Dear Aaron

by Mariana Zapata

People say “everything happens for a reason.” I’m not sure if that’s true, but it was probably for the best. Maybe. If a little distance is all that it takes to tear a relationship apart, that should tell you something.

There are no single guys in church! What is this? The 1800s? Lol. Single men don’t go to church period, at least not any of the churches I’ve ever gone to. Give me a break. Do you know anyone who does? I bet not. I’m better off trying to pick up a single dad at my niece’s school. Now that I think about it, I could make a good stepmom.

Lmao

You eating? RubyMars: Yes, Mommy Aaron. I’m back up ten pounds. RubyMars: Am I being too… familiar with you? I don’t want to make you feel weird. AHall80: No. You’re how I expected AHall80: You’re packing on that weight quick. RubyMars: …… AHall80: I’m messing with you. Glad you are AHall80: Am I being too familiar now? RubyMars: No, you’re just like I expected. RubyMars: :) RubyMars: How’s the constipation? AHall80: …. RubyMars: …. AHall80: …. RubyMars: No? You didn’t like that question? AHall80: ….. AHall80: Did you finish your dating website profile? RubyMars: I’ll take it you’re still constipated. AHall80: Who are you?

RubyMars: Have you gone #2 lately? AHall80: Three days ago. RubyMars: Are you joking? AHall80: I wish. RubyMars: AARON AHall80: I know. I KNOW. RubyMars: Does it hurt? AHall80: Uh, when it comes out? RubyMars: Omg RubyMars: Aaron RubyMars: I meant your stomach. RubyMars: Does your stomach hurt? RubyMars: I can’t breathe RubyMars: Or type RubyMars: I didn’t mean your… rectum. RubyMars: Aaron? RubyMars: Aaron? RubyMars: Are you there? RubyMars: AARON? AHall80: You’re not the only one who couldn’t breathe or type. RubyMars: LMAO I’m crying. AHall80: me too AHall80: me too RubyMars: I mean… you can tell me if your butt hurts too, I guess. AHall80: Ruby, stop RubyMars: Seriously. You can tell me. I won’t judge. RubyMars: It happens. RubyMars: I think. AHall80: Stop RubyMars: I can’t breathe AHall80: I don’t know when the last time I laughed so hard was. AHall80: Everyone is looking at me wondering wtf happened. RubyMars: Your rectum happened AHall80: BYE RubyMars: I can’t stop laughing AHall80: You’re never hearing from me again RubyMars: There are tears coming out of my eyes. AHall80: Bye. I’ll write you again when I find my balls. RubyMars: It was nice knowing you. AHall80: BYE

LMFAO I CANT STOP LAUGHING

RubyMars: You’re Team Jelly too? AHall80: All the way RubyMars: Good. I wouldn’t have wanted to stop being your friend over something stupid like liking peanut butter more, but I would’ve looked back on our friendship fondly. AHall80: Heh AHall80: Aaron and Ruby RIP 2008-2009 RubyMars: There are tears in my eyes RubyMars: “Ruron Forever” AHall80: Ruron? Ruby+Aaron? That’s clever. RubyMars: It’s our ship name AHall80: Like a battleship? RubyMars: You poor, sweet, innocent child RubyMars: Ship. Shipping. I ship ______. AHall80: I don’t know what you’re talking about RubyMars: Today is the day our friendship dies. RubyMars: You’ve never heard that term before? AHall80: No AHall80: For real. AHall80: “Today is the day our friendship dies” AHall80: Ruby…. RubyMars: I’ll forgive you then. I forget the dork doesn’t run strong in you. RubyMars: Shipping is… “relationSHIP” like, liking two characters and thinking they should be in a relationship together in a fandom. RubyMars: Do you know what a fandom is? AHall80: I know what a fandom is. RubyMars: Okay. You watched Buffy. Remember Angel? The vampire? Buffy + Angel = Bangel. AHall80: Got it. AHall80: I liked the other guy more RubyMars: …… RubyMars: Spike? AHall80: Yeah RubyMars: Marry me. RubyMars: I think I might love you. AHall80: Lol AHall80: OK RubyMars: I’m not even joking. Marry me. The offer stands. RubyMars: Kidding, I am joking. :) RubyMars: How much of the show did you watch…? AHall80: …… AHall80: 7 seasons? RubyMars: T...

I want texts like this :(

Friendship. Like that was all I felt for this man whose face I had never seen. That’s how I knew I had it bad. I didn’t even know what he looked like and I had such a huge attraction to him it didn’t matter. He was nice, but not too nice. Funny. Honest. Spiteful enough to be real. And he wasn’t a creep. He understood me and still liked me. So it wasn’t a surprise that I liked Aaron Hall. I liked him a lot. A lot, a lot. More than a lot. If I really let myself think about it, I wouldn’t even call what I felt for him being along the lines of “like.” Even though I knew there was a thousand and a half things he wasn’t willing to share with me.

RubyMars: Are you getting any sleep? AHall80: Not much, my times are screwed up. RubyMars: Melatonin, ever heard of it? AHall80: It’s only 7 p.m., it’s too early for sassy time. RubyMars: :) RubyMars: It’s never too early for sassy time.

AHall80: 270-555-5025 RubyMars: …. AHall80: That’s my number. Call me. RubyMars: Did you even think about it?? AHall80: That’s why I’m giving you my number.

I gotta call this

“I can’t believe you.” “You sound like you work for those phone sex lines,” he finally managed to get out, sometime ten minutes later. What? “No I don’t.” Had he not ever listened to his own voice before? “Have you heard yourself? I was watching TV last night after I messaged you and the commercials for those chat lines came on. You sound just like those girls….” He trailed off for a moment, his voice changing. “Are you sick?” I had no right to smile as wide as I was, but I did it anyway. “No, I’m not sick anymore. This is my normal voice, thanks.” There was another pause over the line and then, “Are you really Ruby?” “What do you think?” I snorted. “Do I need to ask about your butthole for you to believe me?” Aaron choked. I didn’t need to see him to know he’d done it. He didn’t try to hide it or pull the phone away from his mouth. “Now I know it’s you for sure.” I was a fool, and it didn’t matter. “Are you sure? Because I can,” I offered him before I could shut myself up. “I’m sure.” “If you change your mind…” Aaron shot out another laugh. “No, I know it’s you. We’ve been on the phone… four minutes and you’ve got me laughing more than I have in weeks. It couldn’t be anybody else but you, Ru.” I couldn’t count the number of times he’d said something to me like that in written word, but just like every other time he had, I felt like… I felt like I’d done something amazing. And I needed to get it together and control myself. I needed to act normal. Normal, Ruby.

MAH HEART <3

“You could’ve warned me before I called,” he said quietly before I could get my normal game together, but somehow I could tell he was smiling as he said the sentence. Plopping down on the edge of my bed, I pulled my knees up toward my chest, heels on the mattress side by side. I tried not to wonder what he was doing right then, what he looked like, what he was thinking… and I failed. Like usual. “What would you need a warning for?” I asked, almost hesitantly but definitely a little distracted. There was another soft chuckle. “For that voice. Jesus, Ru. You told me you were worried I wasn’t going to like you, so I had this plan in my head for how I’d get you to talk to me in case things got awkward. And you start giving me shit thirty seconds in,” he argued. “You threw my game off.” Act normal. Act normal. Don’t ask what his plan was. Don’t tell him you love his voice too.

That pink mouth went tight as his eyes scanned over my face with a slowness that made me want to fidget and ask him to stop. “Why didn’t you saying anything?” he asked, still being so quiet. Dragging the rim of the bottle from my mouth down to my chin and leaving it there, suspended in the air, I blinked, taking him in one more time and eating up the lines of his bones and the clear skin of his face and thinking he was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen. Of course he was. “I’ve told you everything.” Did he have a dimple too or was I imagining it? “I promise,” I assured him, trying to think of what I could have deliberately missed. Aaron’s golden eyebrows rose just a little, just a little, that smirk-ish smile still playing at the corners of his mouth. “Almost everything.” I lowered the bottle to my lap and frowned. “What do you think I didn’t tell you?” Those brown eyes swept over my face, and he squeezed my knees again before planting his feet flat. He started straightening, his face pausing while he was still eye level with me when he said way too evenly, “You could’ve told me your mom and sister are the ugly ones in the family.”

Omfg why is he so hot... MARRY ME-

I had no idea right then that, for as long as my soul resided in my body and I could reminisce on the best parts of my life, I’d remember how Aaron Hall leaned forward and wrapped those long, tan arms around my back and pulled me into his chest. Me who was still on the bench. The way he hugged the hell out of me would be something that sickness and death could never take away. And in the time it took me to suck in a breath, I put my own arms around him.

Physical Touch>>>>>

“I mean this in a totally platonic way, okay?” I warned him. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him dip his chin once more, and I wasn’t going to pay attention to the way his mouth was doing that fluctuating thing again. Amused, happy, mocking, and back all over again. Why? Why couldn’t he just be plain looking or be so good-looking and not be so direct with his stare? Because that wasn’t my luck, and I knew it. I coughed. Then I did it. “You’re gorgeous,” I said to him almost painfully, prying the words out. “Like… the army should put you on their recruitment ads or put you as the face on their website. I feel like I can’t look you in the eye or I’ll turn into stone, and they’ll need to add my statue to a garden of other women who have made eye contact with you before and lost their lives.” Aaron just stared at me for a moment, just a moment, and slowly that wavering smile turned into a full-fledged one, one with straight white teeth and warmth to it that couldn’t be faked, that could have had angels singing and playing harps in the background. “You smile a lot more than I thought you would,” I kept going. “You said you never really smiled while you were over there.” “I don’t usually smile so much,” was his cryptic answer. I scratched at my neck again and watched him, nerves making a nest in my belly. Anxiety prickled at the center of my chest, and so, so hesitantly I said, “I was worried you were going to be disappointed meeting me.” Those brown eyes seemed to twinkle a ...

Ima melt

Looking back on it, it’s weird thinking about the moments you don’t realize are important. The sentences, the touches, the actions that seem so innocent in that second, you take them for granted. The words that make water into wine in the course of your life. But I would never forget the way his words made me feel. The way he made me feel right then.

And when Aaron asked, “It’s beautiful, huh?” I told him the one and only truth I had. “It’s really beautiful.” And then I told him the second truth in my long list of things I couldn’t deny. “I’m going to owe you forever for inviting me and showing this to me.” He didn’t say another word and neither did I as the sun kept creeping upward, unrushed. I know at one point I held my breath at the same time the sound of two new voices from somewhere behind us broke the silence. I didn’t look back, all I did was keep my eyes forward and swallow the rays entirely. “I think I want to wake up every day and watch this,” I whispered to him, pulling my knees into my chest so I could settle my chin on top of them. “It would be worth waking up early for.” And all Aaron said, in his low, soft-spoken voice that he’d been using on me since yesterday, with something in the notes I couldn’t classify that sounded almost like hope, if hope had a sound and if a promise could be made without vocalizing it, was, “Any morning you want, Rube. I’ll watch it with you.”

OMDS WORDS

“Do you have a boyfriend?” The way she shook her head quickly, like she was disgusted. “Oh no. I don’t have time for dumbasses.”

Lmao

All I knew was that it was thirty minutes after six when I reached for my phone and sent my mom a message telling her I was alive. It was three minutes later I got a response from her that said Good. Keep it that way.

Bro this is to real

“Is it the avocado, Ruby?” Aaron asked slowly, taking another bite and frowning as he did it. Swallowing the questions and the frustrations inside of me, I tried to remember I had to be fair. I had to. So I told him, weak, weak, weak, “No, I like avocado.” Even with his cheeks stuffed full of toast, tomatoes, cheese, avocado, and bacon, he blinked. “You sure?” Why? Why? Why couldn’t he have been normal? Handsome but not stunning. Nice but not kind. Understanding but not so patient. Thoughtful but not so much.

“You’re scared of going swimming at night?” “You saw me jump on top of you when something touched my leg a couple of days ago. I almost cried when you made me hold that first fish, remember? The Loch Ness monster is probably swimming around in the water right now right beside Jaws, ready to get me if I go in.” Aaron snickered and I found myself smiling more at him sounding like himself than anything. I flicked my gaze to the side, finding him with his arms planted behind him, eyes on me. I looked back at the water. “Nessie isn’t going to get you,” he claimed. I side-eyed him with a smirk. “You’re on a first-name basis with her?” “Yeah, what of it?” He nudged me again, and again I kept my attention forward. “Get in the water. Nothing will get you.” “No.” “Ruby.” “Aaron.” “Get in the water. You say you’re scared, and I know you’re braver than that, so do it.”

“Because I’m going in the water.” He folded his shorts in half and dropped them on top of his T-shirt. “You coming?” My heart was beating, beating, beating. “No.” Aaron winked. “Yes.” My throat clammed up. “Aaron—” “Come on. We don’t have to go in deep. You can hold my hand.” I coughed. Sputtered some more. Maybe even gagged a little. “I’d want to hold something more than your hand going into the water—” Aaron choked. Literally choked. Gasping out, “Jesus, Ru.” Oh no. The blood drained from my face. “You know that’s not what I meant!” His laugh was so rough and loud and happy it made something in me click. “Do I?” “Yes!” I didn’t know it was possible for him to laugh louder, but he did. “I’m going back to the house,” I muttered, not moving. He dropped his head back and kept on laughing, a hand coming up to rest on the six-pack I was not going to look at. “All right, all right. I’m just messing with you,” he said, chuckling and sounding pretty much delighted, with a long sigh afterward. I narrowed my eyes when he reached up to swipe under his eye. “Come in the water with me and I’ll never bring it up again. Promise.” I groaned. “Ruby.” “Aaron.” “Come in the water with me,” he insisted, sounding totally back to normal. I stared at him. “I don’t think so.” He stared back at me. “You’re going to regret it later when you think about it,” he egged on. How could I have forgotten how well he knew me? I scoffed again, ignoring the truth to his words. “Come on, will you? Just you an...

“I’m scared.” He blinked and the next thing I knew, he was dropping into a crouch directly in front of me, his face just above mine. Both his hands went to one of mine, enveloping it in between his. His words were soft and gentle as he brought our palms toward his chest. “I’ll be with you the whole time. You know I wouldn’t just leave you out there to be mean.” The worst part was, I knew he was telling me the truth. That was something my brothers would do, but not Aaron. Never Aaron. Not if he knew I was genuinely scared, which I was.

Instead, I hoped he could tell the difference in the way I had my arms around him and that he could notice I was trying to hug him instead of cling to him for dear life, and I said with my mouth real close to his ear, “You’re the best, Aaron not an asswipe.” I was pretty sure that if anyone had been standing out on their deck that night, they could have heard us both laughing.

Mah heart

They all thought… Yeah, they all thought I was a virgin now. Or maybe just really, really, really innocent. Basically: a virgin. What was this? The 1860s? Was porn not a click away anymore? Did he not have any idea the kinds of things I’d seen on the Internet late at night when I had my door locked?