1/29/00 - 2:21 am

So, what happened at New Year�s wasn�t repeated, mostly because we never got together again after that. Chris left for school Jan 5th, and I discovered that I didn�t really want to call him. He called me that Sunday, and we only talked for about ten minutes. I wasn�t very nice, but as it turns out, he didn�t really notice. We didn�t talk all the rest of that week, until the next Sunday, but he was sick all week. Granted, I didn�t find out until Thursday. I called him Sunday the 16th, but I don�t think we talked very long. Saturday the 22nd, Mom and I went to the library, and to Paul�s. I couldn�t decide whether to stay at Paul�s or not, and I ended up going back to College Park. Big mistake, but how was I to know?

Mom and I got back to College Park around 7:30 p.m., and Ricky was in a shitty mood. I went up to the kitchen to get something to eat, and he started yelling about the fact that I had programmed the VCR to tape something, so he couldn�t watch his tape. I was tactful for about a minute and a half, then I just got sick of it, and started yelling back. We got into a whole screaming thing, he was yelling about my school, and pretty much everything, and after six years of putting up with him having temper tantrums, I just snapped. I told him I didn�t like him, he didn�t like me, fine, I�d leave, except that even though he says he fixed the tub, every time I walk into the bathroom, the floor creaks, and I think if I actually take a bath, I�ll end up in the living room. I forget how the subject came up, but he started screaming about the home school.

Short version, I told him to go to hell, he told me to get out, I said no. I said he was my father, he could at least pretend to give a damn about me, and I went downstairs. I didn�t know what the hell I was going to do. I remember I thought about going back to DC, but I�d have had to take Metro, and it was really cold, and I was so angry and pissed off, I don�t even know. I sat down on my bed, and I don�t really remember how I got to it, but I decided the best thing would be to kill myself. I think I really meant it. I was going to shoot myself with Ricky�s gun. (As it turned out, it wasn�t where I thought it was, so I might not have been able to anyway, but I didn�t find that out until it was moot.) I wrote a note, which I intended to be short, but the note ended up taking the better part of an hour to write.

Just as I got done writing, the part of my brain that should have spoken up in the first place finally said �Hey. Um, suicide? Bad idea.� Just when that started to make sense, Sofija called me, and I guess from my tone of voice, she knew something was wrong, and I told her, though I didn�t stress the fact that I had been about to kill myself. I told her, but I didn�t go on about it, because she doesn�t understand those things (Lucky her). We talked from around 9 to 9:30, then she asked if I would be ok, and I said I would, so she had to go. I did some of the school work I had there, and I packed up some of my stuff. I had realized that the house in College Park belongs to Paul, so Ricky couldn�t throw me out, but I also knew that if I stayed, I�d end up seriously depressed, not just briefly suicidal, so I decided to go back to Paul�s after my allergy shot.

This all ties into Chris, and I�m about to explain how. Around 11:15, I called him, because I had run out of things to do, and I knew better than to be alone with myself. I had stopped at 7-11 on the way back from DC, and gotten a new $10 phone card. So at 11:15, I called him, he was home, and could talk, so I called him back with the new card. I had another card, but I wasn�t sure how much time it had on it, so I didn�t want to use it, and have it run out just after they turned off the phones at his school. It turned out to be a good thing too, because we ended up being on the phone for 4 and 1/2 hours, until 3:45 a.m. I wasn�t talking to Chris for all of that. Around 12:30, Greg came in, and I ended up talking to him for about half the time.

Anyway, Chris and I discussed, well, stuff, and I�ve stopped acting like a guy towards him, meaning I�m not avoiding him anymore. One of the things Chris said was that what we did was fun, but it was wrong because we aren�t going out. I don�t know. I mean, yeah, I�d go out with him, and it�d be fun, but I think it would just be so that we could play without him having an attack of morals. This is assuming he would go out with me, which has not yet been resolved, and won�t be for a while, because when I asked him, theoretically, if he would, he said he didn�t know, and I�m not going to force him to decide until he comes back. If he comes back, and discovers that he can play without moral issues, I�m never going to make him decide if he wants to go out.

As long as we�re just best friends with benefits, we�re still friends. But if we start going out, eventually we�ll break up, and that might end the friendship. Why does this seem like D�j� vu? Oh, right, I�ve been over this before. But then it was just what if, not actually. If I do go out with him, I don�t think I�ll let myself like him as anything more than a best friend with benefits, because I could actually fall in love with him entirely too easily. That�s the thing about me. I�m very good at not letting myself fall, but when I do fall, I fall HARD. If I were going out with Chris, it would make it that much easier to fall in love. I know that being in love is a good thing, but it would just end with me getting hurt when we broke up, and why should I put myself through that if I can avoid it? I know that seems very cynical, but I prefer to think of it as realistic.