Free Falling in a Cage.

Act 1: #Snap
So she met a guy at a lounge a few weeks back. He is funny, interesting, and a great conversationalist. He has goals he wishes to achieve and a game plan to get there. All round, a pretty awesome guy.
He is however different on several, albeit, very important factors, religion not excluded. Sex is off the table for her (for multiple reasons). Sex is very much on the table for him. And while he says he doesn't mind just hanging around and making out, it's difficult for her to not feel bad getting him started and not following through. Not bad enough that she would compromise her values (which he, ironically, respects), but bad enough that she doesn't want to continue. Which brings about a dilemma.
See, he is emotionally unavailable. Which, curiously enough to strangers, makes him safe and completely perfect. Because emotionally unavailable means he isn't looking for a relationship or anything that requires her to feel more, get an anxiety attack, or face her inner daemons.
But then there is her morality and religious stance. Her shackles if you will, which negates any form of 'free fun' usually characteristic of someone who is more comfortable with a guy who is emotionally unavailable.
So ideally, she is stuck in between both worlds.

Act 2: #Snap
She mentally goes through her friends list. People she talks to about all this. She finds the one person she absolutely wants to share this with, and brainstorm with. The one person she thinks would understand her. But then she is faced with two problems. That person is long gone, and the one who took his place is so wrapped up in his own life issues, he has no place for her. That person isn't in the frame of mind to laugh with her, listen to her, talk to her or be there with her.
The replacement of the person she lost, even if he didn't have all the current issues to deal with, would not have the right responses. There is something missing, something different. Feels like the ghost or shell of the friend she had is presently occupied by this new and evolved being she doesn't recognise.
Sometimes she thinks, did she imagine him?? Did she put him up on a pedestal, like we know she is prone to doing, and when he fell off, it felt like she was meeting a new person for the first time; but this 'new person' is in fact who he really is and has always been, rather than the pedestal dweller she created? (run-on sentence, I know).

She is grateful she will be out of town for a month. She hopes that in that time, the completely safe and perfect guy would move on and have a more willing and appropriate dial-up buddy. This way, she can avoid the confrontational meeting that looms in the silence. The one that will inevitably project her as an overly emotional person, over thinking situations and trying to force him into something. Hilarious using the words 'overly emotional' to describe her.

Cause wouldn't it be just perfect that she, ever fearful of emotions, turns him, emotionally unavailable, suddenly wanting to pursue something with her.

I shudder to think of that version of reality.

xo