Love story No. 1: trying to make it work

It began with a few snowballs hitting my back and ended with the door hitting it instead.

On our first date, we decided to meet up outside her dorm before walking over to a nearby restaurant. Sweat was literally dripping off my hands when I saw how beautiful she looked in the distance. When we got a little closer to each other, we both began laughing because we were wearing almost identical outfits! Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t wearing a dress or anything, but the style and the colors were exactly the same, even down to the socks! That’s when I knew this girl was special.

I have a lot of trouble in social situations, so oral presentations in class were always one of the hardest things for me to overcome. Anyhow, this girl was so amazing, she made sure to sit in the back of the classroom whenever I had to give a speech. She’d sit in a place where I could focus on her, guiding my nerves. That was really special.

She used to make herself laugh and then laugh harder at her own laughter. I think the most prominent quirk she had was her sense of humor. Now, I am pretty strange and tend to find humor in strange places but I think she had me beat.

I think I could be satisfied just remembering this next moment if I never experienced love again. I was taking the train, on my way back into the city. She called me to say that she’d be at the station to meet me, which is always comforting. When I arrived at the station I didn’t see her, so I walked up the stairs and wandered over to the other platform where I could get a better view. I looked down the steps and there must have been about a hundred people milling around, yet I was completely transfixed on her. It was as if time had stopped and the entire world grew silent, looking through the crowd, as she was trying to find me. Somewhere embedded in that moment, was the realization that someone I was deeply in love with felt the same way for me.

After three years together, we were reaching the end of our relationship.

On one of our last dates we went out to a club on the wrong side of town. She wanted to stay and wasn’t really thinking about the possibility of me getting jumped or worse… So we had a big argument; lots of deep, underlying emotions came into play, so it wasn’t just about the situation at hand. Eventually, we got back to her apartment and she slammed the door on me. I would’ve just left, but I realized she had the key to my apartment. So I knocked on the door, had the doorman give her a call and basically caused a bit of commotion. Meanwhile, her neighbors are getting upset, yelling “Leave her alone!” out their doors. So I’m yelling back – “She has my key!” and believe me, they weren’t buying it.

Finally, I got in touch with her, she throws my key under the door and just my luck – it bounces back into her room! So I just thought, forget it. It obviously wasn’t my night so I fell asleep on a couch in the lobby. Metaphorically, the story represents an amazing relationship, while it lasted, but one that gradually grew into a search for the key to her love. The climax being when she tries to give it back to me but I just cannot reach it. 

-Matt Dangler; Demarest, New Jersey.
Matt is an artist and based a painting off this story. See his work here.