Blind Love, Reunited

I told him how I had never gotten over him but did finally accept the reality that he wasn't coming back to me. I didn't date for a long time though I had plenty of offers. Over time, thinking about how much I wanted a family of my own grew to a point that I made the decision to make that dream become real.

Every first date was an exercise in futility. I'd compare them to Paul and found every one missing a box or more on my checklist that I had made in my head in Paul's image, or essence. That went nowhere.

Then one day I was introduced to a guy through Mom's friend at Torrey Pines, Beth Walters, at my mother's urging to her friend that I meet someone good for me. His name was Robert Preston. Robert, never Rob, Bob, or heaven forbid, Bobby. He was an executive at an investment firm that his father owned. He was handsome, rich, and charming when he wanted to be. He swooned over me and I put away my checklist in order to get what I wanted.

From a very high overview, we wanted the same things. I wanted a family, he wanted to start one right away. I wanted security, he wanted to be a solid provider. I wanted to stay close to my parents, and he was completely committed to his. They were all good signs and I felt like they were pillars to a successful union. What I didn't know then that I fully understand now, maybe because I was still relatively young, was that wanting the same things was paramount but I never asked or fully understood the "why" behind his want for these things. And we were not even close to being on the same page over that.

The waitress brought our food and interrupted my tale for a moment, but after she left, neither of us really felt like eating. I gripped his hand tighter. "You have to understand that I've spent years wondering what I would do if I knew what I know now, but it always comes down to Alice. I wouldn't have changed anything that would have affected that outcome. She means everything to me." He nodded in understanding so I continued.

I got it that I was guilty of my own selfishness, but it wasn't long before I learned that what Robert was looking for wasn't very heartfelt either. All along, I was just an instrument to improve his appearance. I was still a skinny hard body at that time and he wrapped me in expensive clothes and jewelry to show me off to his friends. They weren't even friends, really. I don't think he had those, only colleagues or his audience that he was constantly trying to impress, including his own father.

Things fully unraveled after I got pregnant. He wanted a boy and was never interested in Alice, if you can imagine that. She was the cutest little child, just perfect in every way. I put on some weight and I was fine with my new body, but he wasn't. And then he suddenly wasn't around anymore. Everything just seemed to irritate him at home. We talked about how it seemed we had just grown apart and then he wasted no time in moving out and contacting an attorney. Just like that.

I told him, "Alice and I haven't seen him since she was little. Years now."

"That's nuts," he responded with disgust, "who wouldn't want to see his own daughter?! Especially a cutie like Alice. What about his parents? They must want to see their grandchild."

"Funny you should say that. I see Robert's mom about once a month. She comes over for coffee and to spend some quality time with Alice, but I think she's doing it on the sly. Robert's father wanted a grandson, after all, and he finally got one. Robert remarried and has a son now, according to his mother, so everybody got what they wanted except for Alice. I feel like she's the one who's been shorted the most. A victim in all this."

"I'm so sorry, Polly. None of this was supposed to happen this way."

"That's what I keep trying to tell you."

* O+

I called up Eva a few months later and invited her and Rick to a little party I was throwing. It was to introduce Paul to my friends and even a reintroduction to a few old timers from our past. Eva was real quiet after my invitation.

She finally spoke with hesitation, "Paul agreed to that?"

I replied, "Yeah, I mean he said he'd be OK meeting some of my friends."

"But you told him it was a party, right? I mean, he agreed to go to a party?"

"Uh, yeah. I mean, more or less. I told him I wanted him to meet some of my friends and seemed fine with that, and he said he'd support me in any way he could."

"Pauline, I don't know that it's a very good idea."

Now Eva was pissing me off. Who doesn't like a harmless, adult cocktail party? It's not like I was talking about a kegger like when we were in college.

"It'll be fun," I tried to assure her.

"Why are you really doing this?" She asked.

What the fuck?! I had half a mind to tell her off right over the phone but calmed myself. She really did see right through me so I responded truthfully, trying to keep the frustration out of my tone. "Listen, I just got Paul back. The love we have for each other is still there. I haven't been this happy in a very, very long time, Eva." I took a deep breath. I could hear the edge rising in my tone.

"But...,"

I sighed and reached calm again, "But he's not closing the door. He's keeping the door wide open, and like a broken record, never letting me forget that it would be better for me if we kept it that way so I could walk away at any time and then I wouldn't get hurt. I'm telling you Eva, it would hurt like fucking hell, all over again. He seems to think that he would be perfectly fine just being left alone. I want him to understand that he doesn't have to be. This is important to me."

Eva was quiet for a minute and then sighed, "Alright, Pauline. Rick and I will be there. It will be a good learning experience for you and we'll help pick up any of the pieces."

They say, "love is blind," and in my case I thought it applied because I could love a blind man, overlooking his physical challenge. Instead, love had made me blind as I didn't pay heed to Eva's warning. For years to come I would regret not listening to her or at least try to understand.

* O+

The party was a huge success. In turnout only. Everyone who said they were coming actually showed up. Which worked against us.

I suppose the food was good, I had tried it along the way as I prepared it, but was too busy to eat once the guests had all arrived.

I walked Paul around and proudly introduced him. He was pretty quiet but politely made chit chat along the way. He tried to gravitate around his sister and brother-in-law but I managed to get everyone mingling. I had to leave his side here and there to refill serving dishes, drinks, and stuff, but made sure I always left him in good hands with someone I trusted.

As it got later, I detected Paul getting a little sullen and reluctant to participate in conversation. I was also leaving his side for longer periods, at one point even getting cornered by another teacher from our school who has a gift-of-gab that is more curse than gift and she was hard to break away from.

I finally managed to move on and that's when I noticed that Paul was missing.

I checked the kitchen first, then the bathroom and when I didn't find him, I poked into my room and even Alice's room. I mildly asked some friends if they had seen him, avoiding his sister, not wanting to admit to her that I had lost track of him. Nobody had seen him.

I found my sweater as it was cold outside and was going to check the backyard and then if I couldn't find him there I would start to circle the house and then expand my radius as necessary. It was at that thought which made me start to panic. By now he was familiar with being in my home, having memorized the layout, but he doesn't know my neighborhood, and he could be instantly lost. How long had he been gone? How far could he have gotten? It was dark out, not that it was a problem for him, but he could be hit by a car. He was wearing a black shirt at the party, why didn't I have him wear something brighter?!

I was practically in tears, I was having trouble getting my left arm through my sweater sleeve when Eva put a hand on my shoulder, stopping me. I looked at her face and knew it was time to confess. "I lost him. I lost him, Eva. I don't know where he is. He could be in danger."

Eva steered me into the kitchen, getting us alone. I still couldn't find my fucking sleeve with my left arm. Fuck!

"Calm down," she said, calmer than the situation warranted. Instead of helping me with my sleeve, she helped me off with my sweater. "He's safe. For now."

"What are you talking about," I shot back. "Do you know where he is?"

She replied, "No. But he's here."

I just about lost my shit. Eva cut me off, maybe it was her experience as a mother of teenagers, or of time spent with a blind man, but she got my attention enough that I decided to not rip her head off. She put her hand on my shoulder, giving it a strong squeeze. "I'm trying not to tell you I told you so, but there's some things you need to know if you are going to be with Paul, and this is one of them. This is actually the big one."

That got through to my head, I calmly waited for her to continue. "I should have been more forthcoming with you, so I'm mostly responsible here. You and me, everyone else at the party, have trained our brains from childhood to watch someone who is speaking and tune everything else out. That's why multiple conversations can be had at a table and you only hear the person speaking that you are tuned into. He can't do that. At a restaurant, or heaven forbid, at a party, he hears all conversations going on around him at once. Sensory overload. It sometimes gets too much for him."

I understood right away, instantly feeling bad and responded, "Oh. Shit."

"You've been in a restaurant with him, what? Five or six times? That's more than I've been able to get him to go, in like 10 years. I bet he was reluctant to eat out every time."

I thought back and she was right. It all made sense, but it didn't tell me where he was and I had to find him. Like right fucking now.

Eva clued in on my renewed distress. "He's hiding."

"No," I responded, "I looked for him, he's not here."

She said confidently, "He is. Look again. But look for him in places Alice would hide when playing hide-and-seek. Look for him like you're looking for a 6-year-old because that's the way he's feeling right now."

I made a beeline for my bedroom to start, through the crowd that hardly noticed my swift movements, but getting a knowing look from Rick as I passed him while he was talking to one of my friends. In my room, I closed the door behind me and didn't bother turning on the lights. There was a nightlight in the corner that illuminated enough for my search. I looked under the bed and he wasn't there but on the other side, in front of the closet, there were a bunch of my shoes scattered about. He was hiding in the closet.

I gently opened the door and could see him sort of crumpled up in one of the corners. He scrunched his face like he had been caught doing something bad. I moved some random shoes out of the way and crumpled down next to him, grabbing one of his hands with both of mine and laying my head on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry," I whispered.

"No. I am," he replied.

I just told him gently, "Shush," and leaned into him a little more. We just laid like that in silence for who knows how long. An hour, maybe.

I went out to the party to excuse myself only to find nobody there but Eva and Rick who were both cleaning up the mess. She shooed me back to my room and said they'd take care of it and call me in the morning. I thanked her with a hug and went back to my room.

After managing to pull Paul up and out of the closet, I undressed him before settling him in under the bedsheets. I undressed myself and got into bed from the other side until scooching up into a spooning position.

"I love you, Paul," I whispered in his ear.

"I love you too," he sleepily replied. I could hear his breathing change just minutes later, he was fully asleep.

I wasn't ready to sleep yet. My mind was racing until a calmness came over me. Tonight was just a bump. There were going to be more of them, I just knew it. But we'd get through them. Together. Because that's what we were going to do. Be together.

* O++++++++++

Epilogue

Yeah, so life did get complicated. And it wasn't easy. There really were some bumps along the way, some really big, but we managed and moved on. Every time the dust settled, it was easy to see that there really were more good days than bad.

It is an understatement to say that the morning after the party, Paul had been upset with himself. It matched every bit the disappointment I felt in myself for what happened. It was our first real test of how we would manage our future. We had a serious, at times tear-jerking, discussion about what happened and how we'd overcome things like that together. I was a teacher after all, and, dammit, I could teach myself how to anticipate and overcome the obstacles in the way, but we'd do it together, hand in hand. The most important part was open and honest communication, and looking back, I have to say that was paramount in us going the distance like we did.

It was almost two years before I got him to move in with me, but in that time, the door he left open to push me away gradually closed, and he was the one to do it. It was cute how hard he tried to not be dependent on me, but he slowly began to lean on me for little things that easily solved his day-to-day frustrating moments. It made me happy to do so.

I sometimes think I got the better end of the deal. I had a friend and lover who respected me, treated me with kindness, had no expectations of me being anybody but me, and loved me just the way I was. If I had a bad day, he'd rub my feet or stroke his fingers through my hair, and we'd talk it all through. I always went to bed after those moments thinking that I had self-worth after all, and that the next day would be a new day and I'd be better for it.

I credit Paul for bringing so much laughter back into my life and he freely admitted the same back to me. I would scheme in ways to giggle him up, but he seemed to always be one step ahead of me and he'd make me laugh so hard that sometimes my stomach would hurt.

Alice grew to just adore him, and he became a father-figure, though different from what the other kids at school had. Sure, he couldn't teach her how to hit a softball or drive a car, but he could teach her how to swing a golf club, surf the break at Swami's, and play guitar. And my eager kid learned everything he could teach her.

Even when she became a teenager and emotions ran away, hot and frustrating between typical mother vs. teen-daughter attitudes. After our arguments, she would talk things through with Paul out in the garden and I think he was instrumental in navigating her through a lot of teenage angst. I didn't like having to often get the inside scoop about Alice's life from the outside, but I was glad she went to him and not someone else that wouldn't share with me.

One time he made me laugh when he called himself 'Switzerland'. I bought him a Fedora with a feather in it which he ended up wearing all the time.

When she was a young adult, she had matured so much and I was so very glad she had grown into such a neat woman, she surprised me with a teary hug. "Mom, I'm so sorry I was so shitty to you when I was 17. I get it now. You were a great mom." Through my tears I could see Paul in the background, absolutely beaming.

Shortly after Paul moved in with me, the music teacher at the high school retired and Paul got the job. Which is another thread that wove through our love story, music. There was a lot of it wherever we went, whether in our home, on the car radio, or at school. He would play, I would sing, and we would frequently dance. Sure, maybe just in our living room, but dancing with Paul, especially when he held me close, were some of the brightest moments of my life.

I would be remiss if I didn't reflect on our intimate moments together. He could play my body better than he could play guitar, his hands and other body parts could do things to me that make my body shudder just thinking about it. He was attentive, picked up on my every cue, and made sure that I would feel the love as warmly as any climax. I was never left wanting, and so I returned it in full and did my best to please him in turn as much as possible. I also did my best to fulfill every one of his fantasies, and even the ones he didn't know he had.

It was made more difficult as Alice got older and wiser, but nevertheless, we got sneaky and figured it out.

My grandmother used to say, "What is meant for you will always find its way back to you," and I now know it to be undoubtedly true. Paul and I were meant to be together, and even after we had been divided by his sudden blindness, the universe had put us back together for that very reason. It was just meant to be.