Have I told you about my condition?
Memory, like a gel-coated capsule. Not those bitter things I used to unexpectedly swallow, but a tasteless, odorless thing which gets stuck in my throat, until something cold and refreshing comes roaring in after it.
Memory. I am walking back from a club in Indy, slowly trudging along beside a woman whose heels have got the best of her. We've been talking all weekend, but there is something about the dark heart of Four A.M. which brings people closer together, and this is no different. She says something and I dissent. That's the sort of thinking which caused my divorce.
"You were married?" she asks, and again I dissent. Not married, no, but somehow we went through a divorce all the same.
"It's a strange thing not to mention in four days' worth of conversation."
Have I not been talking about it? So many times, the words have popped out of my mouth against my will and I thought to myself, Am I bleeding on the floor or am I stitching the wound shut? The image of my own words, piercing my skin and cutting needle-sharp against my bloody gaping openness, the image of words as a tiny thread seeking closure, the image of that seeping wound which festers inside me and bleeds across all my efforts, it is so tangible, so vivid, so bloody painful.
Have I not been talking about it? Is it really possible that I went four days through a convention, drinking and being merry and not talking about it? Not her, not (f)AD, not my giant, unceasing, ever growing list of Self Improvement Plans. Have I really not been talking about it?
Memory. "I know we've discussed this already, but for some reason, it pisses me off when you call it a divorce."
Memory. "I think I'll be happy when you find someone you can fall in love with, because then you won't hurt so much over me, but I think I'll also be jealous."
Memory. She is wearing one of my white button-downs, and her hair is free and flowing in her face. She crosses her bare legs and ignores the food we've cooked together. "I...I want to ask you an odd question."
But before I can even bask briefly in that warm, strange moment just a handful of hours ago, it is torn aside by another....
Memory. We stand on opposite ends of the cold, ashen remains of a party. Drug-eyed, chemical wreathed, squinting against the harshly bright light of a 60-watt bulb, my hands still lightly powered from the latex gloves. No, I demand. Some things you decide before. Some things, you choose where you stand and when the moment comes, you Stand Your Ground.
Memory. As the door shuts behind him, I drop my head in the lap of Cave Dwelling Eyes. I had a bad week, I whimper into her stomach. "Oh," she soothes, "and I was barely here for you at all."
And then, a few days later, she says to me, "You can tell, can't you? You know," and I do not know, but she needs me to already know, so I turn my eyes from her and nod and she spills it all out to me. In my heart, I am already saying goodbye to her, because she's fallen for one man and is divorcing another, and neither of those men are me.
Memory. Pulp Fiction came out in 1994, twelve years ago. I saw it in the theater, it was the first date Christine and I ever went on. We started dating in October, and three months later, we were living together. Nine years later, and we were living together.
I know, because I have told the story so often, that we first started talking about moving in together as a joke, because both of us hated our apartments, and gosh, it would be so much cheaper splitting a one-bedroom. I know it, but I do not remember it. I cannot picture the moment in my head. I know that she worked at Eat'n'Park for far longer than she should have, and I can remember the polyester uniform they made her wear before they switched to the pants & pullover uniforms. I can picture that uniform, but I cannot picture her face.
Memory She ignores the food we've cooked together and asks if she can ask me an odd question. I don't think the question she asks is the question she wants to ask. The words of it wash over me, and suddenly the stereo is too loud. I get up, adjust the volume, sit down, and the stereo is too soft. I get up, adjust the volume, sit down, stand up. I refill my drink, and my lips are moving, sounds are coming out of them, but I'm not aware of the words I am speaking.
Memory. I am pacing in Pure Earth's bedroom, my phone to my ear, my words comforting and controlling. I dictate courses of action, I demand answers and attitudes, and the girl on the other end of the phone loves me for it. It comforts and eases that frantic part of her which is under biological siege, needing the reassurance of permanence which she is otherwise so reluctant to consider.
Memory. She does not want to know about the question she's asking. She wants to know if I am here, if I am with her. The question she does not ask is, "What will it take to make you run from me?" and polygamy makes this question easier and harder at the same time, like a path in the woods widening as it climbs a hill. I live in the city, and you live in the suburbs, and that settles things before all other questions, I tell her. I don't want a giant communal family, with us all happily living under one roof. I want a place of my own, but what I'm really think is We've been dating for less than six months, and you want reassurance? Fuck that, fuck you, I don't want any commitments (and a voice from the past whispers "A case of beer is more commitment than I can handle right now.") or obligations or people to depend on.
I want to be alone.
I don't mean it, though. I avoid everything and bury myself in work and escapism, but whenever she asks for me, I go to her. She's safe because she's married, and that lets me commit more than I would be otherwise comfortable with.
She's safe because I can't have her, so I don't need to think about whether or not I want her. I can toss aside questions about the future because no future can be possible, and with every other girl I've even thought about, those questions loom so malevolently over my shoulder that I can't relax around them. It's just a different form of the same thing that made me so comfortable with Radiant Idol and Cave Dwelling Eyes.
Dad has been griping about my lack of medical insurance, what with all the driving I've been doing and the upcoming trip to Hong Kong. I can't bring myself to fill out the forms, mostly because I don't want to hedge my bets against the future. I don't want to acknowledge the future, and I'm trying to forget all of my past.
I don't want to think about things to come, or make plans. I want to just live. I just want to concentrate on waking up each day and doing the things that need to be done today.
Memory. I am walking back from a club in Indy, slowly trudging along beside a woman whose heels have got the best of her. We've been talking all weekend, but there is something about the dark heart of Four A.M. which brings people closer together, and this is no different. She says something and I dissent. That's the sort of thinking which caused my divorce.
"You were married?" she asks, and again I dissent. Not married, no, but somehow we went through a divorce all the same.
"It's a strange thing not to mention in four days' worth of conversation."
Have I not been talking about it? So many times, the words have popped out of my mouth against my will and I thought to myself, Am I bleeding on the floor or am I stitching the wound shut? The image of my own words, piercing my skin and cutting needle-sharp against my bloody gaping openness, the image of words as a tiny thread seeking closure, the image of that seeping wound which festers inside me and bleeds across all my efforts, it is so tangible, so vivid, so bloody painful.
Have I not been talking about it? Is it really possible that I went four days through a convention, drinking and being merry and not talking about it? Not her, not (f)AD, not my giant, unceasing, ever growing list of Self Improvement Plans. Have I really not been talking about it?
Memory. "I know we've discussed this already, but for some reason, it pisses me off when you call it a divorce."
Memory. "I think I'll be happy when you find someone you can fall in love with, because then you won't hurt so much over me, but I think I'll also be jealous."
Memory. She is wearing one of my white button-downs, and her hair is free and flowing in her face. She crosses her bare legs and ignores the food we've cooked together. "I...I want to ask you an odd question."
But before I can even bask briefly in that warm, strange moment just a handful of hours ago, it is torn aside by another....
Memory. We stand on opposite ends of the cold, ashen remains of a party. Drug-eyed, chemical wreathed, squinting against the harshly bright light of a 60-watt bulb, my hands still lightly powered from the latex gloves. No, I demand. Some things you decide before. Some things, you choose where you stand and when the moment comes, you Stand Your Ground.
Memory. As the door shuts behind him, I drop my head in the lap of Cave Dwelling Eyes. I had a bad week, I whimper into her stomach. "Oh," she soothes, "and I was barely here for you at all."
And then, a few days later, she says to me, "You can tell, can't you? You know," and I do not know, but she needs me to already know, so I turn my eyes from her and nod and she spills it all out to me. In my heart, I am already saying goodbye to her, because she's fallen for one man and is divorcing another, and neither of those men are me.
Memory. Pulp Fiction came out in 1994, twelve years ago. I saw it in the theater, it was the first date Christine and I ever went on. We started dating in October, and three months later, we were living together. Nine years later, and we were living together.
I know, because I have told the story so often, that we first started talking about moving in together as a joke, because both of us hated our apartments, and gosh, it would be so much cheaper splitting a one-bedroom. I know it, but I do not remember it. I cannot picture the moment in my head. I know that she worked at Eat'n'Park for far longer than she should have, and I can remember the polyester uniform they made her wear before they switched to the pants & pullover uniforms. I can picture that uniform, but I cannot picture her face.
Memory She ignores the food we've cooked together and asks if she can ask me an odd question. I don't think the question she asks is the question she wants to ask. The words of it wash over me, and suddenly the stereo is too loud. I get up, adjust the volume, sit down, and the stereo is too soft. I get up, adjust the volume, sit down, stand up. I refill my drink, and my lips are moving, sounds are coming out of them, but I'm not aware of the words I am speaking.
Memory. I am pacing in Pure Earth's bedroom, my phone to my ear, my words comforting and controlling. I dictate courses of action, I demand answers and attitudes, and the girl on the other end of the phone loves me for it. It comforts and eases that frantic part of her which is under biological siege, needing the reassurance of permanence which she is otherwise so reluctant to consider.
Memory. She does not want to know about the question she's asking. She wants to know if I am here, if I am with her. The question she does not ask is, "What will it take to make you run from me?" and polygamy makes this question easier and harder at the same time, like a path in the woods widening as it climbs a hill. I live in the city, and you live in the suburbs, and that settles things before all other questions, I tell her. I don't want a giant communal family, with us all happily living under one roof. I want a place of my own, but what I'm really think is We've been dating for less than six months, and you want reassurance? Fuck that, fuck you, I don't want any commitments (and a voice from the past whispers "A case of beer is more commitment than I can handle right now.") or obligations or people to depend on.
I want to be alone.
I don't mean it, though. I avoid everything and bury myself in work and escapism, but whenever she asks for me, I go to her. She's safe because she's married, and that lets me commit more than I would be otherwise comfortable with.
She's safe because I can't have her, so I don't need to think about whether or not I want her. I can toss aside questions about the future because no future can be possible, and with every other girl I've even thought about, those questions loom so malevolently over my shoulder that I can't relax around them. It's just a different form of the same thing that made me so comfortable with Radiant Idol and Cave Dwelling Eyes.
Dad has been griping about my lack of medical insurance, what with all the driving I've been doing and the upcoming trip to Hong Kong. I can't bring myself to fill out the forms, mostly because I don't want to hedge my bets against the future. I don't want to acknowledge the future, and I'm trying to forget all of my past.
I don't want to think about things to come, or make plans. I want to just live. I just want to concentrate on waking up each day and doing the things that need to be done today.