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By wistful Date: 2004 Sep 06 Comment on this Work [[2004.09.06.21.52.25254]] |
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"You're running away" Becky shoved a couple more pairs of underwear into her duffel bag. "No I'm not. It's just a trip." "A spur of the moment, month-long trip, to a place that couldn't be farther away from San Francisco if you tried. I know, I checked." "It's an adventure," Becky returned, as she rummaged through her bureau for some t-shirts. "Exactly! And that is SO unlike you. You are normally such an anal-retentive planner. I still have a copy of your packing spreadsheet for Cancun, which, I will remind you, you had done a good three-weeks ahead of your trip. And now you are just leaving, tomorrow? For a whole month?" "Now, wouldn't life be boring if we always did the same thing, the same way, every time?" Becky flashed Tom a big toothy grin. "Yes, but you ARE boring. Oh come on, face it! You're running away. Would you even have considered this trip if you and Sean hadn't broken up?" "I've thought about it for ages," she rejoined loudly from the bathroom, where she was throwing toiletries into a plastic bag. "Sure, and I've thought about streaking through Golden Gate Park, but I haven't done it." Tom stood and lifted his shirt, rubbing his stomach as he stared at himself in the full-length mirror. "And won't, until these abs look more like a six-pack, and less like a 2-liter bottle." He slapped himself a couple time in the belly, just to make it jiggle, sucked it in, and then blew it out as he flopped back on the bed. "Come on; admit it. Just to me. I won't tell." Becky laughed as she re-entered the bedroom. "Right, you won't tell. You'll just hint at knowing 'the truth' to all of our friends, with a sly wink and a conspiratorial air that will be just as good as telling." "A-ha!" he jumped to his feet, pointing and hopping about gleefully. "That was as good as an admission!" Becky sighed, and sat down on the end of the bed. "Look. I won't argue that Sean's leaving influenced my trip. But I am NOT running away." She lay back slowly, letting her thoughts form, and testing them against her emotions. "It's like this: whenever I break up with someone, I use it, you know? I have all this anger, this pain, but I refuse to be a victim." She turned onto an elbow so she could look at Tom, who had stopped dancing around and sat down opposite her. "So I dig within me and ask myself: what is that I have been wanting to do, but have been afraid to do? Or reluctant to do, or procrastinating about doing? What aspects of myself do I not like, so that in my insecurity, I point at them and blame them as part of the reason that yet again, someone has found me not good enough, not compatible, not 'worthy'? And I kick myself in the ass, and go get it done!" "But you don't even know the language", Tom protested. "I've been studying. I'll get by." Becky stood back up and tested the weight of the duffel, making sure she could still lift it. "How much of any language could you possibly learn in the 24 hours since you came up with this bright idea?" "I can say 'Excuse me, do you understand English?' That should do, don't you think?" |