Maybe

Maybe I like to fall in love.  Maybe I believe in love at first sight.  Maybe if I believe in love at first sight I certainly believe in like at first sight.  Maybe I exaggerate these feelings on purpose because I love to be immersed in them.  But maybe that doesn’t mean they aren’t real.  Maybe if I always do that then when it is real how will I be able tell?  Maybe being romantic is a beautiful, wonderful thing.  Maybe almost as beautiful and wonderful as you are.  Maybe girls think that being romantic is nice but when you are, they don’t like it.  Maybe nice guys are on the grocery list going in but not in the shopping cart coming out [F.J. Shark].  Maybe girls want you to be mean and treat them like shit.  Maybe I should be playing hard to get.  Maybe I tried for awhile and then couldn’t take it anymore.  Maybe I should be able to tell when that one instant is when I should stop playing hard to get and decide I like you.  How the fuck is anyone supposed to know when that is?  Maybe since I'm leaving I couldn't afford to wait.  Maybe if you miss that one instant, too early or late, it's gone forever.  Maybe if that’s true I quit love because the odds are impossible.  Maybe if you’re not the one then I don’t want to feel that way any more, ever again.  Maybe having to pretend you don’t like someone when you really do and both people have to do it is the stupidest fucking thing ever.  Maybe I don’t have a clue how other people get together.  Maybe I don’t know how to do anything else besides be completely honest and straightforward.  Maybe as a child I was too afraid to say what I felt and it almost killed me so now I have to express my feelings at any cost.  Maybe not playing the game means that I lose.  Maybe I would rather lose than play.  But maybe if the prize is you I’d play ‘til death do us part.  But what if I don’t know how?

Maybe all those wonderful coincidences were just plain coincidences and didn’t mean anything.  Like that wonderful basketball game where everything worked out so well and you looked so beautiful in pink and I felt so comfortable walking next to you, and running into you in the hall all the time, like when I always went to get water, and at the Employee Health Screening (do you have a clue that you were the reason my blood pressure went up 20 points?) at the exact second that I got there, and going back to the gym on the same day, and when I was printing out that beautiful wonderful poem that I wrote to you and still haven’t shown you (because I know there’s a chance you would freak out and not understand:) and I was paranoid that someone would see it at the printer before I got there and then YOU came right around the corner, and the fact that we have the same kind of headphones and both have an origami swan at our desks.  And maybe that I could swear that sometimes when you hear me talking or my keys walking by that you get up from your desk on purpose (I must be really wacked to believe that one).  Because I do it sometimes.  Maybe I am praying to God like a hundred times a day not to let me fall for you if it isn't real and I am reassured that we are because tears of joy come to my eyes, and he is just playing a cruel trick on me.  Maybe God is just a mean bastard who likes to play fucked up tricks on his constituents and then laugh at them.  Maybe I am looking for something in nothing, finding joy in tears and happiness in pain.  Maybe I am creating all this mayhem inside myself and you are completely oblivious.  Maybe if I told you you’d laugh and tell all your friends what an idiot I am.  Maybe it would be on film at 11:00.

Maybe I was sure I got over that crush thing a few years ago since I haven’t had a crush on anyone since then and have just been friends with a lot of different girls, but since you came along and overwhelmed me suddenly after so long, maybe I assumed this time it must finally be real.  Maybe it is and you don’t know it.  Maybe girls just want to have fun.  Maybe you were subconsciously flirting with me because you like the attention.  Maybe that’s completely normal and it's still a wonderful thing.  Maybe you are like the sophomores I fell in love with when I was a senior in High School.  Maybe I don’t know you well enough to wonder about all these things.  Maybe that's the whole problem.  Maybe if I wasn’t leaving I wouldn’t be so worried about losing you forever while everyone you work with gets to know you better and better every day.  Maybe I’m worried that if you do need somebody I won’t be the first name that pops into your mind.  Maybe I want to make sure I’m around.  Maybe I am a little weaker right now because a lot of changes are going on in my life.  Maybe I’ll be so much stronger later that you’ll wish you took your chance while you had it.  Maybe I’m not normal.  Maybe I’m afraid.  Maybe if my stepfather hadn’t raped me every day for 8 years I’d be able to feel confident about a relationship.  Maybe that shouldn’t preclude me from having someone appreciate me for who I am.  Maybe you should add that into your world view.  Maybe discrimination isn’t limited to people with different-colored skin.  Maybe you can do something about that.

Or maybe not.

But maybe I’m not crazy and you really do like me.  Maybe you just don’t know how to show it, like I don’t.  Maybe all those coincidences really weren’t meaningless.  Maybe God wouldn’t hang me out to dry.  Maybe those couple times when you walked into the room and saw me talking intimately with someone else, that shocked look on your face was real.  Maybe that’s the way I feel when I see you talking with someone else (guy or girl) and sharing part of yourself that I’m afraid I’ll never get to know.  Maybe you flirt with all these guys for the same reason I flirt with all these girls, just to make you like me (well okay not the only reason).  Maybe we’ll actually get past this and it will work out.  Maybe I hope so with all my heart.  Maybe one day we’ll look back on this and it will all seem funny.  Maybe you are laughing at it now.  Maybe we’ll get married and live happily ever after.  Maybe we’ll finally have a good laugh about all this one day as we sit around the fire with our grandchildren.  But I think God will have to take care of it because I’m completely clueless.

Or maybe I just think too damn much.  What do you think?