Chapter 1: The first Encounter

I plan to write a multi-parts San Francisco based story. I intend to keep it raw, and hopefully it'll represent a point of view to modern relationship - circa 2011.

This is the first chapter of this story.

December 2011 

“I miss you too! No…I crave you like an overgrown forest craving for that long overdue wild fire, promised to burn the branches clean and start anew!”

September 2011

We first met at a wine bar. Your back towards me. You already started drinking. I suspected that you had a drinking problem. I didn't have a base for that assumption. I had not seen you for at least 10 years, but I just had that really strong instinct. I liked that part about you, I liked men with faults. It gave them an edge.  

You ordered a glass of white wine for me, French, but a bit presumptuous. I didn’t drink white. You would not know that, would you?

The upstairs was quiet. You led me to upstairs. I was usually a very equal opportunity person, and I liked to partake in making decisions. But with some people, I let them make decisions. You were that some people. You made decisions for us and you seemed more comfortable if you were the one in charge. 

As I combed my fragmented memories, I recalled that this was how our dynamics was once upon a time. Not when we were friends, but when we dated briefly in early 1998. I fell back into the same mode when I was with you. Even though over a decade had passed, when it came to our interactions, I liked you taking charge, and I wanted to be the submissive one. 

How we interact with people was always set at the beginning. Once it's been set, rarely the dynamics would change over time. We always fell back to the same pattern. We could be the assertive one with one partner, and we could be the submissive one with another. It was a power dynamic. Who we were with, how we would like to behave in front of one person, was set at the beginning. People had different comfort zones with different individuals. My comfort zone with you, was that I needed you to charge. I wanted to yield to you. Even though years had passed and our circumstance had changed.

We caught up.  Like two old friends that we were. You told me about your friends, assumed that I’d know them. I barely remembered you, I had a hard time picturing them.

Then you said, “Shall we get some dinner?” I pushed my barely touched wine glass to you. “Drink some more. I can’t drink.” I said.

I was one of the stereotypical Asians who lacked certain enzyme when it came to alcohol. I also didn’t ordinarily drink white wine, even though this was quite good. 

You drank some more from my glass. This allowed me to look at your face. I knew this man once, intimately. I told myself quietly. Yet, years of friendship washed away that intimacy. And I was having trouble remembering our interactions. I remember how much fun it was to talk to you. I liked you. I always did. I thought that you were gay. That’s how I thought why I liked you. 

We walked down stairs to the restaurant down the street. “Would you hold my coat?” I asked. You did. I had to use the ladies room.  You waited.

We walked up the street. You put your arms around my waist at one point, to redirect my path, in case I would fall because there was a pothole in front of us. I liked how you put your arms around me. I wanted you to hold me more. But you dropped your arm around me after the danger was averted. I wanted some more of that touch, but I said nothing.

We sat at the counter. At a restaurant called Citizen Band. Lots of old radios as decor. Funky, perhaps hip among the startup crowd. It was not my usual choice of restaurant. I was expecting dark drapery subdued atmosphere, something more old school glam, not hipster 20 or 30something crowd. So this was a new experience, and I felt surprised by it, and a little out of my element. But the wait staff was quite nice. She complimented my necklace. People seemed to find me stylish these days. 

I had not thought that I’d be a trendsetter.

I felt a little more comfortable as a result.

I didn’t know how this evening was going to go, if it was going somewhere at all. You stopped what you were about to say and you flashed a bright smile. You wouldn’t tell me what it was that you were going to say. You had a piece of memory, which you were not going to share. You stopped midstream. I was curious. Later on, you told me that you remembered how we first got together, and how you and I first made love. 

You said that let’s go. I was not expecting the evening to end so soon but at the same time it was late. Frankly I was expecting to end sooner, subconsciously. I didn’t know why. There was an energy, a different kind of energy that I couldn’t put my finger on it. I didn’t know what would be the right thing to do, to kiss, or not kiss. To say something about next time, or not.

So when you dropped me off at the BART. I said, “Good night. Thank you for a lovely evening”.

You called out my name, and you said “Good night.”

It was September 28. I had recently gotten out of a long distance relationship with someone. He was emotionally draining, and had been taxing on my mind. I felt guilty. I was married. He was my first affair. We ended after only two dates.

He was occupying my mental space too much. My shrink told me to remove him. So I did. Then you came along, unexpected, or perhaps I knew all along, I needed your arrival to remove his occupation in my mental space.

I just did not know that you were going to have such a profound impact.