By Chance

by Rixxy

 

We met on a bench. By chance, I was unusually early for class and you were reading a book.  You asked me about the class assignment which seemed strange to me since it was five weeks into the semester and I had never seen you before.  You had just been warned by the professor that you needed to go to class if you wanted to pass.  Your casual nature about the situation made an impression on me. I felt that even though I had not completed the reading myself I at least showed up each week.

 

We met by chance on Copley lawn.  Neither of us were in a rush and our conversation lasted unusually long for a casual meeting.  We enthusiastically chewed on the connection that spoke attraction, but you had a girlfriend.  I smiled and sauntered on seemingly disinterested.

 

When we met again by chance at the front gates of the university, thirty minutes passed before we decided we should exchange numbers.

 

After summer I called you up. Your girlfriend left the country.  We planned to meet for dinner. You instructed me in the basics of Italian cooking that you learned from your grandmother.  Garlic, olive oil, a can of diced tomatoes, a can of black olives…pasta.  We walked after dinner, around and around until 4 am.  By chance I ran into you again the next day at a street festival.  This time was different. Nerves fluttered with expectation. Something changed.

 

Over the next year we were too close to meet by chance.  We never separated long enough. We desperately entwined ourselves to each other in poetry, in art.  I felt that our crossed stars held meaning.  I left the country, you were still in school.  My expectation lingered as you sunk into the depths of your own demons.

 

Still heartbroken, I met you by chance.  Somewhere on the lower east side in a bar neither of us had ever been to before at 3 in the morning on new year’s eve.  My heart expected to see you but my cloudy vision took a double take.  Our friends joined paths and we awoke together the next morning.

 

Abroad, my vision continually deceived me.  Facial features, long dark curls, a casual step.  I was surrounded by blood a hundred steps removed from you, but still, something resonated.  I grew dependent on the chance meeting. I hungered for it, but this time it never materialized.

 

When I returned, I needed fulfillment. I scheduled a meeting.  My hope led me to its own funeral.  You cleaned yourself up but from the backs of my eyes I could see the burnt ashes of an extinguished flame.  Chance mocked me through the faded embers of its own ghost.  It divorced itself from the jail of my expectation and I let you go.

  

 

 

Tags: chance, Heartbreak