I got cute for jury duty, because you never know who you're going to meet.
Fact: There are never any cute boys at jury duty.
I was running a little late, so I had to wait in the hall in a long line while they got everyone signed in. Once I got into the courtroom, I heard someone call my name. I looked around, and sitting off to the side, waving at me, was my friend, Kim. I was instantly relieved to know someone, and once I had completed sign-in, I made a bee-line for her and asked a couple of older women to move down so I could sit next to her.
Kim and I have known each other for years. She's an overly bubbly person, incredibly friendly and upbeat almost always. I don't think I've ever met anyone quite as sweet as she is, and I was truly excited to see her. We talked at each other about a hundred miles a minute until the judge arrived and we all had to stand, and then sit, and then listen.
When we were dismissed about fifteen minutes later, Kim and I both agreed that returning to work to finish out the day was a bad idea. Instead, we decided to drive to Pittsburgh, about an hour away, for a visit to Ikea.
On the way, I talked to her about what I was going through. I even mentioned that I wanted to go to a meeting, but that I hadn't been able to force myself into an awkward social situation. Kim, being the selfless, awesome person that she is, immediately took control of the situation.
"We'll find a meeting in Pittsburgh. I'll go with you, so you'll have someone to feel awkward with. I'm not even an addict, so it will be more awkward for me." She was already Googling meetings in the Pittsburgh area.
I plugged an address into my GPS, and away we went. On the way, we chatted about what was going on with us.
"It's funny that I'm going to a meeting with you. My brother asked about you recently. He asked me if he could write you." Her brother was halfway through a six month stint in prison. Before that, he had spend six months in jail, and before that, he had been in and out of rehabs and other sorts of trouble. He would do okay for a few months, then relapse in an insane binge that made him do crazy things and almost always threatened his life.
"Your brother knows who I am?" I had met him once, at a meeting about two years earlier. He had been with his girlfriend, and I had been with the Ex.
"He remembers you. He knows you're in The Program, and just wants someone to write to who gets it. It's okay if you say no. I told him it was kind of creepy. I basically told him no already."
I thought about this.
This moment, right here? It's crucial.
I had to check my motives really quickly. I remember her brother being attractive. Really attractive. I thought about this carefully, then realized that part didn't matter. It didn't matter how good looking the guy was, because all I could think about was the Ex. I had talked to plenty of good looking guys since we had broken up, had even been on a few dates, but the Ex was the only person I could think about.
I had to check HIS motives, too.
"As long as it's just a support thing, and not like a weird prison-penpal-girlfriend thing. Then yeah. Give him my address."
"You know," I said later, "The day he gets out, he will need to go to a meeting. Let him know that any time he wants to go to a meeting, I'd be happy to take him."
This was where the Savior Complex started, I think. Someone needed help, and they wanted it from me. I wasn't thinking about who he was, or what he looked like, or anything else. I was just thinking of a fellow addict who wanted to become something better, and I was so happy to help.
We ended up going to a one o'clock meeting attended by a total of three other people. I was buoyed by a new sense of confidence though, and felt instantly comfortable among them. They were, of course, very welcoming, and it was nice to finally talk about what I was going through with a group of people (albeit small) who GOT it.
I couldn't be more grateful to Kim for allowing me that meeting. The next day, I went to another meeting, right in my own county, by myself. I walked inside, and saw a couple of girls I knew, and knew I wasn't going to have any more problems going to meetings. I ended up going to 23 meetings over the next 30 days, and soon, I knew all of the new faces, and had become reacquainted with the old. At first, people still associated me with the Ex. It was like we were two parts of a whole. Most people didn't know my name, but knew me as "Paul's Girl." By the time that 30 days was up, people knew me for who I was. They knew about my struggles. They knew which meetings they had met me at. They knew me. They accepted me. They loved me, unconditionally.
I floated on the pink cloud of recovery for a while, but soon came back to the realization that my life wasn't any better. I still struggled daily with the loss of my relationship, my failure as a fiance, the rejection that had completely deflated my ego.
For the first time in my life, I was considering suicide as an option. I welcomed the thought of death. Or not so much death as an eternal sleep. I couldn't deal with the world anymore. It was so much WORK to pull myself out of bed in the morning, to make myself presentable, to get through a day at work. Everyone saw it. I cried all day long. I kept a stock of tissues in my desk drawer, and excused myself several times a day to sit outside in my car, to avoid the piteous stares.
I was pitiful. It was tragic. I had no will to live, no grasp on sanity. I couldn't pull it together. I was losing all hope. I had never felt quite like this before. I had been depressed. I had been heartbroken. I had even been self destructive. But I had never wanted to DIE. I had never been so close to giving up.
Day to day, the knowledge that after work, I could go right to a meeting and talk about it with people who wanted to listen, was the ONLY thing that got me through. Without those meetings, I would have completely crumbled. I wouldn't be here now. Even with them, though, I was a mess. A total disaster.
This went on through April, into May. In the midst of this I received a letter from Kim's brother. She had told met that when she told him I had given the okay to write, and that I would take him to meetings if he wanted, that he had choked up with gratitude. That made me feel good.
I wrote back to him, asking about his fears about coming back into the real world, telling him that I thought he should go to as many meetings as possible, and that he should try to avoid getting involved with anyone. I said this last part mainly as a defense, in case he was getting any ideas. I was very much NOT interested in getting involved with a 26-year old addict with less than 6 months clean who had a track record of relapsing and having psychotic episodes. No, I just wanted to help him. I wanted to be his friend, but I had to set boundaries.
He wrote back. This letter was more detailed. He talked about music he liked, he talked about his family, his regrets, his hopes. He talked about how nice it was to have a pretty girl to think of and write to. This unnerved me. I didn't write back. I thought he was going the wrong direction with it, and I didn't want to encourage him. I explained this to Kim, and she said it made sense.
I continued my threadbare existence, praying every day for some reprieve. Just one day, I asked. Just give me one day that didn't ache.
And then, on May 20th, a Tuesday, I got a text message.
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