Meatloaf's old song was playing in the diner. It was too early in the morning. She was sitting across from me saying we were over. I knocked my coffee into my lap and sprang from the booth before she had a chance to finish.

At home I could hear the Rocky theme song my phone plays when it rings. It was her. I said I had another call.

The costume store played canned, spooky tunes. I bought a big bunny costume because bunnies are sweet and innocent. I followed her all day. She was holding his hand and kissing him. Then she sat him down, right next to me, on the same park bench, and started saying all the things she wanted to do to him. It was like I was invisible !

I could feel her slipping away, though, the same way you can tell a song is ending when it starts to get quieter. But I told myself it was just one of those tricky songs that gets quiet in the middle, then comes back on even louder.

She dumped me on my answering machine. Her voice sounds great, especially when I set it to music. Michael Bolton if I'm feeling romantic, Beach Boys for having fun, Enigma when we're having sex, and rap music when I'm mad at her. She can't stand that rap music.

After school we'd go to the ballpark. The same guys always came. I was in the outfield because I had a good arm.

The ballpark was like a real stadium. Fake people were painted on the homerun fence, the dugouts had equipment painted on the walls. The bases were made out of rubber and screwed into the ground to stay in place. One day a new kid showed up. He was leaning against the homerun fence with his hands in his pockets. At first I didn't spot him. When a foul ball landed near him he kicked it to me and said if I was faster I could have caught it.

The next pitch the same thing happened. He kicked the ball over again and called me a slowpoke.

I said, "If you're so good at catching, catch this !"

When I got to him he was on his knees. I said sorry and reached out my hand. He leaned his shoulder into the fence to lift himself. His sleeve got pushed up showing the bottom of his arm. The arm's color matched the beige people on the fence, not the pink skin of his face.

I moved away from him. The ball was by his feet. He kicked it to me and covered his arm before he left.

You're good with girls until they want something from you. Then you get jittery and nervous and awkward as an old friend at a funeral. Knowing this, you learn how to keep their interest, while eliminating their expectations. You research by reading paperbacks about witches and submarines. Pretty soon you too are shallow, but impossible to put down.

You have relationships that last as long as a vacation, others as short as a plane flight. For a while you might describe yourself as happy, but then you notice something about the difference in the way you feel for the x-vacations versus the x-plane flights. Truth is, you liked the vacations more. Sometimes you even miss them. It must have something to do with time.

So you decide to stick with the next girl for a while, regardless of whether you like her. Telling yourself she is more like an experiment than anything else. This makes it easier. You experiment a lot. Then you go to lunch with a friend and when she kisses you goodbye on the cheek- You are in love. It's as simple as a sensation.

You're young, far too stupid to be in love, and treat your feelings like a traveling salesman, ignoring their knocks. This lasts for two days, then you find the girl whose kiss blitzed your cheek, and wade into her as if she was a rough sea. Time passes. Not only do you still love the girl, you suspect she might love you more. This realization swallows you like an undertow and you panic.

Without offering any explanation you sleep with the next girl you see, and cling to her like she was a life preserver. Your cheek has never felt so neglected. But you treat it like just another slighted salesman while the new girl distracts you long enough for the one you love to swear you off like you were instant coffee. You stay with her for a few months, mechanically clicking through your emotions. Like a slide show projecting on just a white wall, things are blurry and not clearly defined. What you need is the proper screen. Trying to focus you overcompensate, making the picture a tight box you decide not to enlarge.

You leave, but this time offer an explanation. It's the most selfish thing you've ever heard.

By then it's Spring and the girl you love is dressed in her best color, making your cheek twitch. By then it's too late. By then you're dead to her. The second girl gives you a book that looks like a journal. It's brown and has metal edges and a hard cover that's bound with canvas. She tells you not to open it for a year, and leaves without saying anything else. You do what she asks because you're disgusted with yourself. Eventually you forget it exists.

More than a year later you're unpacking in a new apartment and find the book. It looks like a friend's tombstone. Inside it are poems, most of them written by her, a lot of them about you. One is called Axioms, a list of ten items she wrote about herself. Nine is, "If I tell you I love you, you must leave." Ten is, "If I write you a poem, I'm telling you I love you."