I Never Had A Dream Come True

Picture This...

Boy meets boy....

Boy falls deeply in love....

Boy basks in bliss....

And then there was the day...

His name is "L"...He was the one. I was 19 as I stood in the Port Authority on a cold December night and awaited his presence. I saw someone walk by that looked like him. When he doubled back he looked at me with a familiar smile, gave me daps, and said "Stop standing there actin' like you don't know it's me nigga..." I had all my luggage and was awaiting a connecting bus to Newark so that I could get home to Paterson...I had about an hour so we took the escalator upstairs and went to grab some pizza. I was quite hungry and did not hesitate jumping in line and ordering a slice.

We sat across from one another. He smiled and licked his lips. I nervously avoided eye contact. He told me how "beautiful" he thought I was as I continued to smile shyly. We continued to exchange pleasantries until I had to return to the gate to catch my bus. He satyed there until the bus pulled off...Two weeks later he affectionately asked me, "So, do you wanna be my nigga?" I melted...And what began was a brief love affair. He said he loved me. He wooed me.

And then it all came crashing down...

Via internet he told me one cold March day that he thought we should just take a break and be friends...Later that evening I called him and begged..pleaded...cried...tried to make every rational argument as to why he should change his mind. He didn't.

Months went by and I remained in limbo. I called every night and most nights we spoke. I believed in my heart of hearts that we were headed back into our blissful relationship. One evening he told me, "Yo, I have some good news to tell you." I begged him to tell me right there on the telephone. He refused. "I wanna wait until the next time I see you in person to tell you." For days I pressed him to tell me. I just knew this was going to be the realization of the dream I'd been having the last 6 months...I just knew he was going to say he wanted me back. Finally I broke him down and he told me. He said, "I'm falling in love with someone." My jaw dropped because obviously that someone was not me. I felt violated, decieved, manipulated, taken for granted...I felt like a fool.

For months after that I made weak attempt after weak attempt to keep L out of my life. I thought I'd finally hit my stride and moved on...and then my world was rocked again.

I was home for the summer working an internship. The money was good and the experience was great although I really had no social life. Occasionally I would hop on the 161 from Paterson and head over to NYC by myself and hit the internet cafe in Times Square (EZ Everything). This place was special to me because L and I had actually discovered it together. So one day I was sitting at a terminal in EZ Everything chatting on Blackplanet and I get a "page" (for BP heads you remember the PAGER?) from....GUESS WHO??!!...L. He says, "Yo, whaddup man...Where are u chatting from?" I told him I was in EZ Everything...He says, "Word!? Me Too!!" I could have died right there at the computer. We eventually found one another in the cafe and he convinced me to go to The Village with him just to walk around and waste time before his rehearsal that evening (he was a singer in a group at the time). He also informed me that he had to meet up with another one of the group members on Christopher Street while we were out there. He used my cellphone to call this person to make sure they were still showing up. In the meantime we walked down to the Piers (which at the time were still being constructed) and just talked. I had a weird feeling come over me. It felt good to see him again because I still loved him. But I also felt like a drug addict who had just relapsed. It was about time for him to leave so we walked back up Christopher Street to meet his group mate and there is where he dropped THE bomb on me...

"Hey man, the dude that is meeting us is actually my boyfriend."

In my mind I flipped....But I held it together and met the dude. He was taller than me...A dancer for Alvin Ailey....a singer...an all around cutie. And I had to stand there and watch them interact as a couple. He knew he was going to meet his "man" yet he took it upon himself to place me in an uncomfortable situation. As the three of us rode the 1 Train back uptown to 42nd Street I wanted to strangle him, bite him, hit him with some inanimate object. I had the familiar feeling of being the fool...

We said our goodbyes and I went to the 3rd Floor of the Port Authority to gate 303 to catch the 161 back to Paterson. I went near the back of the bus and found a seat alone. I pressed the play button on my CD player and turned the volume all the way up. The song that came on was Stevie Wonder's "I Never Had A Dream Come True." As the song played the tears flowed from my eyes like tiny rivers. In the darkness of that bus ride I had to come to the realization that my dream hadn't come true...I cried all the way home as I listened to Stevie testify over and over again.

I went to bed misty eyed that night...clutching my pillow.

And I haven't been the same since.