Coincidental Fate

It was 5pm and I was insanely early for dinner with some old Rotary people, so I thought I would take the opportunity to drive around my old neighbourhood in Mitcham. It had been more like 13 years since I had been down those back streets; even when I lived there for Uni, I lived on the other side of Melbourne and never really had a reason to go there, nor did I have the use of a car back then.

My old school has long since been torn down (Snif, snif) and is now a block of houses. Nevertheless, it was still nice to drive around those streets. I vaguely remembered some of the turns and curves, including the one where I would have branched off to go 'home' when I lived with the McFucks. Surprisingly, I didn't turn to go see their house, especially since I didn't have a dozen eggs to hurl at their windows... oh ya, I guess I'm a grown woman now and not suppose to think like that... oops! What can I say; the thought of that festering family brings out the best in me.

So then I approached the street where Jason use to live. Yes, we had a catastrophic falling out and I hadn't spoken to him in 12 years, but at one point in my life I actually did believe that I was going to marry him. I flipped on my signal and turned down nostalgia lane; I remembered the house that he lived in with his parents... 15 years ago, anyway.

As I drove slowly there was a man walking down the street on the right side of the road. He was wearing a cricket hat and his face was not visible, but my stomach turned 3 times over. No way! It couldn't be! I rolled down my window quickly and yelled out, "Jason!"

He turned around instantly.

Holy shit. Mutha Fukka. Jesus Christ. My heart was racing, my hands were shaking and I seriously thought I was going to vomit. I turned the car around, drove past him again and pulled over; he was waiting in bewilderment. I was also the LAST person on the planet, literally, that he would ever have thought to be driving down his street! We were both suffering from shock... and I started with a very creative, "Hello there!"

He was polite and I even got a couple smiles out of him. I didn't get out of the car, but we spoke for about 10 minutes. Turns out, he moved 4 doors down from his parents and he was going from their house to his when I drove past. It was getting close to dinner, and he then had to leave. I gave him my card, although I won't be holding my breath for an email any day soon.

My hands were still shaking while I drove away.

Despite our falling out, it was sincerely nice to see him again. I don't know if I would call it closure, exactly, since I'm sure our 'closure' was quite clear 12 years ago when he got SOMEONE ELSE PREGNANT, but it was definitely something. Perhaps just to see for myself, in person, that he was doing well. He would have only been walking down that street for about 45 seconds and that is precisely when I drove past... and I'd like to think that there was some kind of cosmic reason why fate granted me one last visit with him; I am thankful for that.

I'm also thankful for Tide with bleach; because I'm sure he probably had a few skid marks to clean from his shorts after our encounter.