Mr. Unavailable #126: Mr. Leaky

See The Imprinter, Business or Pleasure?, Spellbound, No Picnic in the Park, Squatter Love, Who Falls First?, Trouble, Purgatory, Pre-Disintegration, Sanity Takes a Turn, In Heat, Fireworks, Part 1, Fireworks, Part 2 and Don't Tell Mama for the background on this one.

A week went by with no word from #126. Why I cared, I didn't know. Was I worried about the apartment? Did I just want him to want me even though I didn't even want him? Or did I want him?

I met up with Eva at Souen. She imitated my grimace from across the table, which made me, #1, laugh, and, #2, realize how grimacey I was.

"Is it really that bad?" I asked.

"It must be really that bad," she said, then turned her impression of my frown upside-down.

Was I seriously mooning over #126, the nose-picking, dirty-T-shirt-wearing, pee-stained-mattress-sleeping vet without a cause?

Eva had been at James’ birthday dinner, where I’d re-met #126, and at the rooftop party, where all other unavailables faded into the background when #126 appeared. But she hadn’t known any of what happened, so I laid it all down for her.

“That doesn't surprise me,” she said. “…He’s kind of leaky.”

What did that mean?

“When someone’s leaky, it means that they put out a general sexual vibe to most people to see what they get back.”

“Did he come onto you?” I asked.

“I thought he may have for a minute,” she said.

And then Eva saw my face.

“But I could tell at that rooftop party that you both liked each other and he definitely liked you,” she said.

“Should I text him? Just to say hello, you know, make things normal…ask how the apartment is coming along?”

“You do what I do. You give all of your power away. In a couple of days, he’ll wake up and miss you. And then he’ll be calling you asking you to go to dinner again.”

I wasn’t so sure, but I appreciated the sentiment.

“What’s wrong with me? I knew he was leaving and I never wanted a relationship with him.”

“It’s oxytocin,” Eva said. “You have to give yourself a break. It’s just chemical. It'll wear off.”

“That makes me feel a little better. Why do I go for these guys?”

“Well, I know why I go for them,” she said.

“Why?”

“Because I’m emotionally unavailable,” she said, and then she giggled. Either I was sitting across from a total nut or I was in the presence of complete self-acceptance. “When I fall for someone who is wrong for me, it’s usually because I want something from them that subconsciously I know they can’t give me because I can’t even give it to myself. They’re my emotional mirrors.” Then she smiled and dipped her spoon into her soup. “We want someone to be there for us, but we have to be there for ourselves first. So that is the question. Are you available to yourself?”

I know I use the word “suddenly” a lot, but, suddenly, a lot of things made sense. If I’m not available to myself then I can’t be available to someone else and if I’m not available to someone else, I’m going to be picking people that I won’t have to be available to and who, in turn, won’t have to be available to me.

It was so simple. Yet so complex.

The answer was right there in front of me: It was me.

How annoying.

Eva glanced up behind me into the mirror and then looked at me from beneath her jet-black bangs. “You were so wrapped up in [#126] you didn’t even see the cute guy sitting next to you who’s been staring at you all night. He looked at you to smile before he got up, but you didn’t see him. And now he’s gone.”

“What guy? I totally didn’t see him.”

“I know you didn’t,” Eva said. And then she giggled.

Wow. I was worse than I thought.

Signs of Hope: I am merely an innocent victim of oxytocin.

Red Flags: I know almost nothing about how to be available to myself. Am I supposed to buy myself flowers when I have a bad day? That seems so pathetic. Oh...maybe that’s the problem.

Turning Point: When Eva revealed her unavailability, "suddenly" there was mine.

Diagnosis: For him: This is no longer about #126.
For me: My subconscious has been using these unavailable men as camouflage for my own unavailability. Or something like that.