In her column, “In Good Company”, Les explores the most intricate aspects of our personal relationships: romantic, familial, and platonic. She writes on how to navigate people we are interlinked with, whether we want to be or not.

i. 

500 Days of Summer is one of my favorite movies of all time. 

Maybe it’s because my first college best friend introduced it to me. Or maybe it’s because all my friends labeled me as Summer, the protagonist, because we shared the same fucked up mentality about love and relationships. Or should I say, the lack thereof.

I had never thought of myself as a relationship person.

Maybe it’s because I didn’t find myself worthy of being in a committed relationship with someone, maybe it’s because I have never had a good example of a strong relationship in my upbringing. Maybe the idea of tying myself to one singular person forever doesn’t appeal to me. 

I’m really bad at catching feelings for people. I always have been. 

Call it anxious avoidant attachment or whatever it is, but I have always found some major flaw that made it completely unappealing for me to see a future with them. 

So, instead, I’ve started getting involved in monogamous short term… situationships? Flings? Whatever you wish to call them.

Fresh out of my freshman year of college, I met a bartender at my job I was attracted to and quickly we started dating. Dating, not being in a relationship. We went out on dates, made out in his car, kissed under the rain. He did a great job at making me feel special — at making me feel like I was the only one even when he still lived with his ex. He ended up catching feelings for me and I ended up ‘breaking’ his heart. 

He was 25. I had just turned 19.

ii. 

Then, in my next year of college, I met someone on a dating app. The first date felt so amazingly natural that we moved way too fast with it. 

He was not a fling. Not to me at least. He was an exclusive situationship. An even more disheartening title. We would sleep together every night, make stuffed animals together, talk and sit in silence forever. I thought I loved him, I possibly may have — for what I believed love to be at the time at least. When he broke up with me, I booked a one-way flight to New York the next day and curled up next to my sister to drink wine and sob my eyes out as she stroked my hair.

She taught me I should never feel like I’m dying when I get broken up with — that’s the first sign of an unhealthy relationship. That’s how the women in my family always feel. I can’t continue the cycle of trauma when those same women who would break down because of a man, worked so hard to raise me as a self-sufficient, strong woman.

iii. 

Then, last year, I became best friends with someone I had known for six months. We became so close that we knew way too much about each other. We would laugh at the ridiculous idea of us ever dating, that he would never date anyone like me and I would never date anyone like him.

“Slap me back into reality if I do.”

His mouth dropped open.

“No offense, but I’ve heard how you talk about women, and how you treat them. To think that there’s people out there that probably talk about me that way disgusts me,” I explained myself. 

“I would never.”

“Fine, maybe not. But you would most certainly break my heart.” 

He nodded and laughed this time, “Okay, yes that I would probably do.” 

At least he’s self aware. 

A few nights later, we made out for the very first time. 

It wasn’t magical, fireworks didn’t go off, time didn’t stop, snow didn’t start falling from above us. It was during a Hulu ad while watching our comfort show on the same day he got some soul-crushing news. It was terrifying, passionate, fun and happened at possibly the worst time ever. It was us.

The next five months consisted of the most tumultuous, heartbreaking mix of pain and happiness I had ever felt. If I thought I loved my ex, I was wrong. That was nothing compared to what I felt for this man. I would not have ever gone back to my ex even if he begged and pleaded on his hands and knees. I went back to this man every time we ended things, and he didn’t have to get on his knees for me to do so. 

The past is something I actively try not to think about when I think about him, because the current state of our relationship has been so beautiful.

iv.

This summer I, once again, got involved in an exclusive situation I knew would end once he moved away in a few weeks for the next couple of years. We went out on dates. He’d open the door for me, bought me flowers and coincidentally, when we kissed after our first official date, fireworks did go off. Literally, there was a soccer game going on. We’d sleep together, our bodies pressed so closely together that if we were frozen we’d have melted together to become one already. We’d wake up to make breakfast together. On his last weekend, we baked cookies and slow-danced to “old people” music. He became a core memory for me. We became a core memory. 

We say “I love you.” Not “I love you too” because I hate the word “too,” it sounds like an agreement. He doesn’t get it, but he adjusts anyway.

I love you. Fact. Not an agreement.

v. 

Freshman year me and Summer me wouldn’t believe a word I’m saying. Fireworks? Melting? Slow dancing? Corny as fuck. Love? He doesn’t actually love you. He can’t. He’s thousands of miles away. Long distance never works. You’re not even his girlfriend. 

What if we do try though? What if we do long distance and try to see each other whenever we can? We text as much as we can, casually call on our way back home from work or school, have a dinner date or something on facetime together once a week? No pressure. No fighting. Just trying.

Okay, maybe we will fight. We definitely will fight. But we’ll work it out. Because we love each other. And every couple fights. Plus, he makes me want to break the cycle.

I don’t want to be Summer anymore. I want to believe in love. I want to be in a relationship. After all, it’s much better to say “We tried our best, and it didn’t work out” than “I wish we had tried.” Right?

vi. 

I am no longer Summer. I have officially fallen in love with my person.