Going Past the Breaking Point

By this time, word of my ability to 'forgive and forget' had become the thing of legend, and would come up at least three times in one day if I hung out with a group of people. I would just laugh and wave it off, and try to return the conversation to something else. The Mexican restaurant story had somehow spread like wildfire, though, and people wanted to begin to test to see if I had a breaking point, and if they could reach it. I don't think they had a back up plan in case going past my breaking point would result in loss of life and limb, but hey. Almost everyday, something would happen, or someone would do something to try to push me over that edge so they could start a conversation with "I WON!" (at this time, there was a large sum of money to go to whoever got me to the breaking point). I had my ipod stolen three times by the same person, someone told a girl that I was thisclose to dating that I was actually a sexual deviant who liked to dress up in women's under while listening to Goodbye Horses while touching myself (which actually backfired on them, because she for some reason thought that was funny and wanted to see it, although it did send up a red flag in our almost relationship). But still I just laughed these off and went about my life. What could I say? I had endured worst things in my life then these, so I was used to this kind of thing.

I was still maintaining the reputation that I had in high school about being able to help everyone, so I encouraged my friends that were younger then me to feel free and call or text me if they ever needed help with anything. So almost everyday, I had a message on my phone and a problem I could deal with and fix. They ran the normal course for high schoolers, so it was all easy for me to deal with. Most of them just needed me to nudge them in the right direction or say something encouraging and positive and they'd manage just fine. They'd call and cry their stories and problems to me, and I would sit in my boxers and a Mario t-shirt eating a bowl of Lucky Charms cereal or be making a sandwich, and help them out. In hindsight, making this policy did have it's downsides, especially when breakups came around, or people decided that they just didn't want to be friends anymore, which forced me to either play favorites, play both sides, or just say 'fuck it' and tell them to sink or swim without me.

Karma, never being nice to me, decided that this act of me trying my hardest to be nice was what would get me to my breaking point. It happened on a nice, fall day while I was sitting outside reading and smoking (I picked the habit back up two weeks after Claire dumped me). It's a call that most men don't like to get, mainly because you can't understand a goddamn word that's being said: it was the crying girl call.

"Hello?" I said as I picked up the phone, not ready for what was waiting on the other end.

"He*SOB*he*SOB*he's an asshole!" She cried into the phone.

"Wait, what? Who's an asshole?" I closed my book to try and focus on the conversation, trying to get past the sobbing to hear the problem.

"He*SOB*for*SOB*..."

"Hey, why don't I meet you somewhere for lunch?" I ventured. I could understand her better in person then over the phone, and I could probably get her to stop crying long enough to actually tell me what was wrong, and who was an asshole. "Where do you want to go?" I asked, stubbing the cigarette out on the bottom of my shoes. We agreed on a place, a time, and I set out to meet her there.

I got to the diner before she did, and got our table. The girl, Caroline, and I had dated for three months in my last year of high school, so I always made sure to actually invest time to make sure she was okay. She was wearing a pair of knock off Ray-Ban sunglasses, and I knew what that meant. One time during our relationship, she had donned the same pair of sunglasses when her beloved pet bird had died, so I was able to tell how bad she was feeling. I offered her a smile and gave her a big hug before she sat down in our little booth. She had managed to compose herself and articulate one sentence as she sat down.

"Tommy is an asshole." She said, taking off her sunglasses and putting them on the table.

"How is Tommy an asshole?" I asked, trying not to sound to surprised. Tommy and I knew each other, but that didn't mean that we liked each other. We were nice to each other when it benefited us, but for the main part, I thought he was a prick and he thought I was pompous.

"He broke up with me," she said, trying not to break down in tears again.

"What? Why? You two were so..." I hunted for the words that didn't involve wrong or unholy abomonation from the very depths of hell sent by Satan 'cos he was bored one night. "Happy looking," I eventually managed to say.

"I thought that too," she said, playing with her sunglasses.

"Did he say why he did?" I asked with caution, not wanting to have to calm her down in the middle of the diner.

"He just said that he needed time to think about things, and all that crap." She said, while switching from playing with her sunglasses to the napkins that were on the table.

"Ah."

We ordered our food, and I tried my best to help her, but in the end, her best friend managed to bail me out of saying something that I would later regret. She came in, talked to us, and told Caroline that she'd drop her off at home. I nibbled at the plate of fries in front of me, and pulled my wallet out, getting ready to pay the bill when I heard a familiar laugh. I peeked over at the booth that was in front of the diner, and my heart dropped into stomach. It was Tommy, with a girl that I knew all too well. I turned back to the plate of fries, but I suddenly wasn't hungry. This was probably because my heart was in my stomach, filling up all the room that food does, or it was because the girl that Tommy was sitting with, holding hands with, and gently moving that one strand of hair from her face, was the girl that I had planned to ask out tomorrow. I threw the last fire onto my plate, and started to suck down the rest of my Coke.

If you've never had the urge to use a French fry as a tool of murder, then you probably wouldn't understand the main urge I was fighting off. Instead of shoving the incredibly long fry that I had just picked up into Tommy's eye, I instead dipped it in an unhealthy amount of ketchup and shoved it in my mouth. I got up and walked to the cash register and paid off the bill, and left. The two were so involved with themselves they didn't even notice me walk by.

When I got home, my phone started ringing. I checked the caller id, and swore to myself. It was her. I didn't really want to talk to her right now, but I hated not picking up my phone.

"Hello?"

"Hey, what's up?" She asked, all happy. I knew why she was happy, and it made me depressed.

"Nothing, just sitting around," I said, trying to sound somewhat happy.

"What did you want to see me about tomorrow?" She asked, and with every word my mood got worse and worse.

"Oh, nothing really." I lied. "Just needed help with something, but it's all taken care of now." It's times like these I'm glad I can lie like a president.

"Oh, okay. Just checking," she said. I prayed that I would be able to hang up soon, I wouldn't be able to keep up the civil tone for much longer, it was causing me physical pain.

"So, I'll talk to you later then." I said quickly and hung up. I stared at my phone for a bit, and then walked into my room and threw my phone onto the bed.

I don't know why, but this was my breaking point. I couldn't forgive Tommy for doing that to Caroline, and I wouldn't forget that literally twenty minutes after breaking up with his girlfriend of two years, he was out and about with someone else. And I couldn't forgive her for doing that. I eventually told Kyle, and he told the other people, and they called off the large sum of money they had riding on this moment. Kyle would later tell me that they did this because "it wasn't as fun that way".

This, despite belief to the contrary, is NOT the reason that I decided to take a long vacation without anyway to contact me.