Wings of Love – Chapter Two

Being told that my boyfriend had taken another woman to bed was exhilarating.  I felt light as a bird, free to float to another relationship that would give me what I wanted in life.  I needed a strong, independent self-sacrificing man who made me feel like a woman, not a babysitter.

Of course, nothing that starts without drama can end without drama.  I grabbed a cheap garbage bag from my parent’s garage and wandered throughout the house grabbing random things Sean had left at my parent’s house.  I threw in the six dozen dried roses from my previous attempts at breaking up with him, the photo album of our smiling faces and other innocuous gifts.  Everything packed in a straining trash bag was thrown in the back seat of my car.  

My childhood best friend, Kook and I drove downtown to the building Sean was working as a rent-a-cop and dumped the bag of goods all over the hood of his car.  The smile on my face couldn’t have been scraped off.  I was free!  Kook and I had a farewell dinner in celebration of my singledom.

It wasn’t long before I was trapped in Sean’s web again.  A few days later I came home from a night out with friends only to find him sitting on the front porch with my dad, the customary dozen red roses smiling maliciously at me.  Tears streamed down his cheek as he apologized for his behavior.  Sean had some crazy hold over my dad.  I think it was an underdog connection.  My dad always liked the underdog and wanted to see him win a round.

I continued my dismal relationship with Sean for a few more months when The Brother came home one weekend and took care of business for me.  The Brother confronted Sean and told him not to ever contact me again.  He wouldn’t stand for his sister to be in a charity relationship.

I was dating again, flirting uncontrollably with a co-worker, Bobby.  Bobby was smitten with me, willing to give his left foot for a chance with me.  By that point I didn’t want anything serious.  I wanted to spend time with boys that wanted to have fun.

By late summer of 2001, my friend Trish and I would run amok through the streets of Kansas City stopping only long enough to flirt with random men and move on.  After all, we had our hearts set on having fun only long enough to make a few men jealous.  Sitting on the hood of her old hoopty I confessed to Trishie, “I’m done with men.  I don’t want to have anything to do with them anymore.  Do me a favor though… when I die, tell Bobby I had fun!”

Little did I know, the world as we knew it was about to change.  On a float trip down the Niangua River, things between Bobby and I would heat up… a plane would hit the World Trade Center.

My life would never be the same.