Why don't you put your hair back on and come on back?

Just come on back...

Sometimes I feel I'm wearing a mask I don't remember putting on.
Most see me as quite reserved, and always aware of my position with regard to the implications of my interaction with other people.
But sometimes I wonder if my behavior doesn't exemplify my true intent. Sometimes I think it acts as a defense mechanism, one more powerful than even I can understand.
I haven't dated in awhile, but usually when I do, if I get too many phone calls I just stop answering the phone.
I don't know if I cherish "me time" more than most, or if my behavior is self-destructive, ensuring that I will remain alone.
Still, there are exceptions to the rule. People who cause me to rack my brain for an excuse to start a conversation with them. These people afford a glimmer of hope.

One such person seemed equally fascinated by me in the beginning, and the effortless ability to hold a conversation for hours or carry it over for days made me wonder if I too was worthy of companionship.
Now the conversations are fewer, shorter...and I find myself fanning a dying flame while the other person waits for the embers to go dark. The thought that I could need something that isn't essential to my being makes me feel pathetic. And when my thoughts drift back to the fire, I wonder if it's ever in the mind of that other person or if I am completely alone in this.

I wonder how something that seemed to fit together so perfectly could be broken apart and slip away without warning, how one could be left with a void and the other think nothing of it.
And if I was unworthy, I wonder why this person was ever a part of my life, why one would be made to seem so perfectly compatible with me, only to be lost.
I wonder if in knowing me well, all interest faded away.
I feel abandoned.
I wonder if some people exist, beautiful, distant, perfect...just to make us suffer.
And I marvel at the idea that someone who once made me feel intelligent, interesting, and significant could make me feel so much less than before they entered my life.