88 - Tap Dance

    "Soooooo," she said watching me stare into the nothingness, "you are beyond quiet."  I continued to stare into the nothingness.  Tony and Amber were all over each other and my favorite bartender had the night off.  I hadn't expected to see her out for a while.  I had avoided her calls and e-mails for the past month because I was busy with work and family.  She had stopped by to see her girlfriend who was bartending that night and caught a glimpse of me standing out on the back deck getting some air after my waffle fries. 

    I didn't approve of the new guy she was banging so I had cut myself out of the picture.  I didn't want to seem like the jealous guy.
    "I'm fine," I lied as I leaned against the deck.  Usually the breeze from the lake ran through my soul and preformed a little spring cleaning.  I was almost there but this set me back.
    "There are a few things I’m working through."  I mumbled.  The clouds glowed in the midnight moonlight.  I always wanted to be the better man for her but I just wasn't good enough.  There were so many questions that I wanted to ask but I already knew the answers and didn't want to hear them.
    She just looked at me with those big beautiful doe eyes.  I stared off into the distance and let the machines hammer away.  I could feel the metal grinding as the thoughts beat themselves into my skull.
    "Please talk to me," she said.
    "I can't," I said as I felt my heart beating in my throat.  I didn't know what to say.  I felt broken.  I was avoiding her because she had moved on and she didn't know I knew.  I was avoiding her it was killing me.
    I couldn't even look at her.  She was happy for the first time in a long time and it was nothing I did.  There was a part of me that didn't know what to do.  I felt my heart breaking as her heart was mending.  Things were going as they should.  I had introduced them to each other some random evening while she and I were talking.
    Once again I was the catalyst.  I was somehow helping her get where she needed to go.
     I was the gatekeeper.  I was the dead dog in the back yard.  I was the troll on the bridge.  I made sure people got across to their destinations.  Was this my destination?  Was this where I was supposed to be?  Did it matter?
     "You know I'm here for you.  Don't block me out.  I don't want you to block me out."
     "I don't want to hold you back but I don't want to let you go," I said feeling the small choke in my voice.  "I have to let you get all of the things that you need to fulfill your soul.  I'm still here, you know I'm still here.  It's like we're doing this little tap dance..."
     "Is that why don't you take my calls or answer my e-mails?"  She asked the question that she already knew the answer to.
     "Right now you're looking out into the backyard and feeling sad.  Right now I'm that dog buried under your favorite tree."
     "I..." she started as here phone rang.  It was the special ring tone she had chosen just for him.  I could tell by her reaction.
     "You've got a phone call."
     "Hey, baby" he said.  It was so quiet I could hear his voice clearly.
     "It's my...my friend," she lied softly as she turned away to take the call.
     The machines hammered away.  I continued to stare into the nothingness as she walked back into the bar.

That Beautiful Black Man