Fire Walk With Me

What's happening right now can't help but make me think of Shannon. I haven't seen her in years, but at one point she saved my life, and then subsequently became someone very important to me. This was the spring and summer of 1995, a huge transition year for me for a whole ton of reasons. At the center of all that transition was Shannon, who saved my life. I don't mean she pulled me from a car wreck or took a bullet for me, or anything like that. But in a way that mattered quite a bit she did indeed save my life. Because of her, and her alone, I was able to extricate myself from the unknown horror of She Who Will Not Be Named. Without her timely interference I don't know what would have become of me.

I was in love with Shannon. I'm not sure how painfully obvious that fact was to other people, but it was never spoken between she and I. She may have felt something for me, but nothing I can confirm. I just suspected it. She came on like a ton of bricks right away. I met her through one of X's friends, and we hit it off right away. Shannon was in a relationship, and so was I, but we were best pals almost from the get go. It was crazy. That sort of thing almost never happens to me. By the summer when all four of us moved into that two bedroom on Davis Street she and I were tight. I think to any casual observer of the scene it would have appeared that Shannon and I were the couple, because we were just so close.

I do get infatuated with people easily. My history is dotted with countless examples of how that's true, but I was in love with Shannon. It was hard, it was difficult, it was painful. Oh, was it painful. I hung out with her everyday after work until bedtime. We did everything together, went everywhere together, and we were pretty much inseperable for all those months. And this was true while X was still in the house, and it was true while Kenny lived there the whole time. She wasn't my girlfriend, but Shannon totally stole me away from my ex wife lock, stock, and two smoking barrels ... and she did it right in front of her eyes. Meanwhile, I moved right in on Shannon right in front of Kenny, and it didn't bother me a bit. I wanted her so bad. I'm not sure that it was even this bad with Jacquie three years later. That was a harsh crush to suffer, but Shannon might have been worse due to the constant proximity and all. And while I knew Jacquie was out of my league, I did not have that same block against Shannon. If the opportunity had arisen, and if that apartment situation didn't eventually fall apart, I might have done something horrible.

She had a baby girl when I met her. She was pregnant with a second baby also when I met her. For reasons I won't discuss in this post, that made her all the more irresistible. There was one time she and I were out driving around and she told me that she wished that I was the father instead of Kenny. I could have died right there on the spot. There were other times, when she would say something smaller but no less meaningful, but that one moment was the closest she ever came to letting me know that she liked me. If there was a way that I could have gotten Kenny out of the picture and put myself in his place I would have done it in a heartbeat. I know that sounds terrible, and truth be told, I did like Kenny, but I was a goner. I spent so many nights laying there awake in my bed, alone, figuring out how to do away with him.

Becky is Shannon's half-sister. I think the horrifying crush I developed on Becky grew out of my frustration over the situation with Shannon. It was a deflection of some kind. I'm not saying it didn't feel like the real thing, because the weight of that crush almost destroyed me, and it led to me punching a hole through a plastic paper towel dispenser at the Diner three years later, but I wasn't in love with Becky like I was with Shannon.

But in the end I think it worked out the way it needed to. Shannon was put in my path to help save my life, and she did, and then the Wheel moved me along somewhere else (I'll do a post on Milta sometime later). For that summer Shannon was my best friend in the world and my closest confidant. How much would have changed if she and I had coupled up? I have to wonder if that would have ruined the whole thing. And I have to conclude that the very important role that Shannon played in my life at that time superceded my need to be in a full relationship with her.

I have a crush on Jen now. The same thing might be true with her. She's a good friend of mine, and important things might take place due to that friendship, and the friendship is very important to me right now.

I am afraid of screwing it up.