Defending Eve

The Edge Of Night

THE EDGE OF NIGHT

My trip to Louisiana was more wonderful than I could have imagined.  I spent the next couple of weeks trying to come down.  For all my triumph, I knew that this wasn’t going to last.  I was in college.  There were parties going on all the time.  Girls were throwing themselves at me.  I was denying myself for someone who lived hundreds of miles away and Carson was never going to yield completely to my lifestyle.  And I wasn’t ready for the perfect dream home.  I wanted adventure.  I had something to prove.  I hadn’t denied Carson; I just needed to get on with my own life.

After putting my books away, and getting ready for bed, thoughts of Carson were dancing in my head.  It was too late to call her, so I savored our memories

Her wildness seemed so extreme because she was always playing with a net.  She knew that she could fall and not experience any real hurt.  Her melancholy was temporary and never enough to get her to turn her back on her Southern dream.  I had to admit that I wasn’t ready to put aside my career plans.  For me there was so much more.  I felt that I was more willing to venture into the unknown.  I marshaled all my skills, whether in sports or music, to find an experience that had never been tried. 

With all the fun that surrounded me, I was a little slow to test the waters.  My time in Destin really affected me deeply.  It wasn’t like Carson and I made a deep promise to each other.  But I felt that if I pursued another girl, that I might lose Carson for good.  

As much as our trip to Louisiana reminded me how deep my feelings still were for Carson, it also forced me to be realistic.  The winter storm intervened to hold us in Mandeville a little longer.  But there would be no such intervention to keep us together permanently.  As we drove back to Athens, I felt the distance between us growing more and more.  If our experience hadn’t been so intense, I might have expected less.  Perhaps we could have worked something out.  But our passion said all or nothing.  And I was getting closer to admitting that our time together was only a potent memory.

I understood that I was rationalizing our separation.  One minute, I was ready to throw her over for good.  Another, I wouldn’t let her go for the world.  Even if I adopted a plan with regards to Carson, I knew that I couldn’t stick to it once and for all.  This wasn’t the same thing as taking a history elective.  Carson only had to invite me to a new meeting place, and I would be off in a second.  If we loved each other, nothing could really separate us.  On the other hand, we were living almost a half-continent away.  That should have been reason enough to let it go once and for all.  Love couldn’t conquer all.

I promised that I wouldn’t engage in some abstract debate with myself.  If I was in Athens, and if there was a party to attend, I wasn’t going to say no.  Things happen when you’re young.  I was a guy full of energy, and I wasn’t going to restrain myself for a fantasy.  Sure Carson was real as could be, but we were never going to live together.  And we weren’t going to get married, either.

It was simple.  I was going to live one day at a time.  I would pay tribute to Athens when I was in Georgia, and I would pay tribute to Carson when I was in Louisiana.  And if Carson happened to visit me, then I would show her the best damn time that I could.  I wouldn’t even think twice about it.  No matter what happened, we would always be friends.  And deep down,    we would both wish that it could be different.

The next time that Carson and I met in Mandeville, I could sense that things were starting to change between us.  The love was still there, but it was no longer as wondrous as I once felt it.  We were both growing older.  I could no longer pretend that the fact that we lived so far apart didn’t create a distance between us.  I still thought that our love was one of the most important things in my life.  But I no longer felt as if I could slay dragons.