The Perils of Pamela, Part 2

So this "thing" with Pam continued, unchanged, unsettled, undone and unsung.

For three weeks, the blond ex-cheerleader kept pursuing and I kept playing hard to get which, on the surface, seemed completely counter-intuitive. But at the end of the day, Pam's good looks and blond locks weren't enough to change my mind. I know; what’s wrong with that picture?! I guess you just had to be there. Still, no matter how hard I sought separation it was nearly impossible getting untangled from her.

There was the almost constant parade of phone calls. Even if she didn’t catch me- or I ‘forgot’ to call back- she’d still managed to put a bug in my ear. And it bugged me. She kept coming to our hockey games, too, though I told her she really didn't have to. Which was polite-speak for I really didn’t want her to. She also kept showing up at the dorm and almost always uninvited. At least she wouldn't smoke if we were together. She even sat in the lobby for two hours while I did a weekend air shift on the campus radio station, KWRS. That really annoyed me. But then I felt guilty about it because every half hour or so she'd come upstairs, smile and take my coffee mug, then bring it back refilled from the student union coffee shop downstairs. On her dime.

So I passively let her crowd me and did nothing to stop it. Of course, none of this was really her fault, which bugged me, too, because most of it was mine.  I guess I was a slow healer, and though it'd been over a year since the great divide came between me and Kelly, I’d yet to figure out how to divide my still broken heart and share it with someone new. Not then, anyway. However, if timing in life is everything, then poor Pam unfortunately picked the wrong time to show up in mine.  

 

Still, I should have been shouting to anyone who'd listen, "Hey, look who's with the hot chick". Instead, except with the guys on the hockey team- who’d seen her in action- I worked hard to keep Pam a secret. And though I know she thought of me as a boyfriend, the best I could do was think of her as an annoying kid sister; or at worst, an albatross. But I gotta give her credit for hanging in there. She didn't give up. Like trying to find the needle in the haystack, that's how hard it was trying to find the right way to say 'stop’, ‘slow down’, or ‘go away’; not until the Sunday after my birthday. That night, though I didn't find the needle, I finally found the last straw.

 

Pam said she had out of town family coming over that night, and was expected to stay and entertain. Our twenty four day kabuki dance had left little time for me, just me, to have a night to myself and I was pretty jazzed about it. But a little before 7 p.m. - knock, knock- I opened the door and found Pam on the other side. She was smiling. I probably looked like I'd come down with food poisoning. "Change of plans, so I'm all yours instead", she announced as if I'd just won the lottery. Damn! But before she could set her purse down, I grabbed a hold of her arm. "Come on", I said forcefully. "We're going for a walk."

 

Out in the hallway, I pulled her behind me and led her to the exit. “What’s wrong?” she asked, but I think she thought I was teasing because the echo of her giggling followed us down the stairwell. “What's wrong?” she asked again when we were out of the building and since I hadn’t spoken since leaving my dorm room, her voice conveyed a more genuine since of concern. Still holding her hand, I relaxed my grip and steered us in the direction of the Loop, but not sticking to the rules of conversation, answered her question with a question of my own. "What's wrong? What's wrong with you?" I countered. "Me? What'd I do? I just got here."

 

Point well taken, but that was the point- she was here.

 

“You know what I mean. I wasn't expecting you. I had plans to play poker with the guys tonight but now you’re here." It was a mean thing to say; meaner because there was no poker game. But Pam didn't know that and I really wanted her to ‘get it’.  "You can’t just keep showing up here all the time and expect me to drop everything because you are; especially without calling first. What are you doing here anyway? I thought you had family stuff.” Pam started to sniffle and pout. ”They were boring, so I left. But it sounds like you'd rather play poker than play with me.”

 

I couldn't tell if she was being clever, but she couldn’t have been more right. And in the chilly night air, the quiet grew louder as she waited for me to disagree until, becoming impatient, she vigorously let go of my hand and, still sniffling, rephrased her statement in the form of a question. “Well? Is that stupid poker game more important than me?" We were finally at the crossroads, and my answer would take tact, diplomacy, and nuance. Unfortunately, I possessed none of those qualities and simply blurted out the hard truth. “In this case, yes it is.” Now Pam's tears fell in cascades and I instantly felt like a creep because I hadn’t seen her cry before and it really hadn’t been my intent to hurt her. But I wasn't completely ignorant.

 

Sitting down next to her on a bench near the Campanile, I tenderly blotted some fresh tears from her cheeks. In the three and half weeks I'd known her, it may have been the closest and most real moment we'd shared. “Aww….don't cry. It's okay. I’m sorry. I really am... It's just that....” With my sentence unfinished - and before I could say what I knew needed to be said- Pam threw her arms around me and, like we’d been cast in a really bad movie, breathlessly gushed, “Oh, it’s all right. I know you love me…”   Then, before I could say anything else, her mouth was on mine.  

 

With her tongue unexpectedly tied up with mine, she’d regained the upper hand and, if the situation was allowed to remain unchanged, things could very quickly spin out of my control. On the other hand, I wasn't dead either and Pam's tightening arms were a pleasantly warm buffer against the heavy damp air that surrounded us.  At last, though, I delicately pushed her away and stared up into the cloudy night. “What’s wrong?” Since practically dragging her from the dorm and out into the night, it was the third time she'd asked that question, and this time I knew I needed to come up with a better and more definitive answer.

 

"I'm sorry. We shouldn't be doing this anymore. We can't be doing this anymore."

 

"But, why?"

 

Trying my hardest to find just the right words, I looked up into the sky again for some sort of guidance. And once more finding none, I blindly stumbled into a really ragged explanation. "Wow….This is really hard and please know I don’t want to hurt you and well, if things had been different….But they're not and it’s just….it's just that...it's just that I don’t feel that way about us. “  I think she knew what I was going to say next; her eyes were full of tears. And I was hoping I wouldn’t have to, but I had to seal the deal. Close the door. There was no other choice; for her sake as well as mine.

 

“God this is so hard to say…and I’m so sorry….But, Pam …. I’m…I’m not in love with you.”

 

So there it was, raw, but honest, and now out there in the open. And like switching off a light, Pam's demeanor suddenly went from aggressively sensual to dark naked disdain.

 

“You son of a bitch!"

 

And over the course of the next ten minutes, that was the nicest thing she said. Pam shot up from the bench like it was on fire, turned on her heels and broke into kind of a half run, half power walk. Before she got too far ahead of me, I reached for her hand to try and slow her down so we could walk and talk together. But as soon as I did, she recoiled and twisted from me as if she'd been bitten by a snake. "Don't touch me. Don't you ever touch me again" she hissed and continued taking two steps to my one, forcing me to jog to keep pace. 

"Pam, listen….." As I ran beside her, I tried to apologize and ward off the coming meltdown. But it was no use. The conversation remained one sided and ugly. Starting with, "Screw you, asshole", it kind of went downhill from there. She made no attempt to be conciliatory or spare my feelings in a lengthy rant, riddled with profanity that lasted all the way from the Campanile to the gravelly parking lot on the west side of the dorm, where she'd left her car. And without giving me a second look, she threw the door open, plopped down behind the wheel and slammed it shut behind her, with as much force as an angry 100 pound girl muster.

 

But I could see inside, and once she'd unleashed all of her invective and run out of names to call me, watched her, take several deep and wounded breaths and, totally spent, quietly and sadly hang her head. Suddenly I felt a wave of compassion and wanted to reach out to her. I took a step closer to the driver’s side window. “Look, Pam, I like you and you’re a nice girl and I know you’re gonna meet somebody who can, ya know, love you too, the way you want. The way you deserve." I was gentle, trying to soften the blow and give her some encouragement as we parted. But she was having none of it.

"Shut your stupid face and get the hell away from my car!" she yelled from the other side of the closed window and turned the engine over with a vengeance. Glancing up at me, she vigorously rolled it down with the fire returning to her eyes. "Don't ever forget this night, Rocket. Because it’s the last night anyone ever cared about you. And that's past tense, by the way, 'cuz I sure don't anymore. Don't know what I ever saw in you in the first place. You're a freaking troll. I guess I felt sorry for you because who's gonna love a troll? Not me. Not anymore. I'm movin' on, loser. But take good care of yourself, okay, because I want you to live a long life, alone, miserable and missing what you could've had with me.”

 

There was more, but most of it just heaped-on cursing. I got the gist, though- Pam didn't much like me anymore and the “relationship”, or whatever it was, was unquestionably over. There was no ambiguity about our final conversation either. We were done. Her car's headlights popped on and Pam shoved it in reverse. Then just as quickly, she jammed it into first and, with tires squealing, angrily drove off into the night with her middle finger waving prominently outside the driver’s side window. 

 

I watched her taillights disappear onto Hawthorne Road then went back into the dorm, feeling suddenly bled dry, though I should’ve felt a sense of relief because I'd just completed a crash course in Woman's Scorn 101 and lived to tell about it. I'd withstood the intensity of her fury, taken her best shots and didn't flinch or pee my pants. I didn't try to reason or rationalize, either. I just took it. I probably deserved it too. If she got nothing else out of our "friendship" she should at least get the last word.

 

Still, I’d never been talked to like that with so much anger and hate before. And as I tried to fall go to sleep that night, Pam's words played over and over in my head. They hurt and stung as if she was still there yelling at me. From the beginning, Pam and I had been a disaster just waiting to happen, an uncomfortable screeching train wreck, from pointless beginning to its merciful but explosive end. An eventuality I knew was coming but hoped somehow to avoid. 

 

So why didn’t I click with her? She was a golden opportunity, pretty and luckily easy after an unlucky break up. Turns out though, all we really were, were really wrong for each other. Underneath a nearly perfect outside, inside Pam's soul was a clash of imperfections- sometimes coarse, often clingy, whiny and immature; an unhappy person and general pain in the ass.  Of course, nobody's perfect and some of those things could be overlooked. In fact, some of those things could be said about me.

 

But adding up all those negative attributes made her a hard person to like. And that was the rub. We never really become friends. If I couldn't fake liking her, how could I ever fake loving her?  And in the middle of the night, it finally all began to make sense.  I wasn’t retarded after all; breaking up had been the best thing to do, not just for me, but for both of us. I could live with that, and the next morning woke up feeling free and ready to move on.

 

However, two days later, there was another hockey game. And like all the other games since I'd met her, Pam was there that night, too. But not to see me. Making it perfectly clear she’d wasted no time mourning for me, her sights were already set on Hank Savland, one of our burly defensemen. Shoot, she and I had spilt on Sunday but by Tuesday night it appeared Pam and Hank were already an item.  I’m sure that’s how she wanted it to look, anyway. However, knowing she’d recently been my girl (sort of), Hank wanted to get my permission, as if, by then, it'd even matter. What Pam wanted, Pam usually got. But Hank and I were teammates, and though I had no dog in the fight anymore and found it a little uncomfortable seeing her with him, gave him my "blessing". I also gave him some advice. "Don't get on her bad side. She’s not so pretty from that side."



And that was that. They started dating and Pam was at the rest of our games that season, cheering on everyone but me. Our games were sparsely attended and I heard her ‘boo’ every time I touched the puck. I knew her voice. She was the only one doing it, too. She also made it a point to give Hank a big pre-game smooch right on the mouth, and usually when I was close enough I couldn’t miss it. It was curious because I don’t think I ever saw any of the other guys get kissed by their wives or girlfriends before games. She certainly hadn't kissed me like that at rink side. But she slobbered all over Hank like a dog slobbering on a meaty bone. He was embarrassed and I knew she did it mostly out of spite towards me. Everybody connected to the hockey team knew it, too. There was nothing I could do about it though, except live with it.



Still, it kind of hurt. Like I said, I wasn't dead yet and though I was glad Pam wasn't throwing herself at me anymore, on some primal level it hurt to see her throwing herself at somebody else. It was sort of bizarre to witness, and to his credit, Hank finally got fed up with it and told her to knock it off. When she wouldn’t, he banished her from coming altogether. "If she comes out here again, I told her we're through." It must've worked, too, because I never saw her after that- even at our celebratory party after winning the championship two weeks later. Hank was a great teammate, but turned out to be an even better friend.

 

I didn't play hockey the next season. That was the year I lived at Lake Tahoe. But by 1979 I was back in Spokane again and playing in the same league with some of the same guys from our ‘77-78 championship team. Hank and I ended up on different teams, but the first time we went head-to-head we, met at center ice during the pre-game skate to catch up. And after exchanging pleasantries, I said, “So, what’s new?” He took a long pause and, haltingly, mentioned that he'd gotten married....to Pam. Ouch…Awkward.

 

But not really. A year and a half after the fact, enough time had passed and, for me, Pam was mostly just a bad memory. So I congratulated him and asked how it was  going. Hank hesitated and looked away before answering. “Biggest mistake I ever made” he said dejectedly. ”Such a cute mouth until she opens it. She never shuts up and swears more than I do. My mother won’t even come around anymore if she knows Pam’s there. And to tell ya the truth, I’ve started taking double shifts and extra hours at work, just so I don’t have to go home. I can see why you dumped her”.  

 

Well, to be honest, Pam dumped me, not the other way around. Not that it mattered to Hank.  By then it was a moot point, anyway, and I felt really bad for him. He looked so sad and I wondered. Aloud,  if he’d thought about leaving her or getting a divorce. But Hank just shrugged his shoulders. "I can’t now. She’s pregnant, due next month. And the worse thing is, I’m not 100 percent sure the kid’s even mine. Pam's always liked to, ya know,  party, and though she always says she's just out with the girls, well..." His voice trailed off. 

 

Poor Hank. To an outsider, it looked like he had it all- good job, tall, strapping guy, great looking wife and a kid on the way. He shouldn’t have had a care in the world. But it wasn't that way at all. He was miserable. "It all happened so fast and it all seemed so wonderful at first", he recounted.  “But it fell apart so fast, too”, he lamented. Hank stared down at the ice, shaking his head, knee deep in thought and the crumbling ruins of his life. I though he was going to cry. It was two minutes till game time and the conversation, humanely, had to come to an end.  Skating away, Hank wished me a good game. "You too" I answered, now well aware that the outcome of a rec league hockey game was the least of his worries. I watched him rejoin his team at the bench and felt so sorry for him- but so thankful I wasn’t him.

Hank said they’d gotten married on July 1 in the summer after our successful play-off run. July 1?!  That seemed awful quick, but that’s what he said, too… "It all happened so fast… “ I didn't have a 2-year old calendar laying around, but when I got home after the game used the 1980 one to calculate just how fast. And the number was 69. The gap between April 23, 1978 (the night Pam and I broke up, an event so distasteful it was hard to forget), and her wedding day was only 69 days, or about 10 weeks. Wow. When she told me she was moving on, I guess she wasn’t lying.

And I didn’t really know what to think about all that, except for maybe one thing: there, but by the grace of God, go I.