fact or fiction: happy endings.

it happened with i., all those years ago. when he first met me, he couldn't get enough of me. He was in awe of my accomplishments, which was pretty endearing, seeing as how I didn't really feel like I'd really accomplished much of anything at all. I was teaching full time at Northern and half-time at North Central College. I'd already quit the wine bar and had moved to an apartment in DeKalb.

But the year i. and i met, i'd been to europe three times in nine months. he liked that. he saw the MFA. he was impressed with that. he was an aspiring writer who hadn't yet managed to get into an MFA program, though he'd been trying. his previous girlfriend, a poet, had gotten into the iowa writer's workshop and they'd broken up – under what, the weight of her success and his failure? it seemed so.

we started reading each other's stories. we made critiques and gave advice. He started to come round to dinner parties I had. His sister and her boyfriend bought a house near where I lived. I invited him to come watch me teach at North Central. We talked about writing - a lot. We talked about books - almost as much as we talked about writing. based on our mutual love of words, and the fact that he was tall and lanky and shy-boy cute, we dated.

Then came the news. Not only had he finally been accepted to a writing program, he'd been accepted to Iowa. The Writer's Workshop. On a fellowship. There was much celebrating. I bought a house. He kind of moved in for the rest of the summer. that august, he moved to iowa. i helped him move. we drove through the cornfields of northwestern illinois into the cornfields of iowa. and for a couple of months, we had a lovely little life – he in Iowa City, me in DeKalb, traveling the barely 2.5 hours between us on weekends. we talked a lot on the phone. we emailed.

and slowly – his awe fell away. Maybe he got to know me too well? Essentially, a phone call revealed a shift in his feelings – 'well, I mean, you know you write, well, relationship stories,' he told me one day, when I asked him if he wanted me to critique something for him. there was a long silence over the phone lines. In a matter of weeks, iowa and the workshop had gone to his head.

He came for my birthday weekend. It sucked. i think it's safe to say that weekend goes down as one of the worst on record. He didn't stay over once, opting instead to stay with his sister. He came to my party with the worst present ever – a brown wool beret with a flower attached to it. I mean, his sister came up with a better present, a beautiful scarf. Two days later, safely back in Iowa, he broke up with me over the phone. I hung up on him.

Vegan #2 fell hard. Our first night together, he professed love. 'I want to be your boyfriend,' he said. 'I can't get enough of you.' I was flattered. I wanted to be his girlfriend, too, so it seemed like smooth sailing from there. I cooked a vegan Thanksgiving. He took me to see a local production at the community theater. I introduced him to good wine. When we'd go up to the dive bar together, we'd hold hands. We were disgustingly sweet. He made me a mixed CD for my birthday. I felt like I was fourteen again. It was awesome. On Thanksgiving morning, we woke up to snow. A Southern California boy, he was in awe. We took the dogs for a long walk. He went home to make a vegan chocolate cake. I made squash lasagna. We drank with friends late into the night. A week later, he told me he couldn't commit, he was scared, we were over.

Jason, of course, went crazy. A PhD in German literature at a top tier school will apparently do that to you. It was too bad. I liked him a lot. He was kind of my undoing one summer. I'd had faith it would work out – but it didn't.

and then a nice long break. and a move to m-town.

Boy likes girl. Boy starts to pursue girl. Boy is going through divorce. Boy strings girl along, though it's important to note she did not mind being strung along. Girl liked boy a lot. More than she'd liked anyone in quite some time. Boy pursued. Girl allowed. One night, they had fun. Too much fun. Hook up fun. Girl isn't that kind of girl, not really, but girl really liked boy a lot. He liked her, too. He said 'I need time.' Girl stepped back to allow time. Divorce was finalized. Boy stayed away. Then, girl walked in on boy on date. Girl is sad. Boy wants to talk. He can't be with girl. Girl made boy a cheater. Boy can't live with that. Boy said other things to make girl realize boy just wanted to feel better and didn't want girl to hate him. Girl realized too late she had been the dreaded rebound girl. Now Girl and Boy don't talk to each other, go out of their way to avoid each other.

In a perfect world, Boy would look out his window and see girl, cute as ever, walking her dogs. It would be a lovely late-spring day. summer would be edging in, but there would still be a cool breeze. Girl's dress would float in the wind, swirl around her legs. Her hair would blow in her eyes. the dogs would prance. Boy, seeing this, would realize he'd made a mistake, Girl really was special, she really was worth pursuing, she was worth making it work out. he'd remember that this is how he first noticed her, walking her dogs through the park, her hair pale against the brilliant green grass. and Girl and Boy would reunite. There would be much happiness. there might even be rejoicing in the streets.

Only in my world, things don't seem to end this way. Rather, in my world, the boys seem to drift away, lose interest, imagine the girl as something she's not quite and determine she isn't worth fighting for. They go away to prestigious writing programs. They go away to Berlin only to come back and have a nervous breakdown along the side of the road, en route to see her, a trip that never gets finished, a destination that's never met. They surround their lives with rules to live by – what to eat, when to exercise, how to manage – and realize there's no room for her. they divorce and move on, branding her with motives and no conscience, winding her down until she is merely a figure to wave at in the distance.

in girl's world, there don't seem to be happy endings.

but why?