A long long time ago (circa Fall 2002), in a land far far away (Russia, in the Kurgan oblast) I dated a girl for a few weeks. I tend to blame it on the water, that there was something funny in that well, but really it was just a stage. At the time, I considered myself bisexual, and she knew it, and while it didn't work out, it wasn't my fault.
And I bumped into her last week.
I recognized her before she recognized me, and I wasn't sure what to do. It would have been easy for me to twist and keep myself out of her line of sight. I eventually decided to go for it, on the hopes that she had kept in contact with people I haven't heard from since high school. Eventually I emerged from my little hiding place on the other side of the door, and she did a double take, and it was awkward.
Turns out, she transferred and now goes to my alma mater. I'm still not used to calling it that; it's been less than a year. She's an education major, and she's student-teaching, and her class went on a field trip to my place of employment. Which would explain why there were rude misbehaving 12 year old boys congregating around her.
The conversation was more than half dead space, dead air, with the occasional little brat running up to her complaining that someone pushed him or permission to use the restroom. A lot of nodding, both of us had our arms crossed in an almost standoffish pose.
Worst part is, she didn't even have any juicy gossip for me. I've kept in contact with enough people, and have randomly found old friend's myspace pages to know who's engaged, who's dropped out of school, who's pregnant, everything that's surprising and yet at the same time, isn't. She ran off after a few minutes to keep a closer eye on the kids, and I breathed a sigh of relief that it was over.
Eventually the school bus returned and it was time for them to leave. Somehow she found me, even though I had gone back into hiding, and asked for my number in order to grab coffee sometime. Reluctantly I gave it to her, not being able to think of a reason why not.
I really hope she doesn't call. I don't want to have to put up with that again.
At least she was really tired and looked like crap. And she's gained weight. That's always nice to see in an ex.
