She’s Gone
June 25, 2008
Nikki’s gone.
I dropped her off at the airport last night - she had to return home to Florida to go back to work and take care of the house. This will be the first time I have ever truly been separated from everyone I know. She’s been my companion, my friend, my lover, my soulmate continuously for the past three years. And now she’s gone.
Not gone as in permanently gone, of course. But she’s on the opposite side of the country now, a phone call or text message away, but too far away for me to reach out and touch, too far away to hold and kiss, too far away for us to share those knowing glances at one another.
I came home and cried myself to sleep, waking several times throughout the night. Each time, something was missing. Like many other couples, we have our own special, silly lexicon we use to communicate with one another in those little cutesy moments when no one else is watching. Toe wub is one of those cute (to us, cheesy to others, perhaps) little phrases that holds a special meaning to us (wub = a slight perversion of the word “love”). When we go to bed each night, our feet will find each others’ and our toes will rub gently on the other’s. That’s toe wub. You’d think strippers, who spend a huge amount of time on their feet, would have nasty feet, but that’s not the case with us. We take great care of our feet and our little toesies, and we’re always arguing playfully about whose feet are softer than the others’!
That toe wub reflects more love for one another than even sex does for us - it is how we connect even in those little smidgens of time in the twilight when we’re drifting off to sleep or coming out of a sleep. When one of us stays up later than the other and comes to bed with cold feet, the other will warm those feet with toe wub. And I am going to miss that more than anything. I can and do enjoy sex with many people, but toe wub is shared only between the two of us. It has more meaning to us than sex. We often joke about being connected from head to toe. We think alike, have similar personalities (though hers is more introverted), and have roughly the same IQs. We’ve always been connected mentally, emotionally, spiritually. And that connectivity at the end of our toes completes a circle of the two bodies, the two spirits, the two beings.
We did spend three hours yesterday before we left cuddled up with each other in the bed, making love and just enjoying the physical and emotional connectivity that being swaddled under cotton sheets and a down comforter affords. Nikki and I rarely “make love.” Usually, we fuck. But yesterday was different. We have long since transcended the point where sex is the primary (or only) mechanism we use to share deep connectivity with each other. Our primary connectivity lies with the emotional bond between us; the sex is usually a physical enjoyment of each others’ spirit. And, since both of us are free spirits, our sex often reflects that - wild, unconstrained, passionate. But yesterday was different, much more tender, loving, a total enjoyment of all that we are to each other. We laughed, we cried, we came, we snuggled. We just…shared those last, precious few moments together.
It is hard to overstate how much this woman means to me. It all started with a chance meeting at a pool party I threw at my house when I was 14. She was unknown to me at the time, but I noticed her. I noticed that, even at that age, she possessed a kind of self confidence that I had seen only in myself. We spoke only briefly, and even though we shared some of the same classes, we didn’t really talk again until she and I experienced the the most incredible moment of our lives some seven months later.
We tested each other throughout high school, almost at a competitive level to see who could outdo the other. We shared a book report assignment in an English class that, unbeknown to us at the time, would set a course for our lives that no one would ever have predicted. We both graduated high school in the top 5% of our class. We went to the same colleges, enjoyed the same activities, worked at the same places, had identical sex drives and philosophies about how sexuality should work in relationships. We shared heartaches when we experienced problems with boyfriends. The only perceptible difference between us really is that I spend all my free time on the computer, she spends hers watching TV (soap operas, mostly! :lol:), talking on the phone, and reading books. We even randomly simultaneously (literally) bust out singing parts of songs we hear on the radio. We may have had three serious arguments in the eight years we’ve known each other. We could be, for all intents and purposes, mirrors of each other.
Nikki is the one who held my hand under the table to comfort and steady me when I decided to come out as bisexual to my parents. And she laughed with me, hugged me, and kissed me when they told me they already knew. Nikki is the one who encouraged me to change my life focus to sex education and sexual empowerment of young women because she knew how intensely I felt about it, yet was too tentative to actually make that jump without someone pushing me over that edge.
We’ve been together, physically, emotionally, since that fateful New Year’s Eve. Sure, we’ve each gone away for a few days and left the other alone, but always with the knowledge that we’re coming back. That won’t happen this time. Not in the near term at least. We’ll be on opposite ends of the country - different places, different states, different time zones, different jobs, different lifestyles.
Nikki, I know you read these things, and I want you to know how incredibly, incredibly special you are to me. I love you. I truly love and respect you like no other individual I have ever known. You have always been my biggest fan, my staunchest advocate, and my best friend. I appreciate your support of me and the path I have elected to take - you have absolutely no idea how much that means to me. I’ll be back to you in fairly short order, but I am going to miss you, and your toes, so incredibly much. 
*sends Nikki virtual toe wub*
Posted by Alexa | Filed Under Alexa
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(…sending you both hugs…)
xoxo,
nina
That might be the single greatest declaration of love for another that I have ever read…
You two are SO lucky to have found each other.
Beautifully written. Those virtual hugs begin right now, as promised. You are not alone….
That might be the single greatest declaration of love for another that I have ever read…
Well, thank you. That’s nice of you to say.
And thanks, bd and nina , for the virtual hugs.
My heart goes out to you Honey.
It will be tough but you have shown a great emotional strength of character. She’s just a phone call away …and wait patiently for the long weekends and Red eye flights. Maybe find a rendezvous in the middle of the country.
xoxo
Ed
Well, that seriously brought a tear or two to my eyes.
It’s so amazing and beautiful what two people can share. I’m proud of you (and Nikki, although I haven’t met her, or spoken to her) of your accomplishments.
Alexa, you are a powerful woman, and I see you doing great things in the future. Nikki will always be at your side. You know this.
You’ll both be fine :)
<3sc
Beautiful, sad, sweet, touching..
I agree that you’ll both be fine. For the next two years, you’ll both be going in your own directions. It’s healthy, it’s character building, it’s rewarding, and you know it’ll eventually lead back to one another. You have so many things to look foward to over the next couple of years, and I’m sure they’ll all exceed expectations.
As for Nikki… maybe a HUGE basket of chocolate covered blueberries is in order?
(Give me a break… with my somewhat limited knowledge of her, it’s the best I can come up with…)
Thanks, guys. All of you. <3
I talked with her last night, and she did indeed make fun of me for talking publicly about our toes!
And, Ally, if I bought a box of chocolate covered blueberries, I’d eat them long before they got to her.
[...] days. And though I’d had sex on Tuesday with Nikki, that was…different. As I described here, that was more of a “making love” kind of thing rather than an outright fuck. I needed [...]
Wow, fabulous post.
That was really beautiful. All I can say is that you’re lucky to have a relationship like that.
*hugs*
PS. Sometimes making love is a real miracle :)