LiLu's post yesterday about Nice Guys coincided with a call from my own personal Nice Guy, Arthur.

In case you've forgotten (or if I forgot to mention it), Arthur is an ex-boyfriend from waaaaay back in the day (1993-1995-ish?). Part of me is reluctant to admit that those were my second and third years of undergrad at the University of Too Much Beer and Too Many Frat Boys. Arthur was a friend of a friend back in my hometown of Suburban Hell, a somewhat reformed hard rocker boy who liked to play the guitar, cheer for Scotland, have a pint, and was saving up for a black Nissan 300ZX (the coolest of suburban 20-something automobiles). He waited tables at the local chain restaurant, and the little old ladies loved to tousle his hair and, occasionally, pinch his ass. He had Luke Perry hair (with sideburns), and piercing blue-green eyes.

Cute and without ambition...exactly my type at the age of 19. Exactly my type.

And he was, without a doubt, a Nice Guy.

On Christmas Day, 1994, he gave me a gold and amethyst ring (amethyst is my birthstone, and without a doubt my favourite stone, hands down), and said "next Christmas, I'll give you a different kind of ring."

In hindsight, I know that something inside of me panicked. From that moment onwards, I am sure that I subconsciously (and sometimes consciously) destroyed that relationship. But that is a story that is far too long to tell, even for this often long-winded blog.

To work an overused phrase, I walked all over that boy like a discount, end-of-the-roll carpet. And because he was a nice guy, he put up with every single second of abuse, every call I didn't return (I was away at school), every weekend that I mysteriously "disappeared". And I made sure that by Christmas 1995, there was no reason to give me "a different kind of ring." I dumped him over the phone, right before the holidays, and refused to speak to him after that.

Merry fucking Christmas.

Twelve years passed.

Soon after joining Facebook, I received a message and a request from Arthur to be "friends". I almost didn't accept, but not because I was angry or afraid.

I was ashamed. After twelve years of thinking about how the relationship ended, and twelve years of living life, I was ashamed of my actions. Why would he want to be my friend?

And yet, I accepted. We traded some messages, caught up on small talk. He owns a house a few hours outside of Toronto. His father died a few years ago, but his mother is well. He is still goofy, still plays the guitar, still likes to read. He is bald now. Got a few tattoos along the way, during his "post-Fearless" drunken days. I am surprised that I was worth getting drunk over.

One night after a few too many glasses of wine, I finally ask him:

"Why are you still speaking to me? Why would you want to? After everything that I did to you?"
And he answered:

"I knew that you weren't a bad person, and eventually I just made my peace with it. You didn't want to be in the relationship with me, and you didn't know how to handle the pressure I put on you. It wasn't really your fault."

He just decided to forgive me? I wasn't a bad person? These ideas astonished me. I guess I always thought of Arthur as a simple, kindhearted fool, and it suddenly dawned on me that perhaps he was actually much smarter than I. He seemed to have it all figured out.

Live life, enjoy it, help people, forgive. Move on. Drink some wine. Maybe get another tattoo.

From that day forward, Arthur has been my closest and dearest friend. As I mentioned before on this blog, he took time off work to help me move into my apartment after leaving the Bear, and knows all of the reasons why I left. He is the only person other than the readers of this blog who knows about Ben and Mr. L. After Mr. L publicly announced his engagement on Facebook, Arthur was the only person to whom I could turn, immediately returning my frantic texts with the simple statement, "Yeah, well he doesn't know what he's missing. You're too good for him, Snoop, so don't worry about it."*

He is a gem, a truly Nice Guy. But not my Nice Guy. That ship sailed a long, long time ago.

*You won't be shocked to find out that Arthur's job is answering 911 calls.