With These Swords
She tried to explain it to me, and I'm not so sure I get it. She always believed in words, that much is true. She believed in the pure affecting power of stories and song lyrics, she thought they had resonance. I guess, or, from what I can figure out, her main problem was that she didn't trust the reaction of others. Me and she were close. Well, figures, we'd been going out for six months. The other day I heard a girl say she was getting engaged to a guy she'd only been with for a month longer than us. She shared a lot with me, and I tried to help, I tried to understand. But there's only so much you can, isn't there? That was certainly what she thought. It was pointless me just being able to tell you, if you asked, Lucy's not very happy today. I could tell you why, but it meant nothing. Lucy didn't think anyone felt her pain, and that's what she really needed, someone who could meet her in the middle of it. Only then, she thought, was anyone ever going to be able to get her out.
She wanted to be able to effect people. She would tell me the story of the girl who got up and walked out like it was folk-lore. I guess what I didn't know all this time is that sympathy wasn't enough for her. She wanted to make you feel exactly how she did. She told me that if she felt isolated and cut off it took all her effort not make you feel the same. Answer the phone only to say "go away, I don't want you here". She didn't ever want to see us sad, but she cound't explain it, and she couldn't simply contain it any longer.
Mostly, though, she apologised. All she wanted to do, she said, by the end of it, was hurt me. Hurt me and everyone else like she was hurting. And it was killing her to feel like that because she couldn't see an end to it and she knew that if she started she wouldn't ever stop as long as we let her do it. And when we stopped? When she eventually drove us away, what then, all that slow rot built up inside her and her only therapy was to let it out. With no-one to inflict it on, what could she do?
I didn't really understand. I never did, not really. People like her never made sense to me. I wanted her to understand that she didn't have to feel like that in the first place, that she should give up her problems and let us deal with them. Her family, her friends, me. I guess in that way she was right. I wasn't going to know, not really know, from her simply telling me alone.
So. She did the only thing she knew how. She gave in to her demons and hurt us all. And maybe she was right, because now understanding it doesn't even matter, all I can do is feel the pain and absence and isolation of what she's done. Feel it incoherently. Incomprehensively but without ommission. She tried to explain it, she headed her explanation Dear John and signed it with a kiss. Then she left it somewhere we would find it, and plunged the words into our hearts.
She wanted to be able to effect people. She would tell me the story of the girl who got up and walked out like it was folk-lore. I guess what I didn't know all this time is that sympathy wasn't enough for her. She wanted to make you feel exactly how she did. She told me that if she felt isolated and cut off it took all her effort not make you feel the same. Answer the phone only to say "go away, I don't want you here". She didn't ever want to see us sad, but she cound't explain it, and she couldn't simply contain it any longer.
Mostly, though, she apologised. All she wanted to do, she said, by the end of it, was hurt me. Hurt me and everyone else like she was hurting. And it was killing her to feel like that because she couldn't see an end to it and she knew that if she started she wouldn't ever stop as long as we let her do it. And when we stopped? When she eventually drove us away, what then, all that slow rot built up inside her and her only therapy was to let it out. With no-one to inflict it on, what could she do?
I didn't really understand. I never did, not really. People like her never made sense to me. I wanted her to understand that she didn't have to feel like that in the first place, that she should give up her problems and let us deal with them. Her family, her friends, me. I guess in that way she was right. I wasn't going to know, not really know, from her simply telling me alone.
So. She did the only thing she knew how. She gave in to her demons and hurt us all. And maybe she was right, because now understanding it doesn't even matter, all I can do is feel the pain and absence and isolation of what she's done. Feel it incoherently. Incomprehensively but without ommission. She tried to explain it, she headed her explanation Dear John and signed it with a kiss. Then she left it somewhere we would find it, and plunged the words into our hearts.