Love me, Loudly

by Jess Kolbe

  I have a world of anxiety thinking. This is the tip of the iceberg! I do need you to know that this is my fear showing up and that I’m gifting to you. This is the preparation I am doing because I know I want him, I want to feel his hands on me, I want to feel his love, choose to love. So, clearly, I don’t have any control with Sam! And, well, control helps me to feel safe, so trust Evie, trust. Instantly, I revert to self-coach mode, which is a great opposition to my overthinking. Remind myself, remember to trust myself and to unleash the woman I am. Be raw, authentically you, it’s the same as showing up. Evie, you need to show up emotionally, even if that is you shitting your fucking self.

  I make a plan in the pasta aisle. Lasagne. I’ll need to let him in on a little of my crazy, just a small amount. Please let me not be too much. I’m again begging God, the universe, the divine whoever will hear my call on the drive home, normal, please, let me be normal. He let me in on what is happening in his head and I’m not sure he truly knows what is happening for him. I think that this is okay and that it’s okay for us to be in completely different places, emotionally and physically. That is how you come together with someone, the ebb and flow of opening and closing your heart, the peeling back of yourself, right? The hurting and the healing, right? I don’t want to start with a closed heart, but I fear, that I am. I need to understand and accept that our doors could be closed but completely unlocked.

  Opening your heart means opening it to everything, to all the parts you’ve closed the doors on, all the parts that are unresolved, you can’t close yourself off to one feeling without dampening all feelings. I want to be open to the entire experience of falling in love. I guess I want to let him know that this is my experience as well, that I have been secretly freaking out the entire time we’ve spent together. Even though I know he knows this, I want to say it, aloud. I wonder if this is what happened to Sam? Opening his heart to me meant that the dam wall cracked, and shit began flooding out. He had closed himself off and when I came along cracks began to show. I want to be compassionate towards him and honour his relationship with his dad, honestly sharing what I can give and want. There will be a time when he needs to sit behind me and just wait, or whatever it looks like for me. This realisation brings a calm to me. I feel my shoulders relax and I’m beginning to check back into reality as I feel the cold milk on my arm, redness on my skin from the chill. Ingredients for lasagne balanced, very well I might add, in my arms. I laugh out loud as I wonder how many times. I’ve just been walking aimlessly around this supermarket deep in thought. Amazing things happen when you’re in supermarkets. At the checkout, my thoughts softly murmur, ‘our stories are different, and our internal battles are the same, both grappling with life, warts and all.’ I know the best place to heal from relationship trauma is in healthy relationship however the practice of doing it is a different story.

  HIM | Eighteen

  Harold, my blue heeler, has been under my feet since I came home. He’s been like this for a while and today appears even mores agitated. I ask him what I should do about Evie? Harold responds with a bark.

  I’m not even sure I’m going tonight. I’m overthinking things. I know it, but I can’t bear to hurt her. I can’t have those eyes look at me, like that again, wounded. I can’t be who she needs. I ask Harold and he just licks my face, and I laugh, somehow. I think why not, you’re a good man aren’t you? Am I? My God, it got serious quickly. Am I trying to ignore the pain of Dad? She just feels good, and being near her feels good. I just want to feel good, can’t I just follow that? Just see what happens. I take a deep breath, giving myself some encouragement. Right. Put in an effort. She is so kind, I like the person she is. Remember about Mum and Dad and try to be a gentleman like he was. The word ‘was’ disrupts my thoughts and causes me pain.

  Clean up, one foot in front of the other. I put a shirt on, and quietly ask Dad out loud to help me. Harold cuts sick at the door, barking, jumping through the doggie door and into the back of my truck before returning inside. Clearly, he’s made his mind up. I’m stunned and comforted at the same time that it feels like Dad is helping me, and I need to trust it is him. I am choosing to believe it is him helping me. At Dad’s farewell there were a few strange things that occurred, as if Dad were still with us. We all acknowledged it, not out loud of course, that would be too crazy for my family!

  Ruby stopped me later, after I asked ‘what the…’ Her response stuck with me. ‘You may not believe in it, but it believes in you,’ in reference to the strange occurrences and her beliefs that Dad is still with us. It is sort of like what Mum and Evie said that Dad lives on within me and how I continue to love him. I did ask for help and I want to listen, Dad and Harold just gave me a pretty big clue. Particularly with Harold’s weird behaviour. After a lot of coaxing Harold gets out of the ute, rewarded with a giant bone for his help. I drive forward towards Evie’s, feeling more resolved and like things feel right. I guess I’m not arguing with how I am feeling, including just not knowing what is next… because I don’t know, no one has any clue, we all just pretend we do.

  Arriving at Evie’s, I can hear old time music playing, the kind Mum and Dad used to listen to while Mum attempted to dance with a man who had two left feet. She used to stand behind him, swinging his hips in an attempt to get him to dance. He would always give her a clumsy jig and her smile would light up the room. Small moments were what made them both light up. I knock and there no answer, but the door’s open, so I invite myself in. I see Evie. She’s dancing and I’m transfixed immediately. She moves her body in a way that mesmerises me, and I feel hypnotised. I’m watching her body, picturing her riding me, moving to the music, slowly. I think I have my hands stretched out towards her when she turns after noticing me, but I can’t be sure.

  “I knocked,” stumbles out of my mouth.

  She says it’s okay, giving me another swing of her sex in my direction. Well, I am done in. I’m struggling trying to contain myself and keep up with the conversation while watching her. The way she looks at me feels amazing. I notice I am puffing my chest out, its comical really and yet feels primal. This part of me is showing strength to her. It feels electrifying between us. I can smell her, taste her in the air. She’s sweet and musky. I’m leaning into the space. I can see her flicker, from the excitement. I’m getting so hard, pushing my own manhood out towards her to feel for her. She moves, and I want more, so I feel her, taking that body and letting her experience my manhood, while tasting her lips slowly. Showing her that I’d take her passionately, tenderly, and fiercely over and over again. I feel her body change under my hands. Rigid. Too much. I pull back, steadying her hips to feel me. She takes the control of the moment with a passion-filled kiss, pressing her breasts into me. Fuck, she feels so good. We both try to slow down in recognition of how that felt. She tastes like beer, without thinking I say the beer tastes good, breaking the ice a little, releasing the tension from engulfing us both.

  HER | Nineteen

  The local radio station is smashing out some classics. I feel good, showered, restored and determined to be authentically me. I have a beer in hand to relieve my nervous angst and some dancing to take the edge off the anticipation of his arrival, while the smell of basil and tomatoes fill the air from the lasagne.

  Etta James, ‘Sometimes I Get a Good Feeling’ comes on. I am owned by the soul of an epic song, from a time when every song lit you up from the inside, speaking to your soul. The purest form of creativity and expression that I have is dancing, where I can spend my emotions. I spin myself around my kitchen dancing with an invisible partner, dreaming of his hands on me, to find Sam standing in my kitchen in a trance watching my body. I’m embarrassed and giggle like a schoolgirl. “I knocked,” he declares.

  The cheeky woman inside me flashes him a swing of my hips, telling him you’re welcome! I walk around the bench to greet him and he smells so good, a spicy woody tone, showered and clean. Blue jeans and he’s chosen a nice shirt to wear for me, towel dried hair, very se
xy. The shirt shows off his body, making me wonder if he knows how sexy he looks, or if he pulled the first thing out of his wardrobe. From what I know of this man, I think it would have been the latter. He is particularly good looking, and as I take him all in, suddenly, I feel inadequate. I let that thought pass on by as my sassy self internally laughs with, ‘I’m the fucking prize!’ My very own internal rebuttal. I’m in front of him, looking into those eyes. His hands immediately reach for my hips as I reach for him, standing there taking this man in, feeling the moment, him and our energy rising. We are not moving and yet a dance is occurring, our souls are caressing each other, finding their tune, our flow, reconnecting. We are about to move apart, the energy swirling around us increases, my breathing quickens. I’m having a hot flush, sweating, my hands on his chest, exposed, fighting the urge to kiss him, fighting my excitement, attempting to tame myself and to contain the moment. The part of me that is fearful, is the part of me that doesn’t want to be hurt again, the thought causes me to flicker, to move. He responds completely as if tuned into my body and moves me closer to him. Ever so gently he runs his lips over mine, hands reaching for my face, tasting my lips, holding me in him. Turning the volume to right up to max in our energy, the room is spinning, my heart is thumping hard against my chest, dread rises, my heart panics, racing hard against the cage she is in. Fear is coming in this moment, and I’m triggered completely, I feel the rigidity arrive in my body, so I push my feet heavy into the ground and press my chest against his and take some control of our kiss, setting the tone for myself, so I can accept the bodily experiences and recognise this as pure connection and it’s new and I need practice.

  I practice that change in me, feeling both wonderful and terrified to work with it, allow it to live here until it doesn’t anymore. I soften into the space. Sam now takes back the rhythm of our embrace, penetrating my every sense. My heart thumps to find flow, lips quivering, searching for our own beat, feeling the warmth of him, his sweetness, all of me held, synced to our rhythm pulling me closer to his body, his soul, I slow us. I need to breath, I step back taking a deep slow breath, while taking all of him in, I push my feet into the ground, my legs feel like jelly, fear attempting to crawl out of the darkness and yet a smile comes out of me, in the knowing that we have begun, I have faced it in the presences of someone and our rhythm and our tone is creating safety for me. We move further apart, I feel completely surrendered to the mercy of this man, he feels incredible, he knows only the way a man does how to hold your centre of gravity while you are lost in the feel of him wholly. And you trust that this ever-present source of man’s strength holds you right there, right where you need to be held to explore the man before you. I’m overwhelmed by his natural instinct to protect, without even knowing he is doing it, I think. He’s got me like an anchor. Sam’s voice breaks me out of my thoughts, “the beer tastes good!” I smile at his cheek and grab him a beer.

  While we talk about nothing, politely avoiding what just happened and it all feels so surreal. I serve dinner and somewhat regret the formal nature of the dining table, wishing I had of opted for the kitchen bench. The formality of it increases my anxiety. I’m already on edge after my supermarket attack of the looping mind and it all appears blank after tasting him. I’m committed now so over the first bite, I start to slowly tell him how I feel.

  “Sam, you scare the shit out of me!” Internally, I’m screaming at myself for my epic fail at slow and slightly yelling at him. “I want to run towards you and away from you at the same time and this is not just about what’s already happened between us. The reason why I want to run away from you is because of the baggage I come with and how I desperately don’t want to ever be hurt again. I am battling those old wounds that used to keep me scared and now they show up in big moments like this, with you because I like you. I know that’s a stupid way to live, hence why I’m also trying to share with my experience and trying not fuck this up, yet I know we will hurt each other, I understand you will hurt me, and I will hurt you too. What I believe a relationship is the practicing accepting each other while hurting and repairing, rinse and repeat.” Sam instantly reacts, and I interrupt. “Sam, please bear with me, I know I am stumbling though, when you say you’re not sure, I feel hurt and like I’m not enough, sort of like you are rejecting me and that’s ok because you’re being honest with what is happening for you and my feelings are also okay too. I guess I am trying to let both of us be okay in being different places while dealing with massive emotions. I’m trying to respect your wishes and allow space for my feelings to evolve as well. I am scared to open myself up to love with someone and to learn to experience the love of another. I am responsible for my choices and us being in different places is fine and tomorrow I might be in a very different place too and I guess I just want you to know where I am coming from and I understand where you are at, I think. I know this is probably way too full on for you right now, but I want you to know I respect your wishes and also want you to understand my feelings and that I get that we both are ‘not sure,’ just in different ways. I know we will hurt! That’s part of learning to love and I’m figuring out what that looks like and what my expectations also look like. Sam, I come with damage and it will show up, sort of like now! I hope it’s something that we can work through together and I can overcome for myself. I learnt this a long time ago but today in the supermarket, all my fears showed up about you and I wanted to run, then I realised I don’t want to be hurt! My fears are real, and I will still show up in them, I just need to feel them through. I am open to feeling what we look like without expectation knowing that being hurt while working out if there is any possibility of feeling what I feel for you now, is worth it. I am confused, I am struggling with my desire for you and the reality of us, while wanting to get to know the man you are. Trying to keep my feet on the ground, which is what I mean we are at different places and are different people and I guess, I am trying to work with my expectations and overwhelming feelings while acknowledging and giving time for that to be ok within you. I am trying to be open without judgement and expecting you to fit my ideal.”

  Throughout this anxious rambling, my internal fears are oscillating between negative thoughts of myself and attempting to look half rational in what I am trying to convey here. “I understand how my fears work. I get that we have no idea where this will go. It is complete bullshit to say I am ready for you and what this could be, because when you’re near me, I feel like I don’t have any control and when you touch me...”

  I take a slow depth breath to compose myself. I am trying to ride the wave of my feelings while having a cascade of emotion, desire and fear-based thinking overcome me.

  I look up at Sam, and I am not sure of what he is thinking. I am rambling so much, fuck.

  “Well, shit, that doesn’t sound right. A relationship has good and bad, and I know that’s not us too, we are just seeing what happens, what we feel like for each other and I am happy. After hearing your love for your dad and your family today, your honesty and understanding why you didn’t want to see me, why it was too much for you, I want you to understand, I am also struggling with the intensity around us and I want you to honour your father and your feelings for him without me in the way. I wanted you to know a little about me too and I want to be true to myself and true to you, I might get hurt and it might not be what I want and I may be a little crazy, yet I inherently know that I will survive and love that I showed up gave us a chance, without holding back. Sam, I like how I feel when I’m with you, and I’ll chase any amount of time with you even if that consists of going on mad tangents over lasagne.”

  Sam’s attempting to be cool, calm and collected, I think. A wave of emotion is rising in me, awaiting his response to the first flood of anxiety spilling out of me. “Evie, thanks for letting me know, I get it and appreciate you seeing where I am at, when we shared our first kiss I felt all of that and your vulnerability and it felt too much. It showed me what I was trying to outrun my own emotio
ns.” He squeezes my hand and adds, “now eat.”

  I’m dumbfounded and falling in so much crazy love with Sam that all I can muster is a smile as we both return to our lasagne.

  After a few moments of silence, I say, “I was attempting to show you how much I wanted you with your hand on my chest,” while giggling.

  “My God, we are intense, hey?” Sam smiles and squeezes my hand. I add “I will try to stay out of my head so much. This is just new territory.” I’m trembling while I’m saying this to him. Thankfully, he simply responds, “I know.”

  We enjoy the rest of dinner in comfortable silence. It has been a massive day, with a smile here, a gently reassuring touch on the arm, on the hand there. We do the washing up together, enjoying the moment of dancing in each other spaces softly. He laughs at the fact that I like the doing the dishes rather than using the dishwasher and attempts to educate me on water saving. When I explain why I actually like it, he smiles. This used to be a time that families would spend together. I potter around, and he retreats to the couch, it feels so unbelievably normal and this is the first time he’s really spent any time in my house. My space suits him, and I smile at the thought of him naked in my kitchen. Sam calls me over and we both stare at the box, I lie down and rest my head on his lap. The last thing I remember was him playing with my hair.