Summer Swing (3 page)

I grabbed a
beverage
from the refrigerator because I was thirsty, but also because I didn’t want to see Dawn’s reaction. My back was to her deliberately as I poured juice into a glass, but I could still feel her disappointment boring into me.

“So that’s what I am? –Interference?” she finally asked. “I’m sorry I care about your love life, Ellie. Is it so bad that I want you to be happy? Why can’t I be excited for you?”

This was the part of Dawn that I really loved and really disliked at the same time. She was such a passionate person, and she really did want everyone to be happy, but sometimes she just didn’t get it.

“Dawn, I’m glad you care. But sometimes you’re…”

“I’m what?” she asked, narrowing her eyes at me.

I sighed. “You’re too optimistic. You’re sometimes in a dream world. You’d encourage me to jump off a cliff if there was a cute guy at the bottom.”

She gasped. “I would not! Now you’re being ridiculous, Ellie. All I wanted was for you to meet Gage and to
like
him. How is that being in a dream world? Maybe you’re the one in the dream world, little sister. Why don’t you admit to yourself that guys freak you out? You are so scared of having a meaningful relationship with someone that you purposely find ways to make sure it doesn’t work.”

“Oh gosh, now you’re just saying things.”

“No, I am not. Maybe I just try to be positive for
you
because you’re so set against being happy with anyone. I don’t know if it’s because you’re shooting for some prestigious broadcasting career and don’t want to be tied down to anyone, or if it’s because you’re just a pessimistic person, but you have commitment issues, my dear.
And I’m not the only one that sees it—”

“Oh
sure, add that in there to make it more credible. And who are these ‘experts’ we’re dealing with? –Mom and
D
ad? Pssh, they don’t even count. They come with their own set of relationship blueprints. And Wyatt? I surely hope
he’s
not pointing a finger because he’s got
some nerve
. But maybe you’re right. If I can see right through Wyatt, then maybe I really do have commitment issues
. Isn’t that where the saying ‘t
akes one to know one’ comes into play? Wyatt is probably—”

“Tim,” she interrupted angrily. “
Tim
is who I was talking about, Ellie. You know, the guy you strung along for
four
months and then just dropped like a—”

“Don’t even pretend like you know
what you’re talking about, Dawn,” I said, feeling the anger begin to rise.
“
Tim was not the right guy for me and I knew it from the start. I went out with him because he was a friend of
yours
. I did you a favor because you asked me to. Yeah, he was a fun guy, and yeah of course he was
really cute
, but I wasn’t that into him.”

She chuckled bitterly. “Ellie, why do you do th
is? Why do you always use the ‘h
e wasn’t
the right guy for me’ excuse? And y
ou can honestly tell me that you dated him for
four
months because of
me
? That’s not true and you know it
! I saw the two of you together
so don’t tell me you weren’t attracted to him. Stop blaming other people for your failed relationships.”

“Being attracted to someone isn’t always the same as how you
feel
about them! Yeah, Tim was a good-looking guy, said all the right things, and worked wonders to impress me. But he only had one thing on his mind, and I was too stupid to understand it at the time!”

Dawn was about to put
a
box of crackers away when she stopped mid-air. She lowered it and looked at me
carefully, and as my heart quickened its beat, I knew I’d said too much.

“Ellie…” she said quietly. “I hope you just mean in general. You just mean he had high hopes, right? Like most guys? You don’t mean that…that he took advantage of you, right? I mean if you guys went that far and it was mutual then, pssh, it’s none of my business, but if- i
f he pressured you, Ell
i
e, or…
” She sat down on a stool next to me. “He didn’t force himself on you, did he?”

“No, it wasn’t-
it wasn’t like that,” I finally
mumbled
. I let out a deep breath of air and slightly shook my head. “I was just dumb, I guess. I let him talk me into something I wasn’t ready for. And he was so…insensitive about the whole thing. I don’t feel like talking about it though,
so
please don’t mention Tim again. I know you didn’t know, but now that you do, please don’t jok
e about me missing him, okay?”

“Yeah, all right. I’m sorry.”

I nodded.

“Ellie, I’m sorry we were fighting. I really am. I don’t like fighting with you.”

“Good
,
because I don’t like fighting with you either.”

She took a deep breath and let it out, giving me a hug in the process. I was glad that we’d resolved our conflict, which was usually the case, but I was also disappointed at the same time. My big mouth had wanted to get into it about Wyatt, and I was leaning more towards the “just do it and apologize later” method.

“So what are
you doing tonight?” Dawn asked
me.

“Nothing,” I replied, taking the box of crackers from her.

“It’s Friday night.”

“So,” I mumbled with a
few
Cheez
-it
s
in my mouth.

“So? Come on,
Ell
i
e,
let’s go do something together. Something fun, or something we haven’t done for a while.”

“Wyatt doesn’t have a big, romantic getaway planned for you this weekend?”

She smiled and rolled her eyes
at
my sarcasm. “I wish. Actually he’s out of town with
one of
his
friends
. They went up to Seattle for the
weekend
.”

“Mariners game?”

“Yep. So what do you say? Let’s go out to dinner first, and then we can decide something from there.” She took the box of crackers from me and returned them to the cupboard.
“I want Italian;
you can pick which
place
.
”

I was pretty nervous when Saturday morning rolled around. I’d hardly slept the night before either, spending most of the time lying there in bed, fretting over meeting Gage for the first time. Luckily I had work to
keep me occupied
, although there were a few lulls in my day that were filled with thoughts of
him
. I wasn’t quite sure why I was so stressed out about it—it wasn’t like I was about to meet my husband for our arranged marriage or anything—but I think it all came down to my fear of being disappointed. Or maybe it was my fear of being disappoint
ing
to
him
.

Well, however I looked at it, I knew why I was spending more time than usual at my cubicle when my work hours were up. I was literally delaying meeting up with him.

“What’s got you in a daze?” Miranda asked, breaking my thoughts. She
sat at the corner of my desk and
eyed
me
carefully
.

Miranda. Hmm, maybe I could get some free advice from our resident dating expert.
She was almost ten years older than me, so surely her experience could help me out. And
I didn’t really know her
that
well, which made it
even
better.

“Oh, I was just thinking about…a friend of mine, and the guy she’s going to meet up with for the first time.”

“Ooh, online dating?” she asked eagerly.

“No, uh, they have mutual friends that wanted them to meet, but for now they’ve just been talking on the phone and stuff.”

“Do they know what the other one looks like, or is that the problem?”

“Yeah, they’ve seen pictures of each other.”

“And?”

“They’re mutually attracted.”

“So what’s the problem? The pressure of meeting someone for the first time?”

“Yeah. My, uh, friend is pretty nervous.”

“How come? Just anxiety
,
or like a full out fear that it’s not going to work out? Or that it
will
work out,” she added with a smile.

“Uh, I don’t really know,” I admitted honestly. “I think she just feels pressured in general. She’s kind of…complex when it comes to guys.”

“
Complex
. A word like ‘complicated
,
’
meaning ‘full of excuses,’ ” she chuckled.

“Well, I mean yeah, I’d say she’s a bit complicated. But I think the excuses are real, though. Doesn’t everyone have issues
with relationships
?”

“No, not everyone. There are a lot of people that make relationships the main focus in their lives. Some people always have to have a companion, and it’s just another necessary part of life, like eating or sleeping.”

Wow, that could be Dawn.

“The rest of us can browse the ‘Top 10 Fears in Relationships’
and pick a hand
ful
.” She paused for a few seconds and then asked, “So what’s your friend’s fear in this particular situation?”

“Um, what’s on that list again?”

Miranda
smiled
. “Oh, let’s see…
Fear of change or uncertainty, fear of losing freedom, fear of conflict or relationship problems, fea
r of rejection
, fear of dependency, fear of not being enough, fear of losing who you are, fear of giving up too much… Hmm, what am I missing? Oh yeah, fear of
heartache
and fear of disappointment. So? Do any of those pin down your friend’s anxiety?”

With a smile I replied, “Uh yeah, probably a few of them. Maybe fear of uncertainty, rejection, and uh, not being good enough I think.”

She nodded. “
Pretty s
tandard.”

“Oh so there’s nothing wrong with her?”

She
laughed
again
. “No, not at all. Those fears are instilled in all of us.
Here’s what I would tell her—i
f you’d like to pass this along. First of all, no one can predict the future. Even if we have our lives all planned out in our heads, it’s not going to work out exactly how we’ve designed. Relationships are not houses, and the blueprints are a whole different ballgame. There are too many variables that have to be factored in, and we don’t even know what those variables are
half the time. But t
hat’s how we learn and grow, and when we make the adjustments that are necessary to nurture our relationships, then we’ll learn and grow even more.

“Second of all, nobody likes to be rejected, no matter how big or small that rejection is. Some of us handle it differently than others, but to be rejected by another person is the hardest of all. You can
either suck it up and
realize that maybe there are other things meant to be in your life instead, or you can wallow in your self pity and pick apart each one of your flaws to make it even worse. To me the choice
is easy, but it’
s sometimes hard to do.
Now the unfortunate part of those that fear rejection is that they tend to be pleasers. Is your friend a pleaser?”

“Uh…”

“Does she put aside her own wants and needs just to make others happy?”

My heart volunteered its agreemen
t with a strong thud. “Um, yeah,
definitely.”

“It’s important to be selfless and giving of ourselves, but not when it takes away from our own happiness. If we do things for other people and it causes us to feel resentful about it, then maybe we need to re-evaluate what we’re giving of ourselves.

“The third one… What was it? Oh, fear of not being good enough. It’s kind of similar to fear of rejection only we feel like we’re trying to play
‘
catch up
’
instead. When we feel insecure about
who
we are or what we might possibly have to offer someone, we tend to do things because we feel we owe that to the other person; we feel like we’re not good enough the way we are, so we expect all
of
these unrealistic things of ourselves. And when we don’t turn out to be that person we’ve been shooting for, the negative effects can be pretty devastating. You feel like
a
failure sometimes, or other times, when the relationship ends, people feel angry that they spent so much time and effort trying to be someone that they weren’t. It’s a no-win situation when we try to be someone we’re not. It’s never worth it.”