Crash

Mom and Dad think that I'm lonely.

It's nearly midnight. Mom has collapsed on my bed, Dad is sitting in my armchair drinking a beer. They've driven up from Wisconsin to spend the weekend with me. I'm about to throw a big event for work and they wanted to be here to support me during it.

Yeah, they're pretty sweet sometimes.

We're having the conversation we always have when we get together. They, having had roommates (usually siblings) for all of their unmarried lives and then having one another, cannot fathom why I choose to live alone, and how I've managed to live alone so long.

They're surprised, and try to hide it, that I've managed my anxiety over the coming event, my normal work schedule, my volunteerism, my social life over the past month.

Mainly they're surprised to find that the apartment is clean and I've managed to feed myself.

"Don't worry," I observe. "I'll crash hard on Sunday."

***

"Sweetie? Kels? Hey. . . "

I sit up with a start, wiping my face and eyes. "I'm here, I'm here. What is it?" I squint at the laptop, wondering why it's still in bed with me.

"You fell asleep."

It takes me a minute to realize that my Skype session is still open. We've been having trouble finding time for one another recently, and despite being flat-out exhausted, I refused to cancel.

"Was my mouth open?"

He laughs and my heart breaks. Again. "You were also snoring."

"Shit."

"Don't worry. It was actually really sweet."

"Oh, shut up. Snordorable is not really what I'm going for. What time is it?"

"11:00."

"I should hang up." I yawn. "I have an 8:00am and then a 12 hour day."

"Glad to see you're taking it easy, and making sure to take care of yourself."

I snort and answer without thinking. "That was supposed to be your job."

"You're the one who left."

I wrinkle my nose and he knows he went too far.

"I'm sorry."

"I gotta go. Early day tomorrow."

I hang up before he can say "I miss you." 

***

I wake up with gritty eyes, a pounding head, aches all over, sweatily wound up in the sheets. I squint at my cellphone, even that tiny bit of light hurting my eyes. 4:00PM. On a Sunday. 

This is not a hangover. Well, not really.

I've spent most of the past few weeks coordinating an event. It was busy, there were lots of moving parts, and I slept very little during the time period. It was also the kind of event that required me to be extremely social and outgoing. About 72 hours ago my inner introvert just sat down in the corner and started to cry. I kept running on fumes, finished the event, came home, and crashed. 

I groan, push my hair out of my eyes, and start hunting around for my bathrobe before I remember that it's in the laundry basket, with about three weeks of clothing that I haven't been able to get to the laundromat. My hair is damp so I start looking for the towel from my shower and . . . nope. Left it in the bathroom. Exhausted, I wrap the sheets around myself and stumble for the kitchen. 

The fridge has some cold press coffee, half a pack of Sugar Free Red Bull, a beer, and some hot sauce in it. 

The cupboards and freezer aren't much better.

I've dated, I've loved men who have wanted to take care of me. Who waited at the door with a three course meal. Who ran a hot bath of us at the end of an an excruciating day. Who wanted to be at the finish lines of my races, text me jokes in the middle of the day when I'm stressed, accompany me to nonprofit events and crack jokes and charm my peers.

I left them. I left them because . . . well, I left them because I left them. Because (among other reasons) at twenty-two or twenty-five I wasn't ready to be taken care of. I wasn't ready to have someone who knew that I (somehow) manage to sleep with my mouth open and snore, lightly, when I'm exhausted. I was hung up on the idea of independence, of being able to take care of myself. At thirty it's not that I regret those choices, I don't even know if I would make different choices if they were presented to me today. 

But right now, wearing a sheet, standing in an empty kitchen, debating whether or not I can skip dinner with seven loads of laundry in the closet,  is where I start reconsidering my choices.