Everybody has him. You know, “that guy”. “That guy” who remarkably fulfills all the criteria on your unrealistic list. “That guy” who you word vomit about to your friends like you're suffering from some sort of infection. “That guy” who, although you attempt to deny it, continues to be without a doubt, the one you are 100%, head over heels, writing out the script to a romantic comedy, in love with. Yeah, “that guy.”
For me, “that guy” has been a constant guest star in the honest-to-goodness reality show that is my daily life. Of course (in the vein of Three’s Company) the face continues to change, but the overlying character remains the same. I mean, seriously, you would think by now I would be able to recognize “that guy” from a mile away and keep myself at a safe difference but, since my head has little control over my heart, I consequently never do.
The thing about “that guy” is he’s always the guy you don’t expect. You know the type, the one who is too good of a friend to take the risk or too annoying to believe it's even possible. “That guy” is always the one that orbits right outside the romantic center of your life, close enough to wake up that part inside of you, but too far away to give it the nourishing it needs. Honestly, it’s like being some sort of jack-in-the-box. Everybody knows how to open it, and yet nobody seems eager to do the work of cranking the wheel or is too afraid of what might pop out at them if they do. Shit! For goodness sakes, sometimes I think it would be better to be placed away in some sort of attic, rather than constantly ignored in plain sight.
Dark, I know, and I do apologize. It’s just, sometimes it’s hard to be lonely, to feel like something that isn’t quite forgotten but, almost worse, nobody even remembers to forget. You know what I mean, that stabbing pain in the back of your mind and heart that constantly questions the validity of your standing in the eyes of those around you. That feeling of constant concern over whether or not the people you are with actually care to be with you or if they are just too polite to cast you aside completely. It’s like, you’re standing in a crowded room at a party and, although everyone can see you, they feel no desire to approach you. This isn’t to say they won’t talk back to you if you asked them a question or laughed at a joke. No, they aren’t cruel towards you, rather they’re indifferent, as if you’re nothing more important than a chair in the corner that nobody feels like sitting in just yet. So is the life of a nobody.
It’s funny, but no matter how hard I try to rid myself of this overwhelming compulsion towards falling in love, I seem to only fall harder and more frequently. Of course, the falling wouldn’t have to be so bad, if only there was someone there to catch me, but alas, time after time, I find myself jumping from the trapeze and just narrowly missing the arms of the man flying towards me. Sure, there’s always the net that keeps you from shattering into a million pieces, you know friends, family, your favorite characters, but the feel of the scratchy rope is an unsatisfying alternative to the once very real prospect of a lover’s arms.
Okay, so that was a bit of an overreaching, metaphoric, circus image, but I think you sorta get the point. I’m damn lonely and constantly pining over one “that guy” after another, unlike the alleged “realistic” counterparts that flit across the silver screen or the pages of a well-thought out books.
Truth is, it’s probably the media’s fault that any girl (or perhaps slightly effeminate boy) finds herself in this whirlpool of romantic devastation and disappointment. I mean, where the hell did these people get this shit where guys fall madly in love with a girl at first sight and instantly want a relationship. Newsflash, that feeling at first sight isn’t love, it’s called lust, and it doesn’t necessarily end with a princess wedding. Honestly, you have to wonder where these romantic story lines come from, because, looking out on the streets of the real world, it doesn’t really seem to match up. In fact, if the guy is as perfect as the movies make him seem, then he usually isn’t going to end up whisking you away in some horse-drawn carriage and kiss you softly as you disappear into the sunset. Rather, he will turn out to be the next “that guy” on your long list of perfect men that perfectly broke your heart in two.
Needless to say, I wish that I could protect myself from the impending threat of the next “that guy” or at least help protect some of you, but, I am a realist, and the sad truth is, it is in our nature to hunt the “that guy” just as much as it is in his nature to only narrowly escape. Sure, when we first meet “that guy” we convince ourselves that he could never be “that guy” for a long list of reasons and insist that we are only going to be friends. Then, inevitably, that friendship leads our minds down a path of romantic comedy infused, fairytale bullshit until we are writing our wedding vows while we sit across from him sipping coffee. It seems uncanny, our brain's ability to create the perfect romantic plotline out of absolutely nothing, yet, it constantly does it. While we live our lives, our brain begins to script out the details of a fairytale with “that guy” until we’re no longer sure which reality is actually the one we are living in and, eventually, we’re left with an overwhelming feeling that we have lost something which we indeed never had.
That is the saga of the “that guy,” but more importantly, that is the saga of the nobody. The nobody is not the person who is alone in the world. No, those people often find something extraordinary laying in wait for them. The nobody is instead the person who has the almost, the person who can see the happy ending but cannot reach it, the person who can live in perfect moments but not save them. The nobody is the person that is left in the jack in the box, but nobody will turn the crank and that lonely chair in the corner when everybody has just decided to stand.
XOXO
E
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