FicWad

25. Every Joe has his day


Let´s take the time and do a quick survey of the present state of my life, shall we?
Number of people that made me feel as appealing as a steak is to, hm, let´s say, a vegan: 1.
Number of friends I didn´t talk to anymore because I had gotten into childish fights with them: 2.
Number of people I wished dead: 1. Me.

Today Joe surprised me.

I knocked at the door of his and Patrick´s place and he opened. "Hi," I greeted him.

He smiled at me, "Well, hello there. Come on in."

"Thanks," I entered the apartment.

"Just so you know, Patrick´s not here."

My heart sank. "I see," I turned on my heel and wanted to head back to the door.

"Dude," he said and sat down at the kitchen table. "We need to talk." He looked at me in an amicable way.

I was so flabbergasted to hear Joe say something like that I just walked over to him in trance, my feet moving automatically. (Also, I was so flabbergasted that I actually used the word "flabbergasted".)

He patted the chair next to him, "That´s a good girl. Take a seat." Okay, that sounded more like Joe, the patronizing tone of voice. I sat down anyway. I was eager to hear the wisdom escaping his lips. And wisdom it was...

"Sheena, I like you," he poured some coke into two glasses and shoved one over to me. I smiled lightly. "But I LOVE Patrick." I knew what he was driving at and wiped the unnecessary smile off my face.

He proceeded, "And that´s why I need you to consider what I´m about to tell you. I could be wrong... but I really doubt it."

I didn´t know what to retort so I remained silent.

"From what I was able to gather from Patrick´s whining and ranting," he rolled his eyes melodramaticly, "I guess you think the two of you find yourself in similar circumstances, right?"

I was staring at my coke. Oh, a question. He was looking at me a bit condescendingly.

"Yeeeaaah.", I dragged the word out.

"Wrong!", he looked me in the face, triumphantly. Then smiled slightly. "That´s what you think but that´s a misperception."

"How so?"

"Well... you´ve known Andy for how long?"

I scratched my head, "Something like half a year..."

"Do you have any idea for how Patrick´s been in love with Joyce?" It was beginning to dawn on me what he was driving at. "See, that´s the difference. Patrick´s been suffering from unrequited love since senior year in high school."

I sighed.

"Our friend Patrick is heart-broken. Deep inside he knew all along that he never had a real chance with Joyce but it´s usually easier to keep imagining things and attribute significance to the smallest hints that someone might like you back. Patrick is a dreamer type of guy, he´s an artist. He needs to retreat into his own world which probably consists mainly of music... but until a few days ago Joyce was also part of that world. It´s hard to see your dreams come tumbling down. Especially when you´ve had them for years and they´re crushed by someone who entered the stage five minutes ago like that hot shot Pete."

I can´t tell you how much it sucked to have Joe Know-it-all here giving it to me straight. I felt like I should be sitting on one of the chairs in my second grade class and not teaching. But you and I know that it was necessary so I could get a grip on myself and arrive at a less biased point of view. Growing up just made me wanna throw up at times like these.

"You, on the other hand, you just need to put a band-aid on your ego and realize that there are far more handsome and witty guys than Andy around here. Take me, for instance."

I had to smile at that.

"Correct me if I´m wrong but I think you just have a little crush on our Andy guy -", he stopped in mid-sentence and looked at me. I didn´t have to correct him. "So there´s not much damage done to your heart. Granted, it will be awkward for you to be around him in the near future but you´ll get over it. And Andy´s cool - not as cool as me though - he´s gonna try to make it as easy as possible for you."

After Joe´s insightful lecture I hung around for a bit and helped him with household chores. Before I went home I thanked him for opening my eyes.

"I do what I can. It may be hard to see sometimes but there´s more inside of my head than just video games and chasing girls... And with these words I have to end our little get-together because I need to get back to the ´Bikini Madness´ game on my PS 2."

I walked home, starting to work out how I would apologize to Patrick.

_ _ _ _ _


Dear Patrick,


Writing a letter to you is pretty much my last chance at trying to patch things up between us since you´re so thorough at ignoring my phone calls and refusing to see me whenever I show up at your doorstep. So, thanks for still reading this.

I wish to apologize for having been a dick. I´m sorry I acted so inconsiderate that night. I didn´t mean it that way and you know it. I was just still so shocked to learn about Andy and Fox. This is not intended as an excuse, it´s just an explanation as to why I acted like an asshole.

I really wish you didn´t like Joyce so much. Why do people fall in love with someone who won´t love them back? Why do people stay in love with someone who´s obviously not interested in them? I don´t have answers, all I know is it´s happened to me before, it´s happened to me again and it sucks. Yet, I´m aware that your situation is somewhat different to mine. I´m sorry it took me some time (and a conversation with Joe - I´m NOT making this up) to realize it. But better late than never, right?

We should probably talk about this in person, so please do call me. I miss you.


Miserable Sheena