One day after we'd only been together two months, I walked down to the store to surprise him and I saw him standing in the doorway talking to his ex girlfriend. I froze for a moment then strode away, faster than before, toward a nearby park. I didn't turn around to see if either of them had seen me.
Before it was converted into a new high school, the park near the store had two full baseball diamonds, a basketball court, and terraces behind it all. In high school, especially during summer vacations, I would walk the city with Pantera blaring though my head phones trying to find peace. I often made my way up on the hill to sit curled up on a stone beneath the trees. There was a small walking path nearby, but most people walked around the track further below by the baseball diamonds. The spot was a good place to go to be alone. I guess you could say that I went there to meditate before I knew what I was doing. I'd wrap my arms around my bent knees and stare out over the park, sometimes watching a softball game or the sunset. When I was feeling more grounded I'd slowly climb down from the rock and walk home.
The day I walked by and saw my boyfriend with his ex, I went to the stone beneath the trees in the park. I stopped at a convenience store first to pick up a small green first aid kid that I still carry with me in my purse. Back then, when my depression, anger, or self-deprecation became too unbearable, I coped by cutting. On the way up to the spot I picked up a sharp rock or a piece of glass, I can't remember which. Once seated, I dug the sharp edge into my skin until blood began to form. I watched it pool up and soak my skin for a while before cleaning it with antiseptic and wrapping it in a band-aid. I was always careful not to let the cuts become infected. I cried while the sun set that night, then slowly walked home.
The next time he met me at the abandoned church near my house, I asked him about her. He said that she had come to buy cigarettes and nothing more. I didn't believe him, but didn't say as much. I told him that I had cut myself. He threatened that if I ever cut myself again he'd hurt himself so bad that I'd be sorry. I knew he was serious and even though he said it out of a place of care, it worried me. After that, I never again found release through cutting, not out of self-care, but because I was afraid of what he might do.
Not long after the day I saw them together, we were sitting in a different park when he started chain smoking and pacing. He confessed to me that he'd kissed her, that he'd cheated on me. Instead of being angry, I felt bad for him. I hugged him because he looked so worried and upset. It was as if he gained power from my reaction. I wonder if the way I sympathized with him and ignored myself would set the stage for our future together. That night he said that we shouldn't be together for a while until he could sort things out with her. I was devastated. We broke up for two weeks even though we continued talking and seeing each other.
After we got back together, he bought me the blue squishy ball at work one day. It had a plastic dolphin inside and when you squeezed the ball the dolphin would swim around the sea of blue liquid. They were popular back then, but after several children burst the balls sending toxic liquid seeping onto their skin, a lawsuit was filed and the balls disappeared from convenience stores. I kept mine in my purse for years and would take it out when I was feeling upset.
Ten years after he first gave it to me, the ball was still intact, although covered in dirt, in a bin stored at my parents' house. Inside the ball, the dolphin competed with a giant cloud of dust, dirt, or mold, it was hard to tell which. It didn't take much to throw this in the trash beneath the other objects I no longer need.
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