

  All rights reserved. No part of the publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, digital or mechanical including photocopy, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher.

  Requests for permission to use or make copies of any part of the work should be sent to:

  Permissions

  3 Dreams Creative Enterprises

  P.O. Box 8931

  New Fairfield, CT 06812

  OR

  Permissions@3dreamscreative.com

  ISBN: 978-0-9906045-4-9

  DEDICATION

  To Irene Goldkopf, my grandma - who always wanted to go to college to write and always told me she would see my name on a book binding one day.

  To Margaret Woodtke, my mother – because of you I have no “what-ifs.” Thank you for it all.

  To Victoria Nordlund - who first told me I could do this and helped coax out of me all the words I didn’t know where there. And for every competition she ever made us enter.

  To the rest of my family who all said “What about me?” when they read this. I love you. Thank you for being crazy supportive, crazy wonderful, and crazy crazy.

  Sorry about all the sex.

  CHAPTER ONE

  2 Months Before

  I had missed his freckles.

  Looking back, I really never should have left my bed. I should have lain around watching F.R.I.E.N.D.S on Netflix all day long instead of coming out to have lunch with him. Because the freckles on Isaac’s face hadn’t changed, and I’d always had a soft spot for them. Staring down at the letters on a menu that I couldn’t exactly collect into words just yet, I could picture them littered across his cheeks; little flecks the color of coffee ice cream. You’d think since so much else had changed—we were no longer having sheet-ripping, hair-pulling sex—sitting across from him would feel different than it would have six months ago. It’s only fair he should look different because, mentally, I wanted nothing to do with Isaac. “We” were over, and “we” would never be how we had been again because his skills as a boyfriend were light years behind his skills in bed. But physically, am I expected not to be attracted to someone whose bedroom walls probably still have my nail marks on them? Cut me some slack.

  I knew I knew this person, and yet I hardly recognized him—which is not something I had ever wanted to happen. This wasn’t the Isaac I had known so well, the guy who could sweep me off my feet only to drop me on my ass—sometimes within the same minute. But the freckles would always be there. Some people might even miss them, they can be so light—but since that one Thursday Isaac had found me sitting on the railing of some lame ass party no one wanted to be at and made me want to stay all night, there wasn’t really anything about him that I didn’t see.

  But that was in the past now. When things didn’t work out for us – okay, fine, when I finally resigned myself to the fact that things would never work out for us no matter how many times we tried or how right it seemed to feel when he was making my toes curl, that his clear and impassable commitment issues weren’t going anywhere—I decided I needed to make a choice that would keep him and us in the past.

  It started and it ended with a girl who didn’t really know how to be in love; he couldn’t give me what I wanted, and I couldn’t stop wanting it.

  I had to get myself away from Isaac for good.

  “So, do you guys know what you want to eat?” I looked up from the menu I had not been reading to tell this waitress with trashy brown roots that no, I did not know what I wanted to eat, and also, I am not a guy. But my ex-boyfriend smiled up at “Jenny” as her nametag told us and confirmed that he was ready. Not a big surprise there that the two of us were on completely different pages. Possibly in different books. Sorry, excessive hunger and sitting across from someone I didn’t really know if I wanted to be sitting across from could make me a bitch. I, too, have suffered trashy brown roots—seventh grade was a rough year.

  Okay, I shouldn’t have judged her on that.

  Jenny left to give us a few more minutes in which I had to actually read the menu instead of just doing that thing where you look at all the words and space out because you’re thinking about anything but food. You’re more likely thinking about what’s going to happen on Scandal that week or what alcohol to drink that night. Hopefully Liv finally moves to Vermont to start all the jamming and…probably tequila, considering where I am right now.

  Ugh, I did it again.

  “Why do you even bother looking at the menu? You know you’re just going to get the same thing you always do,” Isaac teased. “We’ve been here a million times.”

  “Well, maybe I’ve become more adventurous since then,” I replied, attempting to be cold and not flirt back. Truthfully, this food choice was a pressing matter because of the new nature of our relationship. Before someone is your boyfriend, like say when you’re just “talking,” and you go out to eat; you get a salad. Because, hello, who wants to date a girl that gets guacamole on her chin fitting five nachos into her mouth at once (which I can totally do). But when you hook him, and you’re his girlfriend; you get whatever the hell you want. Because, hello, who wants to date the jerk that dumped his girlfriend for having a healthy, normal appetite? Are you a body shamer? No one dates a body shamer, even when they are one.

  Now that we’re broken up, do I get a cheeseburger because fuck you, I don’t care what you think about me or the ketchup in the corners of my mouth? Or do I get a glass of water and lettuce (a salad with dressing on the side—the choice of sociopaths, might I add) because I’m back in the field and he should realize what that means. Especially because I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before he tells me he misses me. He always misses me. Who could blame him? I find myself entirely miss-able. Every time we broke up, Isaac would eventually pop up at the most inopportune moments, wanting me to remember that he was there. Wanting me to remember that we were still an option.

  To be honest, usually I felt the same way. Usually I’m checking my phone every five minutes from the moment we break up to the moment he finally texts me again because I’ve missed him from the second we’ve said goodbye. Not today. Not this time. This had to be the greatest of all inopportune moments.

  I’ll get a salad so he’ll see I’m keeping it cute for the next guy who’ll come along, then maybe he’ll get the point and won’t bring up missing me at all. But when he says the “same thing I always do,” he’s thinking of the relationship meal—chicken fettuccine alfredo.

  Shit, that does sound really good though.

  “I’ll have the chicken fettuccine alfredo. Extra parm.” As I said it to Jenny, whose hair was actually quite soft looking, (still feeling guilty about mentally criticizing her roots), I could see Isaac mouthing my order. Oh, he just knows me so well—cue the eye roll. Jenny walked away, and he just stared at me. “What?”

  “What are you thinking about, Josie?” He took a sip from his water. Hmmm, how to play this? He always asked me this stupid question, and I always said nothing. ‘Cause, lord knows, he does not want the actual truth. I studied him. It’s been a few months since I’d seen him (in person…I follow every ex cliché about social network stalking). His typically shaggy hair was cut a little differently, long-ish on top and short on the sides. Very Justin Timberlake. His usual bare, baby face had a good scattering of scruff, not exceedingly well groomed. While it was not my favorite fashion statement, I took comfort in the fact that if he had that stuff growing on his face he probably hadn’t
been kissing anybody.

  Unfortunately, my smile at that particular thought caught his attention.

  “Don’t say nothing like you always do.”

  I wiped my smile away just as quickly as it had appeared. What the fuck was up with all of these “you always do’s”? I could say that I’m wondering why the hell he has asked me to join him on this little lunch date, but I’m kind of not. I’m pretty sure I know why. When Isaac and I broke up six months ago, it wasn’t the first time. No, in fact it was the third time we went “separate” ways. I use quotations when describing our separations because the inevitable communication (such as this meeting) always followed a few weeks later. As previously mentioned, we’d typically see one another to “catch up,” end up making out in the parking lot, and bam—back together.

  But this time had been different. The two previous breakups had involved varying degrees of stupidity on his part. Once he had drunkenly kissed his ex-girlfriend (a whore with a massive penis-shaped nose). Another time it became apparent that he and Molly, one of my best friends, couldn’t stand one another, and I couldn’t deal with the drama. Hoes before bros. All that. As any good best friend typically does, she decided that she didn’t think he was good enough for me, and Molly let Isaac know it. The result of each falling out had been the same, however. Isaac would text me out of the blue, telling me he wanted to hear my sassy remark about a particular event or had seen something that made him think about me.

  This last breakup, though, Isaac had initiated—fully aware of his actions and the implications they would have for us.

  He got really introspective all of a sudden and told me he really needed to focus on himself right now. He had to “hibernate.” He wasn’t ready to be with anyone, not just me. Yes, he used that exact terminology, and yes, I understand how weird and bullshitty that sounds. The weeks passed—and his usual “point of return” passed as well. Then the months passed. I had honestly thought his reasons for breaking up had all been for show; he’d surely found a new victim despite the fact that my cyber stalking yielded no conclusive girlfriend findings. But this new Taliban look had me convinced. The man was in hibernation mode.

  And he didn’t contact me out of the blue. He had texted me on my birthday, which I obviously expected because if I’ve had your crotch in my face and vice versa, you better believe I deserve one hell of a happy birthday.

  For fuck’s sake, people I haven’t spoken to since preschool at least say happy birthday on my Facebook wall, so I think someone who has been inside my body should be able to manage as much. I hadn’t expected that conversation to go anywhere, though, and it hadn’t. Months had gone by, and I thought he really was over it. I thought there was no way he was still thinking about me as much as I was thinking about him.

  That’s when I made the decision.

  I was leaving – moving to California to start a life that would just so happen to put three thousand miles between me and this never ending hamster wheel of a relationship. That’s what I assumed Isaac had asked me to meet him about because when your ex makes a huge, life changing choice, you get kinda curious about it, right? Like you had been at least some part of all those decisions when you were together, so it only seems fair that you get to inquire about the ones that occur post–you. I’m sure he’d heard it through the grapevine or something (okay fine, I told mutual friends specifically, so that he would definitely hear) and was just waiting to get it out of me. But I’m not that easy. If he wanted something from me, he’d have to work for it. Obviously we’re not talking about sex, here.

  But that question—that dumb, idiotic question he always used to ask me drove me insane. “What are you thinking about?” It was like he had constantly been trying to delve into my innermost self. At the time, I had thought it was a good sign. That he wanted to know as much about me as he could. He made it seem like he wanted to know absolutely everything about me. And then he told me he wasn’t ready to be with me? Maybe that was why I always answered with “nothing.” Nothing I could have said would have changed that fact that he was going to leave, and he had left…so I was right.

  “Nothing. I’m not thinking about anything.” I smiled smugly. The fact that I was thinking so much the opposite of nothing was clear on my face. I couldn’t hide the disdain that our sudden breakup and his months of silence had filled me with as I mentally tore those old wounds back open (well, more open). My eyes were doing that squinty thing that makes you look like a bitch. Oops.

  “So how are you? What’s new?” He swirled his straw around, and I stared at his hand. His big, beautiful hand that used to grab my whole face when he kissed me. NO. STOP. That’s also the hand he had metaphorically slapped me with. He probably was swirling the straw out of complete boredom and lack of interest in my answer. He –

  Stared at me. Intently.

  The opposite of lacking interest in me or my answers.

  “I’m…fine. Doing well. How’ve you been?” Good misdirection! Isaac probably completely missed how bright red you blushed when you looked into his eyes. You just invented a new shade of embarrassment, so good for you, Josie!

  What was it about this guy, you may ask. And you are, I hear you.

  I wish I could answer that—more than I wish I could answer anything else. But, Josie, you might say, don’t girls feel that way about all the losers they date? You are probably correct, nosey Nelly. But Isaac wasn’t a loser. Not on paper, anyway. He’s a few years older than me, he lives on his own, he has a good job, and he never needs me to drive him everywhere. As far as I could tell, his biggest flaw was his emotional unavailability. Which, fair enough, is a pretty big flaw.

  One of the biggest.

  That’s what made it so difficult, though. Isaac was so perfect in so many ways; it made me want to be so close to him. And I just couldn’t. He always pushed me away when he sensed that he’d brought me in close enough.

  Initially, I tried to keep him at arm’s length – I was well aware of his relationship history when we started dating. I didn’t want to want him—but you can’t not, not with Isaac. Maybe he knows that.

  The ass.

  The ironic part is that if I did tell him what I was thinking, Isaac had the fucked up habit of cutting me off only after he’d gotten the information out of me that it seemed like he wanted. He’d ask his annoying “What are you thinking?” question or say, “You don’t have to act so tough with me, you know.” Then I’d give in and tell him I care about him or wish he could give me more, and he’d run. Not just run, sprint. But he’d come crawling back a few weeks later with the usual bullshit: “I messed up. I’m an idiot. It really scares me to think about how much I care about you.” Maybe try growing a pair and speaking up when something bothers you instead of hiding under the covers from a 130 (okay, 145 around the holidays) pound (fake) blonde. I mean, how fucking scary can I possibly be?

  Okay, rant over. (Maybe. No promises.)

  He never answered my question, only shrugged and gave me this small smile. Am I supposed to take that as he’s fine? Or maybe he wants me to think he looks a little sad without me? “What’s this all about, Isaac? Why did you want to get lunch?” I guess I’d have to drag it out of him.

  “Well, you know…I just heard…”

  “Yes, it’s true,” I cut in, a bragging tone coming in a little bit. But he didn’t stop his sentence, and talked over me.

  “That you’re not seeing anybody,” Isaac finished. I blushed, he laughed.

  Classic us.

  “Oh! Sorry. No. That’s not what I meant,” I stammered. “I thought you were going to say something else.” Now I’d done it.

  “What?”

  “What what?”

  “What did you think I was going to say?” Isaac wasn’t flustered by my confusion at all. He smiled at my pain. How ironic. “I…uh, I guess I just thought you had heard,” I started. Jenny brought our food over just to drag out this dramatic little cliffhanger I’d constructed for our conversation. She ev
en grated more parm on my already extra-parm-added fettuccine, so now I felt especially bad about my harsh judgment. I decided to leave extra tip money to speed up her next hair appointment.

  “What should I have heard?” Isaac sounded strange and rushed, a new tone for him. He was always calm, always collected, which always made me feel a little crazy. This new inflection made me feel a little powerful, not gonna lie.

  “I’m moving,” I took a big bite. Let that info sit a little bit. Maybe let it sting a little bit, hey, who am I to judge?

  But then he didn’t say anything for longer than I was comfortable with.

  “To California,” I continued. I took a sip of water. Isaac choke-coughed a little theatrically and swallowed his food hard.

  “California?”

  “California.”

  “But…why? How come?”

  “I mean, nothing is turning up job-wise here. I can’t write.”

  “You can write from anywhere. Apply at the Courant, apply at the Inquirer. Apply at the freaking Reminder if you have to.”

  “I don’t want to write that kind of stuff. I’m not a journalist.” He knew that, so I don’t know why he even bothered suggesting it. Honestly, it felt like he had been ready to pull those names out. “Los Angeles is where there’ll be the most opportunity for me in entertainment. It only makes sense. And I have a connection there who thinks he might be able to hook me up with some stuff potentially. And I have a friend who knows people there that I can live with. He’s -”

  “He?” Isaac interrupted. “So you don’t even have a job yet? And…why now? Why do it right now?” I couldn’t tell if he really was shocked or was just pretending not to have known. I had let it slip to certain people in hopes that it would get back to him. But he had apparently been a good enough liar to make me think he wanted to date me all those times, so I wasn’t sure how I’d figure out if he was lying about this, too. And I didn’t want to look at him as he asked me this. I wanted to scream, why now? Why not now? You left me to find yourself; you haven’t talked to me in months. Why do you get to care if it’s now or then or later or never?