I put him off. It wasn’t easy. Not to make myself do it or to get him to accept it. I agreed to share a quick bite to eat with him after my shift and before his show, but not for three more days, and not at his house, but somewhere public. It wasn’t what he wanted. He was used to bigger concessions from me, but he took it, believing I was resolute. I was relieved when he did, because my resolution had been wearing more thinly than he’d realized. I was a little shocked, and not altogether pleased, when I didn’t hear from him for those three days. That messed with my head, and I had to wonder if that had been his intent, because it had me obsessing about him more than ever. It made me wish I hadn’t said three days. He didn’t have to do a thing but stay away, and I saw the error of my ways. Why had I thought I didn’t want to see him for three days? That small amount of time with silence on his end had me realizing that I hadn’t expected not to see him for those three days, and that’s why it’d been so easy. He may have been playing some game by staying away, but I’d clearly been playing a game, when I’d told him to. The ‘Who wants it more?’ game is what I would have called it if I had to give it a name.
