Yours, Mine & Mine

In every relationship a couple goes through different milestones. It starts out with your first date, the first time you have sex, your first trip together, and eventually, if he’s lucky enough to make it that far, your one year anniversary. It doesn’t necessarily take place in that order but you get the idea. When enough time has passed and you feel comfortable enough to share that part of yourself with him, naturally you take the next big step. For me, it was giving Tyghe a set of keys to my apartment.

I was never the one to share, whether it’d be my food (and I am quite greedy with my food), my clothes, my cigarettes, or my bed, let alone my apartment. It’s part of the reason why I lived by myself. I never deemed a guy worthy enough to give him a copy of my keys. It was mostly because I didn’t trust them. Giving a guy a set of my keys would mean him having access to everything. Most importantly, it means that I would be sharing a piece of myself with him. All my flaws would be exposed. He would see how I would leave dishes in the sink and wouldn’t wash them until days later; he would see how I would always leave the bathroom sink and floor wet after I wash my face and never bother to wipe it down; and when I have a sinus congestion I’m forced to snore. So when I decided to give Tyghe keys to my apartment, I knew it was serious.

Before, I would leave my keys with the front desk for him to pick up after work since he gets out earlier than I do. Then he would wait for me in my apartment until I got home. It would be almost like him having a set of my keys. Still, this was as close as it would get for him, for now. We would do this for months and it never really inconvenienced us until he asked me.

“So when do I get my own keys to your apartment?” he asked as he handed back mine. I knew that question was eventually going to come up sooner or later.

“Um. I’ll get you a set soon. I just haven’t had time to do it,” I responded. That’s a lie. I just didn’t want to give it to him.

It’s true. I’ve been delaying giving him his own set. I don’t know why. I just wasn’t ready to take that next step. Yes, they were only a set of keys but they were my keys. I wouldn’t say that I’m a commitment phobe. Like I said, I just don’t like to share. After 14 months of dating, I decided that it was time. He should have keys to my apartment. The next day I went to the hardware store and finally made him a set. Boy, did I make a huge mistake.

Like every couple, we fight a lot. Sometimes we argue about petty things, such as leaving his dirty glasses everywhere, that there’s never any Coke in the fridge, or that he doesn’t fix the bed in the morning. We would fight about 15 of his friends coming over and leaving a mess behind or him smoking in my apartment. This is what happens when you give your boyfriend the freedom of having keys to your place. I thought about taking my keys back from him, but what good would that do? It would just cause more animosity between us. In some instances, it could be worse and sometimes more severe than others.

My friend Gene went through something similar with her boyfriend except ten times worse. She had apartment problems that led to a heated argument. They were at the brink of breaking up. At that time they weren’t talking for a week. No phone calls, no text messages, no emails. Nada. A few more days passed and he still hadn’t called. She wasn’t even sure if they were still together and he still had keys to her apartment. With the keys in his possession and still no phone call from him, maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to give him her keys. Gene was convinced that he was going to take off without saying a word. Imagine coming back home finding your boyfriend’s suits gone from your closet. Then on top of that your clothes returned from his apartment with a note attached saying “see ya, wouldn’t want to be ya!” Hopefully that alone would be a clear indicator that you guys are through.

Gene wouldn’t have that. So to prevent that from happening, she hid half his clothes into one suitcase, locked it up, and slid it under her bed. Then she took the other half, stuffed it into another suitcase, locked that up, and hid them in another closet. That way, if he was really going to take off without saying anything to her, he couldn’t, because all his clothes were hidden. She would have trapped him and he would eventually have to call to confront her. If you’re planning to break up with your significant other, approach it like an adult and have a civilized break up. This is not exactly the best route to resolving your problems. True, what Gene did was childish and maybe she should have gone about it in a different manner. And yes, her actions may have been slightly extreme, but it was called for, maybe even justified. And like she suspected, he ended up going back to her apartment to pick up his suits. He was confused and dumbfounded to see his suits gone. He called Gene asking where his clothes were. She explained to him what she did and both had a good laugh about it. They talked things out, settled their differences, and the rest was history. In the end she gave him back his clothes. Gene learned her lesson and asked for her keys back.

I’m not going to ask for my keys back from Tyghe. Sure, we may have our differences and we may not always see eye to eye, but at least we’re heading in the right direction. We’re taking the next big step, hopefully to something great. Who knows? Maybe I’ll let him share my food but I wouldn’t be so hasty about it. Then I thought to myself, if those crazy kids could work things out, then so can we.

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