WTF is a healing stage, I'm not broken?

"Can I please kneel for you?" "You can't, we're in a car."

I would just like to preface this by saying that I wrote this seated next to a very attractive older man on my flight back to London. I did, indeed, keep my brightness up just enough, in case he got curious.

Allow me to set the scene: I’m with Texas Ex #4. We’re seated at Dave & Busters, the only place where it is socially acceptable to have a blue tongue if you’re over 21 years old. I’m sipping on a cocktail that has a little pink umbrella balancing on a wedge of pineapple and a neon green test tube filled with Malibu floating in an ice bath of blue curaçao. We had just taken green tea shots-- something I swore I’d never do again after my final year of undergrad, during which I would drink those and only those, mainly because they sounded like something Gwyneth Paltrow would advocate for.

I’m biting coyly on my crucifix as he catches me up to speed on what he’s been up to while I’ve been away. He tells me about his grad school experience, studying whatever it is men with 145 IQs do. Something maths, or physics, or computer-something. To be honest, I was barely comprehending the Mr Robot jargon, and found it even harder to focus when I caught a glimpse of myself in his wire-rimmed glasses. He switches the subject, asking me about myself: How have I been? He asks this with as much tact and care as he can muster, which isn’t much, as we both used to joke about how bad he is with the concept of empathy.

I hesitate answering genuinely; it would have broken the spell of sexual tension that had budded after the third green tea shot hit my system. He clearly was asking how I’ve been regarding my most recent breakup. I take a moment to put the crucifix down, and consider how best to respond. I felt like the truth was too shameful. In my sternum grows a pit of guilt for how eager I was to be free, single again.

But I know Texas Ex #4, and I recognize how, out of everyone I’ve ever spoken to about this, he would be the most likely to understand, maybe even relate to this. I told him about how the night before, I was writing in my notes app whilst my father was driving me downtown to see my girls. I felt inspired by the fireworks on the ride there, and how next to every other building we passed, the Texan or American flag loomed over the sky. The fireworks either were half-obscured by the enormous flapping of cloth, or by the concrete skyscrapers themselves. You could hear the bangs, even catch a glimpse of sparkles, but I rarely got to witness the entirety of an explosion.

You couldn’t quite pronounce my first name, and I couldn’t say yours either. The ‘ah’ and ‘uh’ vowels clashed, I felt so ashamed, so I would rarely call you by your name. The non-rhotic stung my non-native tongue.

Then, to lighten the mood, I bring up this meme I had come across whilst I was traipsing around in Cancun with my friends the week prior, one that I took as a message sent by God himself: “What the fuck is a healing stage, I’m not broken?”

I admit, it’s a little extreme, but I am partial to a Good For Her moment. The light-hearted misandry in the comments section caught my attention, with the general consensus being relatively positive about this reclamation of power, no matter how authentic it may truly be. I love my friends to death, but they have admitted to my face about preparing for Hurricane Mina when it became clearer that my former relationship was terminal. My darling Rita-Maria was essentially baby-proofing my room, strapping metaphorical armor onto herself and everyone who came to pay tribute during that final week (visited my flat with gifts, mainly alcohol, and pledged their swords in my name.) But, in an unexpected turn to even myself, I was shockingly merciful. Rita-Maria later revealed that I seemed relieved. Relieved? Of course I was relieved, I had been baiting my breath and clenching my jaw, powerless for too long for me to publicly admit. I no longer had say in my relationship.

The first time it occurred to me that this split was probably for the best was when I was trying on different heels, asking the panel of judges I had assembled in my kitchen to consider which pair not only matched the garter and stockings I put on underneath my skirt, but the red lip I had boldly decided to do as well. No one was surprised that I had chosen to wear lingerie to my breakup.

But I digress. Texas Ex #4 leaned in closer as I told him this, successfully recognising the green light I had offered to him. We went to the arcade and tried to distract each other whilst taking turns throwing plastic axes. We raced virtually, me on the pink stationary motorbike, him on the green. I arched my back as I rode through a pixelated London-themed track. I kept eye contact for long enough to make him turn away, bashful and sheepish. God, I love when grown men get flustered–-there is no better high than knowing it is you who has control, who is capable of such impact.

As we drove home, I put on the same Addison Rae song that I had played a few days prior with Texas Ex #3, rolled down the passenger seat window of a different car going down the same Houston highway. The first time I had pulled this move this week, I hypomanically stuck my hand out at first, then my head, and eventually my torso. I outstretched both arms, contorting myself so that the slit in my dress revealed a healthy amount of thigh and my chest was the peak.

The second time I tried to do this, with Texas Ex #4, I got humbled very quickly. All he needed to say was “Hereditary”, and I sat my ass back down immediately. I did, however, lean my seat back and slowly hike up my skirt, one centimeter at a time. Thigh reveal perseveres. I barely got the seam above the knee before he took initiative, grabbing a fistful of my flesh and moving the fabric further back. I made him do it again, told him to grab tighter, and took a picture with flash. I told him I’d post it, and I kept true to that promise (no one tells you that along with the honor of being added to my close friends on Instagram, you become prisoner to my incessant overshares).

We stop at the closest Whataburger, and we talk about power dynamics, Platonic ideals, and coding hierarchies. I giggle to myself as I draw Lacan’s Borromean Knot onto a snap of my triad of sauces. We drive around my hometown, and I give him a tour of the spots I used for making out in cars back in the day. We pull up to the back of my old neighborhood and I ask him to park in the exact same spot I mentioned in my initial Substack essay, in which I (over)described the mental breakdown I had upon my first ever attempt at going further than second base. I make Texas Ex #4 recreate that scene with me, recapping the memory briefly as we get ourselves comfortable in the backseat, and I shuffle the Spotify playlist I made when I still lived in Texas with the most suitable title: ‘Backseat’.

I tell him he has to use at least a four-syllable word before he can kiss me. He struggles at first, but finds his footing when he brings up physics. He admits he purchased the cologne I just complimented because of its name-- ‘Albert Einstein Quantum’-- and chastises himself for the pretentiousness behind that decision before I can. I expected for its packaging to have that photograph of Einstein that 1 in 10 ivy league college dorms have hanging on a wall somewhere, but its design is a rather yonic-seeming gravity well instead. I ask him to explain what that is, and he uses four-, five-, then six- syllable words in a single sentence. “Gravitationally”. I lean forward, unable to hold back any longer, and our lips meet. We make out for a while, to the faint rhythm of leftover fireworks from the 4th of July. I open my eyes, peer out of the back window, and watch as a medley of explosions of color go off in the distance. Whole.

I interrupt our dry humping in the backseat every so often, asking for him to explain a concept that would be foreign to me. He teaches me more about science, maths and logic. We resume making out when I have been satiated, and I allow each new piece of information time to marinate before I inevitably break away again and order, “More.” I know he enjoys this as much as I do, perhaps more so, because he stammers when I reach for his belt. I move my hands away when he does this, and my pulling back causes him to lean forward.

I look down at him, and he asks, “Can I please kneel before you?”

“You can’t, we’re in a car.” I reply without hesitation, and we break into a fit of laughter.

“I need to write this down, one sec,” I reach for my phone and open up my notes app, close out of the prose poem draft from earlier, and start a new page. He smiles as I do this– it’s not the first or last time that I’ve paused heated moments to jot down something I could write about later. I used to tell people I was interested in that I would “often get inspiration whenever I was on top.” Whether this was true or not didn’t matter, at least not at first, since it was enough to fuel the manic fantasies I wanted them to have of me. Eventually, in the process of identity formation, I started actually doing this more and more as I was exploring casual hook ups.

We wrapped up in the backseat, as it was already pretty late and he still had to drive back to a different city. Knowing someone would drive eight hours in a day to see you, especially without any predetermined potential of intimacy is an unparalleled ego boost. Even so, I didn’t take my clothes off that night with Texas Ex #4, nor with #3 earlier– I didn’t need to. I got my agency back. I had a say in my relationships again. In fact, I was in total control. God, I love submissive men!

I picked up my phone after we were back in the front seat and checked my notifications. The first thing I read was the Bible app verse of the day: Romans 8:6, ‘For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.’ At first, I interpreted this to have been a biblical scolding for my desire. I gasped and shared this with Texas Ex #4, my palm clasped over my mouth.

But when I got home, I thought about it some more, I remembered how, in Tarot, the Death card is symbolic of endings and beginnings, birth and rebirth, change and transformation. It is often read as the closing of a chapter, either a phase or aspect of one’s life, and is meant to help you realize that whatever it is, it’s no longer serving you. One door must close so a better one can open, as some may say.

That’s how I found myself again: legs up in the backseat of a former lover’s car, parked in the back of my neighborhood, in that same spot where I had a mental breakdown during my first sexual experience. Full circle, as some may say.