"The Boys are Back in Town" = Jeremy (Part 1)

Jeremy broke my heart into so many pieces I swore I would never be able to put it back together again. When I found out he cheated on me – the first time – my roommate took me out on the town to try to cheer me up and I cried in my beer the whole night – literally. I just couldn’t stand the thought of him being with someone else. We had met about six months before on the street – of all places! My roommate and I had gone to a club in downtown DC and Jeremy was driving by in his gold Nissan Maxima. I thought that car was so damn cool!

He had only gone as far as high school, but we were still able to have very intelligent conversations, which is huge for me. As most people know, I am allergic to stupid people and he was far from dumb. He may not have had book smarts, but he definitely had street smarts. He worked for the government, in a menial job, but always had money. I knew that was suspicious, but I had a pretty good idea where the money was coming from and I didn’t really want to be involved, so I asked no questions.

Jeremy wined and dined me. Every night, we ate at a new restaurant. We went on trips together, and he always footed the bill. He was the first man (besides my father) to buy me a diamond. He spoiled me. And I got used to being spoiled.

The night that I met Jeremy was also my two-month anniversary with David. David was a good boy. He played football at Syracuse, had just graduated and was about to start a good corporate (read “boring”) job in Northern Virginia. David was friends with my next-door neighbor at my dorm (one of the perks of a coed dormitory). When we met, sparks didn’t exactly fly. I mean, by most standards the boy was fine. And he played college ball for a recognizable school, which I guess meant a lot to my college girlfriends. I had no idea why he was interested in me because I treated him like crap. But, he kept coming back for more. Once I met Jeremy, I cooled off toward David. He would call the dorm and I would tell my roommate to make excuses as to why I wasn’t available. After a while he just stopped calling and a few weeks later I saw him on campus holding he hand of some freshman chick. I figured he was over me, and I was surely over him! By the time I spotted David with the freshman, Jeremy and I were hot and heavy.

Looking back, I now notice a pattern. I tend to meet men and rush into relationships. I am what my friends call a “serial monogamist”. I don’t date around. I find one guy and stick with him. That’s something that I’ve gotta get over.

Back to the story.

The only complaint that I had about Jeremy was that he could only hang out at odd hours. And when he was around, he always turned his cell phone off. Now, in my defense, I was young and dumb and hadn’t really experienced much. My last boyfriend was Robert who was always present and accounted for. So I wasn’t sure whether I should be suspicious of this dude. Was he really shady or was I just overreacting? I couldn’t be sure. And, at the time, I followed the philosophy of not doubting someone’s explanations until they gave me a reason to doubt them. So I let him breathe and, again, didn’t ask any questions when he told me that he just couldn’t spend anymore time with me during the week. I wondered what he was doing with his time (aside from the obvious illegal activities) but, to assuage his guilt, he bought me more nice things, took me out even more places, and I kept my suspicions to myself.

One day, I was sitting at home and hadn’t heard from Jeremy all day. That was relatively unusual. I called him from my landline, so I had to actually dial his number rather than just selecting his name from my address book. The phone rang a few times.

A woman answered.

“Hello,” she said.

“Hello…” I said, very confused.

I looked at the phone just to be sure that I had dialed the right number. I had misdialed by one digit.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I have the wrong number,” I explained.

“Who are you trying to reach?”

“Uh… Jeremy.”

“Oh, he’s not available right now.”

Huh?! ‘He’s not here right now”? Well, uh… I had misdialed the number but clearly she knew who I was talking about.

I was shocked into silence.

“Ok, thank you,” I said. A million thoughts were running through my head, but obviously, the first thought was why did this woman act like she knew my boyfriend? I mean, there is the very unlikely possibility that I could’ve misdialed the number and that phone belonged to another Jeremy, which was not necessarily a common name. There is also the possibility that this woman could have just been playing around with a “wrong-number” that was obviously confused.

If only it were so simple.

To be continued…