Take Another Little Pizza My Heart

My name is Stevie Ryan and I live with my two dogs in Los Angeles. After being in a string of unhealthy long-term relationships, I have been single for the past two and a half years. I have never been single this long. Ever. That said, having now had the time to look back on my past relationships after being alone for so long, I have realized two things: 1) I give way too much power to people I fall in love with.  2) I am that psycho girlfriend that people talk about. (You know when some one is like, “Yea, I dated her. She was crazy” ? They’re talking about me).

All of the following stories you are about to read are true. Names have been changed in order to protect the innocent and extremely stupid. (I’ve decided to do this Flava Of Love style and just nickname people things like, “Texas” and “Tiny.”)  

Gingerbread Vol.1, Issue 2 – (Issue 1 can be found here)

After the text message/kick out episode, I started seeing Gingerbread again for some sick reason. And by “seeing”, I mean I was totally in love with him while he was probably out kissing thousands of girls. I have no idea why the hell I even wanted to talk to him again. If that happened to me now, I wouldn’t give homeboy the time of day, but I was only 19 and had this wild idea that I could change someone. Not change as in consciously trying to change someone into a different person, I mean change as in I thought I was awesome enough that someone wouldn’t want to lie and cheat on me. Now I know that I’m not awesome and if I want someone to change, then I don’t really want that person. I’m just really good at building up who I want someone to be in my mind and that never works out.

About a month after we had started seeing each other again, Gingerbread called me during the week and asked if he could come show me his new fancy car. Of course, I said yes. An hour later, he showed up in his new, stupidly beautiful BMW. We drove around a bit so he could show off and picked up a pizza to bring back to my place. I specifically remember being super happy because that song “Yellow” by Coldplay came on and he said it was about me because I had blonde hair at the time. DUMB, I know. But I totally fell for it.We parked back at my place and he started showing me all the fancy little gadgets the car came with: a GPS screen that was bigger than my TV, bluetooth that worked through the car speakers (mind-blowing at the time) and even a sunroof. While playing with the seat buttons, I noticed something in the passenger door cubby that wasn’t mine. A tampon. In a wrapper, of course, but nonetheless a tampon. A tampon that didn’t belong to me. It was, like, a super huge one, too, so it DEFINITELY didn’t belong to me. I’ll be the first to admit that I did jump to conclusions, but too bad. Even though I was all in love with him, I still knew I couldn’t trust him. And when there is no trust, there is no relationship. But I still had hope. Hope that it would get better. I was paranoid and everything was evidence in the court of my own law. Going from 0 to 60, I grabbed the tampon and held it in his face.

Me: What the eff is this?
Gingerbread: Oh… Um… Maybe it’s from Tom’s girlfriend or something?
Me: Or something? Like this random tampon grew legs and climbed into this car?
Gingerbread: Oh, come on. It’s probably yours.
Me: Or from you? Do you wear tampons?
Gingerbread: Yea, sure. It’s mine.
Me: Or maybe it’s from a girl you were showing your car off to earlier? I love how stupid you think I am.

I threw the tampon at him, grabbed the pizza  and stormed out of the car.  He followed me as we argued our way into my apartment like two little chihuahuas.

Gingerbread: Really? I came all the way here and you’re going to act like this?
Me: I’m going to act like this? I think I have every reason to not like you right now.
Gingerbread: Stop being so insecure!
Me: Insecure? You mean stop letting you lie to me all the time? Just leave, please. You’re gross.
Gingerbread: You’re crazy. There she goes with that crazy talk again. And there goes my damn mind.
Me: If you’re going to lie, learn how to do it instead of always pulling the old “you’re crazy” card. It gets old after the first time.
Gingerbread: Well, then, you’re a c***.

The C-word used to set me off. Luckily, that has changed through the years. Or maybe it’s just because I have thick lizard skin from being picked apart by trolls on the internet for so long. Either way, I wasn’t having it at that moment and when I’m not having it, I see red. This time it was pizza sauce red. I just remember noticing the pizza box on the kitchen table and my dumb idea lightbulb went off. Even though I had cream colored carpet, I decided the old “pie in the face” trick was my best move. Obviously it wasn’t, but my brain isn’t capable of producing anything that makes logical sense. I picked the entire pizza up from out of the box and with all my might, I proceeded to chuck it across the room using both hands, aiming for Gingerbread’s face. He dodged the flying pieces like they were animal tranquilizers flying at him, but he still got a tomato bomb straight to the chest. It took him a minute to realize what the hell I just did, but about 10 seconds later he came to.

Gingerbread: YOU JUST THREW A PIZZA AT ME!
Me: YOU JUST CALLED ME THE C-WORD!

In slow motion (wasn’t really but it felt like it), he lifted his brown motorcycle boot in the air and sent it crashing down on two still-stuck-together slice’s that had landed upside down on the carpet. The crust crunched under his boot as he rubbed it back and forth, grinding the slice into the rug with all his leg strength.

Me: WHAT ARE YOU DOING? YOU JUST RUINED MY CARPET!
Gingerbread: And you just ruined my tee shirt.

BURN. He flipped me off and walked out the front door. I stood there staring at the marinara seeping out from the sides of the smashed slices that were now one with my cheap cream colored carpet. My carpet that didn’t belong to me. Just like that stupid tampon.

I did my best to scrub out the greasy stain, but it was still visible. A daily reminder of the person I didn’t need any help remembering since I constantly thought about him anyway. And yes, when I moved out of that apartment two months later, I was charged a ridiculous amount for new carpet. And yes, Gingerbread and I ended up getting back together about 2 ½ months later. And yes, you will have to read the next entry to hear more about why I’m going to die alone with a bunch of cats. I don’t want to spoil anything, but let’s just say it involves a handsome young British chap and me hanging out of the drivers window of a moving vehicle.