I Was An Emotional Prostitute Part 20

The tension between her and I might have gone on indefinitely if not for an incident that occurred when I stopped by one night. The moment I walked in, I saw a lovely painting on the wall that was mostly obscured by a statuette of an owl. I teasingly said, “Why’d you put the owl in front of the painting?”

            He shrugged as he said, “I don’t know,” then he handed me a hammer and said, “but, if you can find another place for the owl go ahead.”

            As I took the hammer from him, I heard Debbie say, “Not that again. We’ve already gone round about it once tonight. Leave it alone.”
            I ignored her, but inwardly I seethed. “How dare she tell me what to do?! This isn’t her house!”

            I knew then that I needed to talk to Dorn privately. I called him and arranged a time to see him alone.

            When I walked into his house, he said he needed to work on something while we talked. I followed him to a computer he’d set up in a room off the living room. He brought a chair in for me and I sat. I asked him how he’d felt about what happened between Debbie and I a few nights prior.

            He told me he’d noticed and he’d made it clear to her when she left that night that she was out of line. He then told me that he’d given her a key to his house so that she could come and go as she pleased and that she took care of his dog if he needed to be gone. That when they said “good night,” she often kissed him. I became jealous, but hid it as best I could.

He also said he saw what was going on between us and that if open war broke out between us, he’d lock up the house and disappear so that no one could find him. We talked a little while longer. When I left that evening, I felt gratified that he’d told Debbie she’d been out of line for ordering me around as she’d tried to do. I also decided I needed to back away for a few weeks. I knew if I stuck around, things would just get worse. I figured it was better to find other things to do till I could either handle being around both of them without wanting to throw her out or worse. So, I went to work, then found other things to do while I tried to work out how best to deal with her presence without driving him away.

            A few weeks later, I called him to see how he was. He asked me why I hadn’t been around. I told him I’d been busy. I wish I’d told him the reason wasn’t that “I was busy,” but that I thought it best to back away rather than risk driving him away. I was afraid if I did that though, he’d think I was more interested in him than I could even admit to myself. I asked him how Debbie was doing.

            “Why?” He said, suspiciously.

            “Oh, just curious.” I said. He told me that he’d taken his house key back and she’d quit coming around or returning his calls. I was thrilled. I could now go back to seeing him without fear of running into her.

            I got back into the habit of going to his house after work. After a while, he started asking me about my feelings for him. He was offering to help me out, but I told him that he couldn’t. I had to learn how to deal with my feelings for him on my own. I sometimes wish I’d asked him how he thought he could help, but I think I was afraid to.

            I was visiting another friend one day when I recounted a conversation with Dorn to him. I said that I’d told Dorn that I wanted to see his marriage come back together, regardless of how it affected me. He looked at me and said, “You really love him don’t you?”

            I just stared at him as my jaw hit the ground. “I what?! I love him?”

            I walked out of his house with my head spinning. Over the next three days, it sunk in. I’d fallen in love with Dorn. The part that really surprised me though, was that in the past when I’d “fallen in love” with someone, it was because we’d had a sexual relationship. Dorn and I had never done anything more than hug, except for the one time I kissed him on the cheek for his birthday. 

The hardest part of that was that I couldn’t have him not only because of his marriage, but because he’d told me that he didn’t see us ever getting together as more than friends. Unfortunately, the heart wants what it wants.

A few weeks after I realized that I’d fallen in love with him, I knew that I needed to cut our friendship off. Not because I wanted to, but because I knew that the more I hung out with him, the more I’d want him. The more I wanted him, the harder it would be for me to contain my feelings.

I went to his house one last time and told him that I was cutting off our friendship. I didn’t tell him I was afraid my feelings would overwhelm me and that I’d do something we’d both regret, but rather that I had other emotional baggage to deal with and I couldn’t handle how I felt about him, too. He tried to talk me out of it. It would have been so easy to let him do so, but I knew it’d be dangerous for both of us if I did.

As I drove away that night, I had to hold back tears for fear of not being able to see properly. I didn’t know if I’d ever see him or have any contact with him again.