Sushi night

Last night we had a sushi party, partly to celebrate the (brief) return of a friend  to the city, and partly as a last (?) get-together before my ex moves away at the end of the year. It was fun to see all the friends gathered, and to laugh and bond over lots of good food. Making sushi was great, and earlier in the day, my ex and I went down to Chinatown to buy lots of ingredients to make sure the evening was a success. And it really was.

It's been a while since we last organised an event together, and I kind of missed cooking together. The excitement of drawing up a menu, the hours standing around in the kitchen chatting and preparing food. It was like old times... It really felt like old times, just laughing, joking around and getting tipsy on good wine and food.

Then suddenly at one point, my ex's phone rang. He quickly went away to chat, but I could hear laughter on the phone. It was his friend. And again, I began to feel really uncomfortable being there, at my ex's place. Why would I feel like that? Why does it matter if he is just talking to a friend? I guess it's all because it's the whole reason the evening felt like old times, but was not. The intimacy, the subtle touches and pokes of one another's bodies have become awkward. I want so much to touch him, but dare not for fear of rejecting and coming on too strongly... for fear of making my ex uncomfortable. Is it really just me who wants to do all those intimate things? I sometimes get the feeling he can miraculously just switch off his feelings, and I have been relegated to someone he has something with, but can now let go off... Just a feeling, just my feeling...

Why am I lamenting? I never did have an entitlement to be my ex's partner, and he is free to be with whomever he wants, to speak to whomever he wants to speak to. I don't own him, I don't have a monopoly on his care or love or affection. He chose to be with me at one point, then he broke it off so he can find himself. And now, six months down the line, we still find ourselves in the uncomfortable limbo of being less than lovers, but more than friends. That balance is difficult to adjust to, and moments when I see my ex talking so sweetly on the phone to his friend, I just freeze, and ask myself what I am doing exposing myself to this kind of hurt. It would be better not to see all that. How would he feel I I started to chat sweetly with someone right in front of him, or have to excuse myself during get-togethers just to have a chat?

So the rest of the evening, I was friendly, but a little distant. And when it came to bed time (as it was so late already...) I said I wanted to sleep alone. Not to punish him or anything, but I just felt I would sleep better alone, and I needed to be alone. I insisted on sleeping in his living room, but he offered me his bed, and somehow for a while we both ended up sleeping on the floor in the living room.

I twisted and turned on the floor and could not really sleep. My head was spinning from the alcohol, and since two days my thumb has been swollen and filling with some kind of puss for some unknown reason just above the nail. The pain was throbbing and unbearable throughout the night, and I could only lie there trying to calm my agitated mind but to no avail. My mind was so unsettled, and there was an awkward silence between us for a while. I knew he did not sleep for a little while, until I could hear his breathing next to me...

The physical pain from my swollen thumb, the hurt of having to witness yet another episode of my ex's chats with his friend... I lay there until the early hours of the morning and only managed to fall asleep for two hours or so...

Come morning, I left his apartment early to go to the walk-in clinic to have my thumb checked. Just before leaving my ex lay in bed and said he is trying to understand why the climate of a wonderful evening somehow suddenly took a change...

I too am trying to understand. And I cannot.