Alright, first things first.
If you've enjoyed this little series, or any of my other posts/photography and want to be besties, head over to Findingravity's new Facebook page. Click like and be part of the fun. I'll be revealing a few new projects and fun things for everybody in the next few days, and I want YOU to be a part of it
The like button is on the side bar, OR click here and visit it directly: http://www.facebook.com/findingravity
ALSO!
Today is BLAKE'S BIRTHDAY.
So I want everyone to:
-Give Blake lots of love
-Openly make fun of his Australian accent
-Give him presents
-Openly make fun of his Australian accent
- Give me presents
You're probably here today because I promised part trillion five of Not Another Love Story. If you're sick of the cuticle peeling, nail biting, teeth grinding series, today is the last day. If you're new here, feel free to play catch up! You can backtrack a few posts and read any part of our story. It has been quite the international journey.
____________________________________________________________
PART V
For being remarkably colorful, the world is full of grays.
There are places in this world that we are unsure of, places that seem too delicate to trample on with our elephant feet. There are delicacies we could crush with our fingers if we dared to pick them up long enough to examine them. These spaces, these gray, gray spaces, will never know vibrancy if we allow them to stay in the shadows.
After months of magenta, violet, and bright sky blue, Blake and I became gray.
For like…one night…
The night after our first kiss, Blake and I decided to go out to dinner. It was something comfortable, something familiar, except it wasn't. We had become creatures of habit together, a wonderful thing. If I was in a bad mood, Blake would habitually drive in circles around the nearest roundabout until I started laughing. If Blake seemed grumpy, I would habitually fall down or break something, and Blake would chuckle and shake his head at me.
The night after our first kiss, everything was different. I shuffled food around on my plate the way I did when I was a child, to fool my parents into thinking I'd actually eaten something. I wasn't fooling my parents back then, and I still wasn't fooling anybody. I could see right through my own act, and so could Blake.
Blake looked at me, and then looked around. This two step pattern continued through dinner. Look at Carley. Look down. Look at Carley. Look down. Look at the clock. Look down. Look at the clock. It's only been two minutes. Look down.
Painful.
After dinner we decided on a movie…"The Other Guys," not that it's important. Blake and I stood in line together, and when it was our turn to step up, without thinking, I placed my hand on Blake's arm. He returned the motion by placing his hand on my lower back. Neither of us said anything, but it was the closest I'd felt to him all night. Not necessarily physically, I just felt comfortable, for one brief fleeting moment, and then it disappeared again.
We were those people in the theater who arrived together, but could not have been sitting further apart. We sat with our shoulders leaning away from each other, in our gray place.
The movie was hysterical, and we laughed. The popcorn was good, we ate it. The theater was dark, and we were happy that we couldn't see each other long enough to make awkward eye contact, or the clock. That was how the night passed by.
The movie ended and Blake drove me home. I felt a little stupid. Clearly the night before had been a mistake, or an accident, or maybe my subconscious dreamt it up while I was sleeping.
Blake parked his car outside of my house and neither of us said anything for a moment. Finally, Blake spoke up.
"So, that was a funny movie."
"Yeah."
"I'll text you tomorrow."
"Okay."
The roles had completely reversed and now I was sitting next to this person with nothing interesting to say, while he hopelessly tried to fit scraps of conversational small talk together to form a goodnight. Finally, he gave up, and leaned in to hug me. Except, he didn't just hug me, he PATTED me on the back.
That's right, a pat on the back. I would have been happier with a high five, or maybe a slap across the face, or a nose flick.
"Talk to you tomorrow." I walked to my front door, stormed to my room, and looked in the mirror. I checked my teeth to make sure I had nothing in them. My hair was usually pretty messy, but I didn't have an unexpected birds nest in it. My clothes were on straight, I even managed not to spill anything on myself.
What was the problem?
This was NOT how it was going to end.
Impulsively, I picked my phone up and sent Blake a text.
"Come back."
Almost instantly I heard my phone beep. It was Blake.
"Did you forget something in my car?"
"Yes." I responded.
You know when you plan on confronting somebody, and you create the perfect dialogue in your head of how the upcoming conversation will go? Don't even sit there and pretend like you don't know what I'm talking about, whoever you are. If you're shaking your head, you're lying.
That's right. I'm calling you out.
If I'm going to be honest, so are you.
I had this conversation in mind, in which I displayed a stellar level of wittiness and competency for the situation, while managing to address the problem, AND look like a bombshell at the same time. The brick walk way leading from my house to his car would probably become the red carpet, and when I opened the door my hair would blow in the wind.
Here is what actually happened:
Blake called me when he arrived, and I felt like I was going to throw up. Nervously, I left my house and dragged my feet down the brick walkway, hoping the ground would part and I would slip into the earth's abyss before making a fool of myself.
I stepped into his car and buckled my seat belt.
"Want me to drive?" Blake asked.
"That would be great."
We drove, and drove, and drove, and eventually I internally convinced myself to speak up.
"We kissed last night." Okay, so that wasn't the smoothest way to start.
"Yes. We did." The corner of Blake's mouth curved into an upward smile.
I was already flustered. I didn't know what to say next.
"Well?" I asked. Nice, Carley. One word sentences. You sound so intelligent.
"Well what?"
"Well, if that's going to be how it is now, we kiss and then not talk about it, I'd rather just stay friends."
Blake didn't say anything. By this point, we'd driven around the block and were sitting in front of my house again. I didn't want any of this. I wanted my best friend back. I wanted dance lessons and late night coffee trips, and funny text messages while I was at work that distracted me from getting my work done. I wanted competitive bowling and stealing street signs together, and sitting in the car overlooking the city discussing music all night. If I had to trade all of that in for THIS, I wanted no part in it.
As I was getting ready to get out of the car, Blake finally spoke up.
"If the kiss upset you, I'm so sorry."
"I'm not upset that you kissed me. I wanted you to kiss me again."
And we did.
The brave girl with all the right things to say had finally shown her face.
Our friendship returned to its authentic, organic state, except better. There was this whole new realm to our friendship that hadn't existed before. Everything went from gray to saturated with high definition.
Unfortunately, Blake was leaving Australia in a month.
It felt like he had just arrived, but he explained to me that he'd accepted an offer in Ireland to play rugby for seven months. Part of me was sad, part of me was excited for him, but no part of me felt hurt or scared. I wanted him to go. I never wanted to be the person that held him back from the things he was meant to do in life. We were both meant for wonderfully great things, and I knew we could accomplish them separately, and manage to stay intact.
Instead of focusing on the fact that he'd be leaving in another month, we decided it was time to cross something else off our list. #32 on our list was to tell somebody your deepest secrets. I asked Blake to drive to the lookout overlooking the entire city, where we'd spent many nights with our seats reclined talking about music.
I unfolded a piece of paper and began reading. I picked ten things about myself that only one or two people knew, and a few that nobody knew. I shared thoughts that might have made me a bad person to anyone but Blake. I knew I was vulnerable, but I didn't feel it. I felt like he was the person who I was meant to share these secrets with.
That's how it always should be.
It had been a two weeks since Blake revealed his plans for Ireland, and three weeks since our defining conversation in the car where I tried to come off cooler than I actually was, and Blake tried to humbly apologize for what I'd wanted him to do all along. I only had two weeks left with him, and he wanted me to meet his family. I agreed to go shopping with Blake so he could pick up a new suitcase and some things for his trip. After, we planned on going to the grocery store to pick up ingredients so we could cook dinner for his family.
While we were at the mall, Blake's phone rang. His future coaches in Ireland were calling him. They wanted to Skype when he arrived home. We decided it would be a good idea to leave so Blake could get the video call over with before his parents came home for dinner.
When we arrived at Blake's house, I made myself comfortable in the living room. Blake set his computer up in the kitchen. Moments later, Skype rang through his computer
I tried to focus on the television, but the tone in Blake's voice quickly transformed from shocked to distraught.
"I don't understand." His voice became cracked and broken.
"We're really sorry, but we're going to need you here a lot sooner than we originally planned."
"So when would I have to come?"
"Well, we need you to be registered in the next few days."
"So when would I have to leave?"
"Tomorrow."
"You mean I have 12 hours to say goodbye to my friends and family?"
"We're really sorry, Blake."
Blake hung up and I was scared to turn around. I knew he was devastated, and I thought I'd be able to hold it together as long as I didn't look at him, but I also knew that he needed me.
I stood up and walked over to him, and gave him a hug. He buried his face in my shoulder, and we both began to cry. I was heartbroken for him. It had taken me weeks to say goodbye to everyone before leaving for Australia, I couldn't imagine having to do it in 12 hours.
"Bring me home, Blake."
"No, I'm spending the night with you."
"Blake, be realistic. You have to pack, say goodbye to your family, and your friends. I can't be selfish."
"I'll pick you up after."
The following two hours were filled with a lot of waiting and tears on my end and rapid packing and goodbyes on Blake's end. He picked me back up at 10:00, and we knew we'd only have two hours together. We drove straight to the cliff that overlooked the city, parked the car, and reminisced over the previous two months. There were beautiful moments of stillness and repose, and there were somber moments of reflection and what if. Neither of us spoke about what would happen in 12 hours, after he stepped on the plane. We expected to have an extra few weeks to figure that out, and we were faced with it so abruptly, that we decided to leave it alone.
At midnight, I knew that I had to go home. I'd have to be up early for my internship, and he had a plane to catch. We both cried the entire drive home. I sat in his car with my feet curled up to my chest and my head against the cold passenger side window. This was not the right moment to be distant. I relaxed, and let Blake hold my hand.
We parked the car in the same spot we had weeks prior. The red carpet pathway had turned into a walkway of solitude.
Blake took my hand and placed it on his heart.
"This is yours. Take good care of it." He whispered.
"Come back to me soon, Blake."
We shared one last kiss and I opened the door. I couldn't sit in his car anymore. I couldn't cry or look at him again, it was too hard. I blew him a kiss and turned my back and began to walk into my house. The only sound I heard was his car pulling away and a voice in my head telling me there were words I should have said, but chose not to.
I cried myself to sleep that night, knowing in the morning Blake would be leaving me and Australia behind.
____________________________________________________________
Blake and I spent the next four months in separate countries. We wrote each other letters every week. Yes, I said letters. Like…snail mail. Old school
In between the packages and the letters, we Skyped daily.
I finished my internship without Blake, the way I had initially planned. I knew that losing Blake was not going to determine the rest of my trip, because I knew that I had not actually lost Blake. People told us both it would be an impossible task to stay together, but I can honestly say there wasn't a single moment that either of us doubted the other's commitment.
I returned home from Australia in November of 2010, and a month later, Blake took a break from Ireland and made his first trip to America. We took a trip to New York City, and had the chance to celebrate our first Christmas and New Years together.
Saying hello again
NYC
After three more months, I travelled to Ireland to visit Blake and to meet all of his new Irish friends. We celebrated St. Paddy's day in Dublin, and road tripped through Northern Ireland.
St Paddy's Day in Dublin
After being all around the world together, the goodbyes never became easier, so we decided to put them to an end once and for all. In June of 2011, Blake packed his bags one last time and moved to America.
Neither of us can believe that three years ago we were having our first conversation, and that a year and a half ago, we were saying goodbye to each other in Australia. We now live together and every mile that was put between us has only made us closer.
"Love is friendship, set on fire."
Thank you ALL so much for the wonderful feedback and comments. Blake and I are so amazed at how receptive everybody has been of our story. If you have any more questions or comments, please feel free to speak up and ask.
I also have a post aimed at helping anyone who is currently in a long distance relationship called, How To Make It Through A Long Distance Relationship Without Wanting To Jab Your Eyes Out.
Looking forward to sharing more of my crazy life with you all.
Cheers
Like this:
One blogger likes this post.
