So we were engaged. Happy. Head over heels, in love. Innocent. Not for long.
Our beloved TIP was cut short due to my contracting swine flu (H1N1), and I left about a week into the program without so much as a goodbye. When I got better from home, plans immediately began for our first high school visit: homecoming at my school. With only a few months of a wait between the end of TIP and homecoming in October, we figured the time passed would be easy. I thought all of high school together would be easy. It wasn't.
I knew throughout 8th grade with Graham that I'd run into Jimmy again, but I thought that being engaged would've been enough to put me past all of that. I was very, very wrong. The split second I saw him my first day of freshman year, my heart skipped and I had hot flashes. I was nervous, and he triggered my "fight or flight" adrenaline response. But for the first few months of high school, we didn't interact much, if at all.
Meanwhile, Graham and I were progressing in our relationship. We used Skype for "sex," along with nightly phone calls. Based on our sexual escapades at TIP (and our ignorance), we believed that not only had I gotten pregnant, but also that I miscarried. It was the worst thing that happened that had happened to our relationship at that point. We were crying on a daily basis, and we couldn't talk about anything but what we believed was a loss of a future child. All we wanted was to marry and start our family young, and when we thought we had a chance, it was ripped away from us. It killed us. We never got distant, as we talked plenty, but the experience deeply influenced the coming events.
Homecoming came, and it was the first time we had what we arguably considered real sex. We were watching a movie alone, and it just...happened. He never orgasmed, because I wasn't doing all that much and it was more of a "let's see if we can do this" thing, but it was enough. When he left, we felt closer than ever. And giving my virginity to him felt right. After, I was faced with school and how I remembered that I was fighting with my best friend. I recall feeling able to reach out to Jimmy (via YouTube) and talk; we ended up becoming friends, and the first thing we talked about was Graham. How happy I was, how happy he was, how happy we were as a couple, how far we'd gotten. Everything. In retrospect, even making contact was a mistake, as far as what it'd do to my relationship with Graham.
I figured out pretty damn quick I wanted something more with Jimmy. I'd never gotten over him, and now that I was older and more experienced, I thought I could handle it. I fought with Graham because of my inner frustration between giving into my temptation and being faithful to who I thought was my true love. Jimmy and I texted constantly about striking up a friends-with-benefits situation, and I attempted to try and get Graham to agree to us kissing to freak out Chelsi; he completely disagreed. But, as I was doing at the time, I disobeyed. Jimmy and I agreed to one kiss after first period one morning, and if it was any good then we'd continue. I dressed up in what I thought was my sexiest outfit, and we made out. I remember getting lost in the kiss and how right after I got to my second period he texted me saying we would definitely continue. The affair lasted from around the end of October through the end of December, ending with us having sex ("Him" part 2). And throughout this time, Graham had absolutely no idea.
Until Graham found out, I didn't regret it. I lived my life as I normally would have. I visited Graham with my mom in December, where we tried to have sex outside in the cold. Combined with this failure, my having had slept with Jimmy, and the failed attempt afterwards, I was frustrated. Annoyed. And I lashed out against him. It was pretty much a miserable and cold few days in North Carolina. Things remained the same once I got home. We continued to plan for our Valentine's Day visit, like we'd wanted the year prior. About four weeks before it, Jimmy quit talking to me altogether, claiming he didn't care about me and he wished I would disappear. I cried, utterly distraught at not only losing someone I cared about and loved (I realize now I was in love with him), but that I put my relationship in jeopardy by sleeping with him. Within a week I was dropping hints on my Twitter about my guilt over the affair, and Graham caught on fast.
I confessed over text message, since I was at school and he was still on winter break. And he was heartbroken. We said we'd talk when I got home from school, but while I was still gone he got into my Twitter and changed my username to "@The_Slut" for awhile. I had nothing to say, considering I would be that upset too if he'd done that to me (he later did). I didn't know what I was walking into when I got home, but I was prepared for pretty much everything. When I called, he picked up, but he refused to talk except for bitterly asking me to explain how and why it happened. And I was in tears, because I could hear the hurt in his voice. It was a hard few days (not to mention the plenty of time to follow), but he seemed to get better.
I admit now that I pushed him into forgiving me faster than he was ready to. In retrospect, I should've let him do what he needed to do, regardless of what that may have been. I should've taken responsibility for my actions instead of trying to sweep the mess under the rug. And me pushing for forgiveness and our normality fueled everything in the rest of our relationship.
Two weeks before Valentine's Day he confessed to a sort of emotional connection thing with a girl in his theater class named Lauren. From my continuing guilt over the Jimmy thing, I didn't react to it the way I should have and was allowed to. Two wrongs don't make a right, but he thought it was us getting even. Regardless of the turmoil, our Valentine's Day visit went well. We were okay, it seemed. He "made" me a shirt with "Property of Graham Howell" on the front and "Valentine's Day 2010" on the back, written by hand. I also got a pair of his boxers and a couple old t-shirts from before he "got in shape," as he called it. With his new haircut and body, he was morphing far from the cute and cuddly "teddyGwaham" I fell in love with, and it killed me. I was paranoid and jealous and overly controlling. Instead of working out, it only fueled the tension between us.
On a fairly regular basis, he'd get mad over Jimmy and I talking at school because he thought I had no business doing so. And then just a few weeks before he was supposed to visit for my fifth year dance recital, I got a text message from him intended for another girl; it detailed having her come over, alone, to his house. He originally tried to cover it up by saying it was a dare from his guy friends to see how I'd react, to which I yelled and screamed and told him he was to never associate himself with them again because a stunt like that in the state we were in wasn't funny. After a minute, he said he lied about that and confessed to cheating on me with a girl named Rachel (this is detailed in previous posts). After, we agreed on a break for a long weekend, where we were supposed to contemplate our relationship and see if we really wanted to continue long distance. One day into it he was begging to let me take him back, and I did. I told him I didn't think I was ready for our visit, but he countered with the fact that it was the same amount of time I gave him when he found out about Jimmy before the last visit. So, I got over myself and welcomed him to Florida with open arms.
The visit went better than expected, and we had renewed faith in the relationship. I was on my religious kick prior to the visit (also detailed in previous posts), but it all got thrown out the window when we had sex whilst alone in a movie theater. For over a year, it was "the time" to compare all other times to. We watched the rest of the movie, went to the mall, and attended my stage rehearsal. He left with our relationship in good spirits.
Little did he, or anyone else, know that I struck back up with Jimmy. He apparently was having relationship troubles, which I was more than happy to help out with, and all that resulted in plenty of sexting and other talking. We discussed a lot, and my feelings for him grew to even the point I felt about Graham. I felt happy and conflicted at the same time, especially when Jimmy said that if there were no Graham or Monika (his paramour of the time), he'd be with me. And I heavily considered it.
So our third year of TIP came around, and it became more difficult to keep in touch with Jimmy while enjoying Graham. I'd wait until I was in bed to text to maximize the time I had with Graham, during which I found out he'd given up Monika because she wouldn't jump on any kind of solid relationship with him. It only made things more difficult, because I started to really think about leaving Graham while still in school but marrying him later, since I'd already begun planning the wedding. It created even more tension between us, adding on us not being able to publicly express our feelings for each other on this TIP campus. That, and me talking to Jimmy at all set off Graham to the point where he'd ignore me. And then I found that he kept a list of phone numbers on paper for people he wanted to talk to that I didn't like, but that if I checked his phone I wouldn't find them.
Our second anniversary, however, went well. He gave me a stained glass image of a sunset that he made himself, and I made him a blanket. It was just us in the world, even though my mind was wandering.
I didn't know then that it'd be the last time I would see him.
Love,
Caitlyn
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