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"So I hear that you're a single man now. Is this true?"
He ducks
his head because he's cute and shy like that when the little girls are watching. "Yeah, man, I'm single now."
"What
happened?"
He sighs and pretends to look perplexed. "Well, see, things got complicated. Between my job and the lack
of time and the distance, it just didn't work out. Sometimes two people just aren't meant to be together, you know?"
I
shut the television off with a frown. Hell, yes, I know. I know better than that freaking host and all of his little teenyboppers
put together. I know how much it hurts to look into the eyes of the love of your life only to hear that, despite the fact
that you're willing to do anything for him and do, time and time again, he's just "not feeling the 'us' anymore".
He
couldn't even lose the ghetto-speak when he decided to break my heart.
I shake my head and frown at the television
again, wondering why I want to see his face even when I hate the way he looks without me by his side. Wondering why I'm the
one who has to face the torment of seeing his face everywhere, knowing that he's all right without me and I'm breaking inside.
And then comes the inevitable question, the one that's been running through my head since the moment he slammed the door and
left me to listen to his voice on the radio.
How in the hell do you break up with a Backstreet Boy?
Well, maybe
that's not quite the question I meant to ask. See, I never wanted to break up with the Backstreet Boy. In fact, I was perfectly
in love with the Backstreet Boy. Some of my friends might even go so far as to say that I was infatuated with the Backstreet
Boy. They probably wouldn't be too far off the mark, either, because I really did love him to the point of obsession. Of course,
I thought he loved me to the point of obsession as well, and that made it okay.
I was wrong. He didn't love me. It
wasn't okay.
I really fucking hate how men can take everything a girl depends on in her little, emotional, girly life
and turn it upside down. One minute, I need the Backstreet Boy to keep me afloat, and the next minute, the Backstreet Boy
is the one drowning me. Drowning me in a huge sea of paparazzi and pictures and press and fan mail and hate mail and gossip
and giggles and index fingers directed at me because I'm with him but now I'm not. Now I'm not and I'm just drowning in my
own loneliness and the aftermath of this disaster that he calls his career.
"You keep me drowning in your love" he
sang once, flanked by the Latin one, the freaky-deaky dawg, the old, reserved sex symbol, and the religious choir boy. What
bullshit.
I don't know whose love he drowns in now, but I know that he wasn't ever drowning in my love. Had he been
drowning in my love, dammit, he wouldn't have ever left.
It's funny, because your friends will tell you how you're
too good for him, how he couldn't handle you, and how you're way out of his league while they're getting you really, really
drunk so you can forget what an asshole he was before he slammed the door. After all, it's only when you can forget about
it that you can really talk about it, and then your wonderful friends can start doing their job.
It's really hard to
believe your friends, though, when every girl below the age of sixteen is telling you exactly why he was too good for you.
They may not know shit about your relationship either, but words like that hurt regardless of whom they're from.
Stupid
freaking Backstreet Boys. I hope their next album flops. I hope his next album flops, dammit.
No, I don't. Because
I may hate him, but I still love him, and I still want nothing but the best for him. I only wish I could want his next album
to flop. It might make me feel better. Might make me feel a bit less empty inside.
Let me tell you: old, young; Gentile,
Jew; Backstreet or fucking *NSYNC; it still sucks to be all alone in love.
I stare at the TV for a minute and contemplate
whether or not I should turn it on and torture myself, but I decide against it. I've had enough torture for today. Now, it's
time to visit the anti-Backstreet websites and see if they have anything to strengthen my cynicism and toughen this mushy,
bleeding heart of mine.
God, I'm pathetic. And it's all his fault, too.
To avoid feeling even more pathetic,
but knowing exactly where I stand, I log onto the net and into a chatroom, where a group of teenyboppers are discussing the
latest milestone in Backstreet Boys history.
Insert a very annoying, very Valley Girl "Oh my GOD!" in here, would you?
Of
course, once I begin to read the comments that the teenyboppers are so rapidly posting, I start to get the feeling that I'm
about to eat my insert. Why, you ask? Because these girls just might provide me with a way to get over that damn Backstreet
Boy.
Apparently, the new Backstreet Boys site has a feature that allows you to screw their faces up. You can make their
whole face one big nose if you so wish. In seconds, I was signed off of chat and cautiously probing the Backstreet site for
said feature.
Hell, yes, I'm going to screw with his face. I'm going to turn him into the man he is in my eyes. Fuck
the pretty boy image. I'm going to make sure that, by the time I'm done with him, he looks exactly like the prick that he
is.
So I find the game. I take my little mouse, click on the tip of his nose, and drag it down to the bottom of the
picture. He always was a nosy bastard anyway, right? Might as well make the Backstreet Boy pay for his uglier qualities. Soon,
his big blue eyes are mere slits, and his unruly blonde hair has taken over the picture.
Take THAT, Picasso. I'll
show you just how ugly a beautiful person can become. Because, hell, underneath it all, this is probably what we really look
like anyway.
The worst part is that I don't really believe that. I'm not even really a pessimist. I'm an eternal optimist.
Of
course, that's also the reason that I ended up with the Backstreet Boy. Come to think of it, that's also probably the reason
that we stayed together as long as we did. And so the question isn't really how to break up with a Backstreet Boy, it's how
to get over a Backstreet Boy.
I'm not enough of an optimist to think I have the answer.
Just for good measure,
though, I pick the tip of his nose up and allow myself a decent view of his nostrils. Soon, his head is flat and his ears
are large enough to rival Dumbo's. And, believe it or not, I'm feeling a whole hell of a lot better. Shit, I may tackle Brian's
face next, and I actually like the guy.
For now, though, I'm stuck on my cretin of an ex-boyfriend. He looks relatively
decent with his eyes crossed and a dent in his nose. I examine the picture for a long moment, studying all the imperfections
that I've managed to bring to life, before deciding that, ultimately, he looks better as a person and not as a perception.
That
decided, I reset the picture, I turn off the computer, and I go on with my life.
Well, kind of. Hearing his voice still
hurts, seeing him smile still pisses me off, and watching him perform still makes my stomach knot, but I think I'm glad that
he's happy. After all, if he's happy, I figure that I'll eventually get there too.
Right now? I'm just glad to have
figured out how to get silent revenge. And for all of the ex-girlfriends out there in need of time, therapy, or a shred of
advice...
I think I finally figured out how to get over a Backstreet Boy.
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