The story of a lonesome ol'Jerome

*30 Year old Gwyn's POV*

After Damien, I swore off of being involved in anyone's infidelity. I resolved to make sticking to my ethics my backbone for the rest of my life.

After years of being alone, spending time thinking about what I wanted, I realized that I wasn't interested in monogamy, and I wasn't bisexual. I wasn't really a fan of labels at all, but if they had to be applied to me, the most appropriate one would be pansexual and polyamorous.

It was around then that Owen's diabetes killed him. I had other wonderful friends, Brian included, but Owen and I had shared a truly special bond. We had met our first year at Oberlin, we had lived in the same dorm, and we both wanted to be veterinarians. I never understood why he had been so bad about taking care of himself when he was so good at taking care of everything and everyone else.

When he died, I spent hours hand-sewing a stuffed toy I called 'the device' to cremate him with. I had meant to make it for him for his last birthday, but hadn't gotten around to it. I made it a little plush heart, dabbed it with my own blood, and put it in with the stuffing.

It had been so weird, Owen lying there with his septum ring out. Years later, I learned it was because body jewelry doesn't incinerate, so it's removed beforehand. I made a mental note to leave instructions to keep my fucking body jewelry with my damned ashes, unless they were going to get tossed somewhere.

I completely closed up. I had a few sexual experiences, but kept the walls around my heart impenetrably thick. Over time, loneliness began to eat away at me from the inside.

I had been single for six years, and no one had touched me for four, when I caved and started looking at ads on Craigslist. I took a chance and responded to a guy named Drake, he sounded interesting.

Drake was poly, tall, pale, had very light blue eyes, black hair, and worked the night shift at a porn store. I was horrified to learn he had type I diabetes, the same disease I had lost Owen to. On our first date, we hung out for eight hours. I went home totally smitten, dizzy with butterflies. It seemed impossible that he was interested.

A lot could be said about my relationship with Drake. What really mattered, though, was that I thought it was wonderful, I believed it was mutual. Comparing relationships is like comparing children, or friends; one is not better than another, they are simply different. But I felt like what Drake and I had was so clearly and obviously purely happy, healthy, and going to endure for the remainder of our lives, it went as a given. And the way he made my body feel, the way he made me feel about myself, it was incredible!

But four years into our relationship, he told me he still really loved me, but I didn't make him happy. This was the summer after my second year of vet school. He said I was too negative, that I brought all my issues upon myself, that I chose unhappiness. He said most of what we had in common was just sex and video games anyway. And he made it clear he didn't want to work on it, he was done. It was a total shock. I could hardly grasp the reality of what he was saying.

There are not words adequate to describe the damage that caused, the resulting pain, and the ugly emotional scar tissue that had to form to allow survival. What was left behind was not Gwyn. I continued living only out of a sense of obligation to my parents, and because I would never abandon my pets.

But I had changed. My light had gone out.

Notes

i worked on updating the 'characters' section. :)

some folks put a 'question of the day,' in the Notes, and I thought that was fun to answer, so here's one for you, if you like:
QOTD: what music do you enjoy other than BVB? any particular special favorite group/composer/performer/song/album?