Sam and I have been going round and round in cir­cles for quite some time now. I'd hes­i­tate to say that it's get­ting old, because that's really not the prob­lem. I like how things have been with us. I sup­pose I just find myself won­der­ing where things will go from here.

Wondering.…and scared.

I'm ter­ri­fied of get­ting hurt again, of doing the wrong thing and end­ing up exactly where I was two years ago — with a bat­tered, bruised and bro­ken heart.

Fear begats more of itself, which in turn begats very stu­pid choices. Part of me knows that by sab­o­tag­ing this rela­tion­ship, I will save myself any fur­ther pain. And for the past week or so, that's what I've been doing. I need to get myself out of that way of think­ing, oth­er­wise I'll end up sav­ing myself any fur­ther hap­pi­ness, too.

Prob­lem one is that our respec­tive sched­ules do not com­pli­ment each other at all. With the new job, I actu­ally have a fairly struc­tured sched­ule to adhere to where I'm happy to have week­ends free. But her new job requires mostly week­end hours, so our time spent together as of recent has been spo­radic at best.

Prob­lem two is that from the start, our rela­tion­ship has been pri­mar­ily phys­i­cal. Because of this, both of us have needed to remem­ber to stop for awhile and just, well, talk. This has been a prob­lem off and on for as long as we've known each other, but we're try­ing to work with it and not against it, which I think is the key.

But how the hell would I know? I've tried this before, and it wasn't exactly a resound­ing success.

Last Spring — March 5, to be exact — I remem­ber check­ing the e-mail. Not an uncom­mon occur­rence, that. The usual smor­gas­bord of mes­sages pro­claim­ing scream­ing orgasms, breast enlarge­ment, penile enhance­ment and Cialis were wait­ing for me as they always are. Among the selec­tions, how­ever, was some­thing I wouldn't have expected if I'd lived to be 100.

A mes­sage from a girl — once a very dear friend who had shared some of my dark­est moments, and yet some­one who since had become only a dis­tant mem­ory. At the time, it had been almost two years since we'd spoken.

We had one of those rela­tion­ships. A trust of deep alle­giance, and yet always had an under­ly­ing layer of innu­endo and mys­tery to it — a layer that was never acknowl­edged or explored. That was, of course, until our junior year.

It was a fling. Nei­ther of us knew it at the time, but I started to real­ize that I wasn't will­ing to put forth the effort required to make it some­thing more. I don't know if I regret that, per se. But oh, do I regret the aftermath.

Our friend­ship with­ered and died a hor­ri­ble death by the time we grad­u­ated from high school. I was never really sure how to apol­o­gize — or even at that point, what to apol­o­gize for. Time passed, and we went our sep­a­rate ways.

It took her almost two years, but she for­gave me — and in time, I learned to for­give myself. We were young and stu­pid at the time. I'm still young and stu­pid — it's just about dif­fer­ent things now.

We met shortly there­after and sparks began to fly. Our rela­tion­ship was like a breath of fresh air, espe­cially after hav­ing spent the pre­vi­ous year pin­ing for Megan. This time, it didn't feel like a dis­trac­tion, but some­thing new — some­thing with potential.

I was seri­ous this time, but hes­i­tant. As much as I wanted to be — as much as I really wanted this, I just wasn't ready for all of it yet. I wasn't pin­ing any­more, but nei­ther was I ready to start again. The pain was still there, lin­ger­ing. Some of it still is.

Not all scars are vis­i­ble to the eye. Not all wounds heal.

I don't know if let­ting Ash­ley go was the right deci­sion. At the time, I was sure it was — not only for my peace of mind, but I thought I was being the hum­ble per­son by spar­ing her feel­ings. Now, I'm not so sure. I really wish I'd given her more of an oppor­tu­nity instead of just shut­ting her out. She under­stood bet­ter than any­one ever had, and I didn't give her any­thing close to the chance she deserved.

We used to talk every day. As sched­ules and life sit­u­a­tions have changed, that doesn't hap­pen so much any­more. If any­thing, we chat about once a month, but it's noth­ing more than surface-talk. I sup­pose I don't blame her. She's done what's right by her — there's noth­ing wrong with that.

I still won­der if, given the chance, we could do bet­ter if we tried now. It's all moot, though. The best thing I can take away from that whole expe­ri­ence is the hope that I won't do the same thing again with Sam.

I'm still afraid. I'd like to think that I've made strides in the past year. Fuck it, I know I have — espe­cially in the last few months. But how does one actu­ally gauge any of this? There's just not an easy way to do it. Since H.S., I feel just as gun-shy as ever. I need to break out of that box, and I know that. And still, after all this time, I just don't know how to do it.

Just don't make the same mis­take again. Don't.