My Montana, Week 1

I had arrived. And it was just like I had remembered it to be three years ago. It was beautiful. With mountains in the distance that created a surprising and unexpected skyline for a small unknown town in a valley with rivers and a dam twenty minutes away where it got its name "Great Falls" from. I had traveled for three days and two nights to get here. And, I was 10 days earlier than I had planned on coming.
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I heaved a sigh of relief when I arrived at the local Wal-Mart. I had had 200 dollars when I first walked in and walked out with a 110. There was no sales tax here Thank God! I thought. I had been without cell phone service for the last 7 hours of the drive. My phone cut off halfway through North Dakota while I was on the phone with my mother.  It had taken me two hours to get a new phone and new service at the cheapest rate without a contract and to find the local Wal-Mart where i got lost twice and had to stop at the Hilton Garden Inn ten blocks away from it. I got a nice little introduction to the town as no one knew I had arrived for two hours. After a long wait at the cash register in "Electronics" I finally had activated a phone. I called my friend David, my Montana friend who had offered me to stay at his place and make Montana my new home. He and I had been friends for eight years. We were platonic for the first five but then after my last trip to Montana in 2011, things got romantic and then quickly died out. He simply didn't know how to truly love and had a hardened heart when it came to love relationships. He was a little better at being a friend. He knew when to be there when he was needed, or so I thought. Either way, he was there for me this time and I had faith he would help me out.

While messing with my new phone outside leaning against the Wal-Mart, I looked up to see David pull up in his white 1999 Ford Explorer. Our eyes connected as if it were our first time seeing each other again. He was just as handsome as I remembered him from three years prior. I smiled and hugged him and said "Thank you." David smiled back. We then headed over to Miss Liz's house. She was the lady he had told me about that needed help with her business. And i was excited to help her. When we got there, I met Miss Liz. She had a kind smile and quiet demeanor about her. But, she seemed frail and sickly by how slowly she was moving. Her feet shuffled across the floor and she was cooking my welcome dinner hunched over the stove. She had short natural hair and was about my height with glasses and pretty sparkling eyes. She must have been about late 50s.

Meanwhile, David and I were talking with Mr. Harold. He was a Haitian man in his 60s who still spoke French and Creole fluently.

"So, you and David have been friends for 8 years? How come you aren't married?"
I immediately blushed. I never expected someone to be so forthright within ten minutes of meeting.

"Are there qualities you like about David that you would like in a mate?"

"Yes, there are many qualities I like about David." I revealed.

David paused and then looked ahead at what he was doing-- snacking on something. He didn't respond. Instead, he froze.

Miss Liz finally came into the dining room where we were sitting and served dinner. She had missed the whole conversation.

"So Kristen, how was your drive in?" 

She and I continued to have conversation about everything from my journey, to personal training, spirituality, God, etc. After dinner, David went to the couch and laid there and fell asleep. He was such a mama's boy. By the time Miss Liz and I were done talking on the couch, David and I gathered our things and headed over to his place. It was 3 minutes down the street. He helped me carry some of my things in and he gave me his room while he slept on the couch. For then and the rest of the week I spent there it felt like we were roommates. He didn't speak to me or really acknowledge me, meanwhile I made attempts for us to hang together like old times and to be chummy. It was David's birthday the previous week so I wanted us to go out, but with every attempt it would be met with a "No" or "no thanks". We would go to the gym together and workout on opposite sides. We would go to Miss Liz's house and not speak. He ignored me and I started to wonder why he had ever invited me to Montana in the first place. Every day of the week I had spent helping Miss Liz with her business as she was going in to surgery in ten days. So, I helped her put some of her things in storage and watched her put together floral arrangements. I had thought I would be paid for helping her business during her recovery but the more Miss Liz spoke the more she sounded kinda selfish.

"See Kristen, this is a technique I call 'hiding the booty'." She said as she motioned to me to watch her put together a floral arrangement that was worth $150.

"So you do massage therapy, floral arrangements and you teach massage class. You are doing alot! Don't you ever hire anyone to help you out?" I asked wondering how she did it all successfully.

"I used to do that but i realized that I was giving my money away when I could be keeping that to myself. If its 10 dollars an hour times 40 hours a week, thats 400 dollars!"

I started to see that I probably wouldn't be getting paid to help out with this lady and that I'd be helping her out with her business just to stay at her house for free. David's mom and two niece and nephew were coming at the end of the week and that would conclude my time at his place. I felt somewhat relieved as it felt he didn't want me there. He was cold and distant and stayed up late on the phone sometimes until 3 or 4am in the morning where the sound of his voice murmuring kept me from sleeping. I would toss and turn and try to dream but only extreme fatigue carried me to sleep. By the time Friday rolled around it had been a week that i had arrived, David had had one of his friends stop by, Terry. He had left Terry waiting on him for about an hour after he reassured him he'd be just 5 minutes. I was starting to see more of the side of David that I had remembered I first experienced. That night, after chatting with Terry and him complaining about waiting I took myself out for a celebratory dinner for having been there a week and went out alone.

When I came back, David sat next to me on the couch.

"So Kristen, I want to ask you, what is the reason you thought I asked you to come out here?"

I was blank. I didn't see this question being tossed at me randomly.

"Uhhh to help Miss Liz out with her business and for me to learn how to start my own from her?"

"Yeah so what have yall done? I mean I've been sitting back and observing yall. I went down to the college with you guys for you to look at spots to set up your personal training classes or programs underneath her, but what have yall done?"

"Look David, it takes longer than a week to start up a business. Further, i thought that part was coming later. Miss Liz is going into surgery next week. Doesn't she just need help with her business? Who is going to run that while she's recovering if Mr.Harold is going away for a month?" I responded.

"You guys were supposed to be piggy backing on one on another. You to help her with her health, her business and she to help you with your personal training and yall ain't done none of that."

"Excuse me? How can you be accurately observing anything when first you have not asked me how my day was, what I am doing daily and you are at work for longer than 8 hours a day to accurately assess what we have or have not done! Further, what difference does it make to you? What part do you have in our business?"

"Kristen, well I feel like I am in the middle. I'm Miss Liz's friend and I'm your friend and I was the middle man trying to merge you two together. Do you know how much money you will be paid?" David fired back.

"No. How would you feel if you were sick and you needed help with your business and someone would be staying at your house and you go up to them and ask them, 'Oh by the way, how much am i being paid?' I just think that is rather insensitive David."

"Well, you need to talk to her about that. Let me know when you do that. When are you going to do that?"

"Well, she goes into surgery on Wednesday so it will be before then." I asserted.

David got up.

"Wait just a second David, I feel uncomfortable about this conversation. You did ask me to come out here and stay with you with the opportunity with Miss Liz and I accepted. However, you and I live like roommates. We don't speak, you don't ask me anything about how i'm settling in or how things are going yet you assume and jump to conclusions about what isn't happening between Miss Liz and I. You think I drove 32 hours for a place to stay and an opportunity?! Part of the reason why I drove out here was to reconnect with you! My friend of 8 years. Everyone keeps reminding me of the length of our friendship but its starting to feel like we are strangers!"

It felt so good to get the truth out. I didn't like the way he was treating me. It was such a drastic difference from the last time I was here.

"Kristen, you're an introvert so I figured you wanted your space. So I do my thing and let you do your own thing."

I left the conversation alone. I had learned something new. David seemed emotionally unintelligent because he was. When it came to emotions, he was ignorant AND he didn't know how to treat people. I continued to distance myself from him and started to understand more fully why we were on-and-off friends and buddies for years.