30. February 15 - Wilder

"You called her a hooker?" Gus asks, twisting the cap off the beer bottle. He hands it to me, and I swallow half in one gulp. "That's not your smoothest move there, buddy."

"I know." I slam the beer bottle on Gus's kitchen counter and inhale sharply. The taste of a beer hitting my tongue usually has a calming effect. This time, I want to hurl the bottle against the wall and make Gus's kitchen tile hurt as much as I hurt.

"Do you feel bad because you called your girl a hooker and hurt her, or do you feel bad because cuffing season is over?" Gus asks.

I study Gus and his ridiculous handlebar mustache. He smirks at me because he's been my best friend for over ten years and knows me better than I know myself. "You know damn well that it's both. I'll never admit that again, though," I add, jabbing my finger in his direction. "Don't you tell a soul I have cuff remorse."

He holds his hands up like he's being held up in a bank robbery. "I just find it entertaining that the guy that walks away from his cuffing partners without a backward glance is in my kitchen, chugging beer to try to wipe away the memory of his most recent." He wipes a fake tear from his eye. "Our little player is growing up into a nice, young man. First, you turned down a threesome last fall. Now, you're crying in my kitchen."

"I'm not fucking crying," I grumble, turning away from him because my eyes are filling with tears even as I deny it.

I tap my foot on the floor and lean over his counter, trying to catch my breath. The air around me feels like it's choking me, and I struggle to inhale. The exhales don't come easy, either, and I spend a minute consciously making my lungs work, making my chest move up and down like I've forgotten how to do it.

Gus pats me on the back, rubbing clockwise circles between my shoulder blades. "What's happening to me?" I ask, and I hear the anguish in my own voice. I hate it. "Am I dying?"

"No, man. You just broke your own heart. And hers."

"I didn't break her heart. She did this for the money. Turns out, she never gave a shit about me. This was all to get money for her last year of school. She broke my heart."

"The guy who used her for room, board, and pussy?"

I squint into the kitchen counter, leaning forward more and taking gulping breaths. "I've been horrible to her, haven't I?"

"To all of them, mate."

How could I have been so selfish? So immature? "Why am I like this?"

"I'm not saying that you have an excuse. Whether or not you can be forgiven by the other years, well, that's up to them. But you're my best friend, and I like to think I know you. I know that you got done wrong when you were a kid. If I had to guess, you learned that some people in the world have no loyalty, even to their kin."

A tear rolls down my cheek, and I wipe it away before he can see it. If he notices, he doesn't comment. He wouldn't usually hesitate to make fun of me for crying over a girl, so the fact that he doesn't immediately make fun of me tells me I'm in deep shit.

"When your mom gave you up and turned you over to foster care, I can't imagine that did anything to help you learn to form attachments in relationships. Hell, man, you don't even have an attachment to a place. Sure, you bounce around the same few counties within the same state, but I think that's more so you don't have to make new friends that let you crash in their houses when the tornado sirens go off or change your license plates."

"I'm broken."

"You got broke a long time ago, dude. Maybe it's time for you to let someone try to put you back together. Glue. Duct tape. Let someone try, Wilder."

"I don't know how to be attached," I mumble. Everything he's saying is spot on, and I can't believe I haven't listened before.

"Yes, you do," he laughs. "You got attached to her. Why? What made her different?"

I rub my eyes with my palms. "I have no clue. She just is. Sure, she's beautiful, but I don't cuff with ugly women. She's smart, but so was 2020. I don't understand."

"Maybe it was the whole package," Gus suggests. "She was kind to you. Giving. She wanted to please you, and you loved pleasing her. There was something innocent about her. The experts always say it's the little things. Not to get too personal, because we don't do that, but was the sex different with her?"

"Yes," I say, dropping my voice. Gus and I don't usually talk about sex except if we're discussing which respective woman we're taking home from the bar or what position we'll be in if we happen to share.

"How?"

"Stop asking for details, you dirty pervert," I chuckle. It feels weird to feel anything but overwhelming sadness or anger.

"I'm not asking for positions. I just want to know if you felt something. Something besides the obvious friction, that is."

I slap my hand on the counter. "Are you asking if I felt love?"

Gus reddens and works his jaw, adjusting to my sudden outburst. We've never thrown punches, but he steps back. "Yes. I'm asking you if you felt like you were making love instead of fucking."

My legs, previously frozen, move on their own. I pace his kitchen, running my hands through my hair and tugging at it like pulling my own hair out will somehow make this right. If only an angry outburst and masochistic body harm would make her go away.

How fucked up am I? I need help. I need professional help with my attachment disorder, and I want help to make sure I never make the woman I love feel like that again.

Wait. Love?

"Do I love her?" I ask, my hands still clutching my hair. I probably look like a madman, and poor Gus can't keep up with my conflicting emotions. I've never been so thankful for such a patient friend. "Is that the feeling of unease and inability to focus?"

He nods. "I think you love her, Wilder. You probably have for a couple of months, best I can tell. You changed around Christmas."

"What do I do?" I ask, clutching my chest. "I don't know what to do. Tell me what to do. Do I go try to get her back?"

"You need to go to her and make this right."

"Do I take flowers?" This is ridiculous. "I've never gone back before, Gus. I just walk away." I pace again, shaking my head and squeezing my eyes shut like the idea of taking her flowers and swooping her into my arms is asinine. And it is. "No! I can't go back. I made her sign a contract it's over."

"Jesus Christ, Wilder. Fuck that stupid contract."

"It's signed by both of us. It's binding in a court of law, and…"

"No, it's not. Any lawyer worth their salt will get you or her out of it," he interrupts, turning me around and gripping my shoulders. He shakes me a little like men used to do to women in old movies. If this were happening to another person, I'd find it comical. "The contract is ridiculous, and a judge would laugh it out of court. If you want her, go get her. If she's like you've described, you don't need flowers or grand gestures. She's not going to sue you for breaching a stupid dating contract. You just need to show the fuck up and tell her you love her."

"I can't. My mouth won't make those words. I don't know how to love and give."

Gus pulls back and smiles. "Yes, you do. You know. It's what you wanted when you were a kid before your emotionally dead mother built a wall so tall that it took a librarian to scale it and break it apart like it was the Berlin Wall. You just need to love like you did back then. It's still in there."

I walk to the beer and down it in one go, swallowing to kill time more than enjoying the taste. I stare at Gus's ceiling with my head back while I think. How do I even go back and apologize? Tell her I love her? The concept of me being in love is so foreign. It's like someone telling me I need to suddenly start speaking German instead of English.

I sniff and wipe my nose with the back of my hand. "How did you get so smart?"

Gus shrugs. "I watched my friend be an idiot for several years and cataloged everything he did wrong."

"I hate you," I laugh, a tear sliding down my face. I don't worry about wiping it away now. He knows I'm totally gone for Savannah, and I pat my pants pocket, checking to make sure I have my phone out of habit.

I clap my hands together and roll my shoulders. "I can do this. This is totally crazy, but I can do it."

Gus walks me to his front door, his arm around my shoulder. He hands me my hat and my coat, holding it out like I'm his date and he's being chivalrous. "Go get your girl. Bring her over for dinner sometime, shithead," he says, opening the door and giving me a nudge into the cold air. "And don't fuck it up."