Vodka Yonic features a rotating cast of women, nonbinary and gender-diverse writers from around the world sharing stories that are alternately humorous, sobering, intellectual, erotic, religious or painfully personal. You never know what you’ll find in this column, but we hope this potent mix of stories encourages conversation.
If you’ve been to a concert in Nashville, you’ve likely seen it: the space between the audience and the stage. We call this the “Nashville bubble,” and musicians know it well. Sure, the audience could move closer to the stage, but they don’t. Maybe it’s because it’s too loud, they’re too shy, they don’t care enough, or they want an easier exit. My own participation in the bubble sometimes comes from knowing the people onstage, which happens a lot in Music City. I can’t transition to fangirl, front-row behavior when the artist can see me — it feels so cheesy. Especially when that artist is my ex-boyfriend.
“Ex-boyfriend” doesn’t feel like quite the right word. He was my first love. I was 25 years old, and he was my first boyfriend. I had dreamed of having a boyfriend for a decade, but was terrified of the idea. To tell them what’s on your mind, show them your body, stay in tune with their well-being — it seemed like too much of a compromise, too much of an opportunity to get hurt. Here was someone who felt safe to do all that with. We’d both grown up with repressive religious backgrounds, so he understood why I was so inexperienced.
In an early Hinge chat, I had told him I wasn’t much of a crier — and that was true up to that point. But being with him made my heart grow two sizes, like the Grinch. Part of that was because I cared about him so much. Looking back, I think a bigger part might have been because of all the old hurts of not feeling desired, and all the insecurities about being a late bloomer that demanded to be felt. Turns out, I am a crier.
We were so different — starting with our families. Mine was almost too close; his was too distant at best. He’s from out West. I’m from Ohio. He told me he didn’t like going out to eat or to bars, and felt uncomfortable in upscale spaces and parties where he doesn’t know anyone. I love talking to strangers and bougie settings. The songs he liked were all sad, and the movies too. He asked me to watch The Pursuit of Happyness and Waves — both times looking over at the end to see my face blotchy with tears. I’m really more of a My Best Friend’s Wedding kind of person. He said he didn’t really like going to concerts. He could spend all evening making sounds on his computer — sometimes not pausing to drink or eat, while I got hangry.
Together we found common ground. Watching documentaries, then making out. I learned to cook, tried weed, had sex for the first time. He could play any instrument, and was sometimes even better when he was drunk. He’d slow-dance with me and always linger outside after he walked me to my car. We loved to unpack religion and politics and music and pop culture. I felt like he wanted to understand me. It was a new feeling. He wrote me letters on a typewriter and sealed them with wax.
Throughout this time, we wrote each other a lot of cards. I remember writing to him about how lucky I felt to get to see him “up close.” It’s a phrase I write often in cards — but the way I felt toward him embodied it the most. We all do things and post about them, but it’s a select few who get to know the inner workings. He knew the minutiae of my life, like if I stopped for gas on the way home from work, or in the deepest sense, why it felt so shameful to even talk about sex. I got to know more about him than everyone else too.
Being a main character in his life made me feel wanted, needed, important. I felt lucky to experience love with him and intoxicated by the fact that my goal in the relationship was to just know him very well. It’s a feeling I get often — I want to know everything about everyone — but never got to act on it until him. Quite simply, we were close.
I didn’t see my ex play live until a year after I ended our pandemic relationship. I was the one who ended things. Seeing him play felt like something I needed to do. I had never gotten to see this version of him — it was the one he liked the best.
I regret the times I got frustrated with him when he was obviously hurting. The times I stood back and watched, or didn’t jump in and show any kind of unconditional love. So when his bandmate asked the audience to close the “Nashville bubble,” I looked around as everyone hesitated and stepped to the front.
A few weeks later, I ran into him at a bar. Later that night, I both threw up and sent him a drunk text telling him a part of me will always love him — I’m not sure in which order. He reciprocated.
The next morning I struck again, typing: “Sometimes it still feels big weird that I’m not up close anymore, but I promise I’m getting better and adjusting.”
Months later, I went to see him play again in the same venue, opening for a band that I was a fan of. He was on the opposite side of the stage from where I stood, and his new girlfriend was in the audience, in the middle back.
She’s up close to him now, but I really loved my time at the forefront.
