I felt a strange attraction, immediately to her beauty, but later toward her philosophy, her humor, and her inclinations. My second cousin, my uncle’s cousin, that is, she was. My aunt, at whose house we were both staying, cued me into her person before she arrived. She told me she was Randy’s (my uncle) cousin, that she was roughly his age, and that she worked for a living as a hairdresser and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Later on, my second cousin would correct my pronunciation of this province. My aunt, a professional homemaker was very warm and catering, and was an excellent host for my second cousin and myself. It was Christmastime, as was the motivation behind my visit, and my aunt bought a number of presents for everybody and instructed the cousins to choose presents to gift for each other. “This is a time I want you all to relax, you’re off school, off work, I want you to be able to just, veg, ya know?” “Yes Aunt Tara,” I agreed. “Now close your eyes and turn around, I’m getting stuff.” She scrambled inside the closet of the guest room and pulled out a large cardboard box. There was a fancy round case with different sorts of eyelash and eyebrow primping devices, a set of wine glass markers and a “Girl’s Night Out” bingo game that I envisioned my second cousin would find tacky, and a few other items that don’t come to mind, but I chose the primping kit as I liked the box and thought I would enjoy wrapping it for Elaine, my second cousin.
The next day Elaine showed up at the door with her bags. I saw her blonde hair and tender, loving facial features and I became again greeted with that sort of “in love”, or “in lust”, as I knew it, feeling at the bottom of your heart. That shrill pang that made you blush internally, that spread from the bottom of your sternum to the top of your skull, to your heels, back again to your heart, sending messages to your endocrine system, to your liver, and, if you are a man, to your penis and your balls, too. And the more “logical” side of my mind fired shotgun thoughts of doubt and fear to the same core of my being, when I realized I would be living, yes, living my life, if only for a few days, a stairway away from the guest room where she would unpack, sleep, dress and undress, think, daydream, stretch and breathe, and we would be so close! Doors and walls matter little for separation when you can hear someone snore and stub their toes just a hallway’s distance away. I feared, with her life decades longer than the one I am living, that she wouldn’t take me seriously, that she would be able to see through me, that she would see I was little more than a sad, lost little boy with issues.
We exchanged greetings and pleasantries, but with difficulty, with the rest of the family crowding her at the doorway, pestering her with asinine questions, although in just observing her interactions with them, I had a genuine feel of her maturity, her kind spirit, her earthly yet spiritual wisdom.
Here, we drank and chatted.
Later, she talks about feeling her father’s spirit, smelling him, around the hour of her mother’s death
It wasn’t until we wrapped presents together when our relationship really began to unfold. I found out she is unmarried, single and looking, has no sisters, brothers, or parents.
I wanted her to hold me and love me, though I never wanted her to know what I wanted. And that, in retrospect, was a problem in its own.
I am sorry, I must continued shortly after.
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