Wait, You Had Other Plans?

His parents warned me.  That’s right, JD’s OWN PARENTS warned me about the patience that was required to be with him long term (or even short term for that matter).  Being with JD can certainly be exhausting.  But I decided early in the relationship that it was worth it.  Late that summer, we moved in together.  In a small 1 bedroom apartment, we made our first home.  

A few months later, we planned to have a few friends over.  JD had gone out for a few hours to ride BMX with his buddies while I enjoyed baking appetizers and preparing to play hostess.  We hadn’t been to Urgent Care for a while, so I probably should have known.  About an hour before we expected people to be at our house, the call came in.

In a muffled voice he said, “I’m okay.  We don’t need to cancel.  But I scraped my face a little bit.”

“Okaaay.  What do you mean a little bit?”  JD likes to sugar coat things in an effort to avoid disappointing me.

I’ll give you the short version. Bike + ramp + face in the cement = blood everywhere.

He stopped by his mom’s house so she could take a look.  She called me, “He might need stitches so we’re going to Urgent Care.”

Still not wanting to disappoint me, he encouraged me to still have people over and said he’d “be there later”.

I, of course, called my friends to cancel and headed over to be with him.  Besides, I missed the Urgent Care staff.  They were probably wondering where we’d been.

When I got there, JD was freaking out because he didn’t want stitches.  I smiled and relished the moment.  “Let me get this straight.  You’re a Marine, you’ve been to war, you’re heavily tattooed, and you’re telling me you’re afraid of needles?!” 

“Not all needles!” he cried defensively.  “Just needles in my mouth!”

That didn’t stop the harassment from me or the rest of his family.  It may sound mean, but if you knew how much JD teases other people, or how sarcastic he can be, you’d understand why we seize every opportunity possible to make fun of him.

It looked a lot better once they’d cleaned up the blood.  He didn’t even need stitches.  But he does have a nice lump of scar tissue on his lip now.  Sometimes I look at it, smile to myself and think, “Oh, JD.”