drown.
‘I defended you all these years with no expectation but that you’d do the same. even in the worst of our times, even through the deepest, darkest corners of our life together, through my doubts, through my fears, through every changing moment of my life. and here we are, now.’
the last word was a heaving sigh more than a syllable. he looked up at his friend and found himself anguished by his silence.
‘and instead of defending me, you traded me in. you decided I wasn’t worth the trouble anymore, that I was expendable. do you know the way your decision has affected me? do you think your silence justifies it?’
in response his friend only shook his head and continued quietly looking away. the lights in the small room were bright and painful. the shadows were carved deep into the hardwood floors where they fell behind the edge of the desk, the great blue bed, the lonely guitar on its stand. it was an unnatural contrast, so brief, so harsh. the first man looked closer at the edges of the darkness, at the fiber strung between black and white, trying to see what his friend now saw, the finality of it, or to somehow recommend another way, if just by continuing to look, by insisting on a last vain effort. every time he fixed the clarity and found it intelligible, almost tangible, the shadows melted and fused and lost their sharpness. where there was once only form now there was this divide, a shadow tattooed dichotomous and deep inside their multiplicity which once felt so indistinguishable from the first man’s owness, his pale, pink skin punctured and laid open to be stained, the boundaries of new realities setting and burning with newfound permanence before lapsing back into some new ineffectual, impotent, dawning realization.
‘it doesn’t have to be this way. it never had to be. you put me here, you chose your way to this place the same as I did.’
he looked back at his friend, still lost in the space between them.
‘I am sorry. I never knew that this was the way it would pan out. if I had known, things could have been different. but here we are again, me mired to my neck in your silence, waiting for your judgment which I can only guess and I cannot deserve. but you’d rather wait and let me damn myself. you’d rather I had no chance to defend myself, no possibility of absolution.’
a tear traced the shadow lining the first man’s cheekbone and he turned further from the glaring light above them both to hide it, but not before it sparkled and gleamed in judgment’s exhale before falling shaking to the floor. his friend watched the place where it disappeared, exploring the space between the wood grains pregnant with emotion but not showing it, perhaps unable, perhaps purposefully.
‘and even through all of this, through all the death you’ve sown inside me, I’ve defended you. I’ve lost friends for you. I’ve ignored the better parts of my conscience and feelings, and all for what? for fucking what? to stand here waiting for something, for fucking anything, any movement, any betrayal, anything to show me you ever gave a shit, that you would have ever felt this way about me with any permanence, that you would ever have sacrificed any part of yourself to make sure I am ok. I folded up your weakness inside me and buried it and you’ve let me grow sick with it. you let me continue to hide your ugliness and then turned away from me, daring me to prove my worth to you again and again by containing this awfulness you brought on yourself and I took from you. can you really not stand me? is it really me you can’t stand? or is it some piece of yourself now that infects me, this silence, this dishonorable resolve to keep you safe, a mirror of your own willingness to sacrifice me for your security? why would you leave me to carry this on my own? can you see the guilt scrawled on my skin? can you see how you make it permanent by not forgiving me? or can you just not forgive yourself?’
if his friend reacted he never saw it. the silence crested and submerged him where he stood in the door, some massive macrocosm of the salty blame he’d shed, a wave of heaviness and sadness which threatened to overwhelm all the resolve he had left, all the sturdy pieces that were holding up his intentions and with them his passivity. for a moment at the top he felt himself let go and saw in front of him the consequences of a new choice, a new resolve to reinsert himself in his friend’s life at all costs, to speak all the ugliness that brewed inside him and destroy all the things he kept safe in tribute to the memory of his friend, all the things which sickened them both and turned them away from the harshness of the light, now glowing and streaking like a newborn sun above him. and as suddenly as the thought had come it was gone and he was spinning, searching for his feet, then waiting for the next peak and crash. his friend watched him drown.
the last word was a heaving sigh more than a syllable. he looked up at his friend and found himself anguished by his silence.
‘and instead of defending me, you traded me in. you decided I wasn’t worth the trouble anymore, that I was expendable. do you know the way your decision has affected me? do you think your silence justifies it?’
in response his friend only shook his head and continued quietly looking away. the lights in the small room were bright and painful. the shadows were carved deep into the hardwood floors where they fell behind the edge of the desk, the great blue bed, the lonely guitar on its stand. it was an unnatural contrast, so brief, so harsh. the first man looked closer at the edges of the darkness, at the fiber strung between black and white, trying to see what his friend now saw, the finality of it, or to somehow recommend another way, if just by continuing to look, by insisting on a last vain effort. every time he fixed the clarity and found it intelligible, almost tangible, the shadows melted and fused and lost their sharpness. where there was once only form now there was this divide, a shadow tattooed dichotomous and deep inside their multiplicity which once felt so indistinguishable from the first man’s owness, his pale, pink skin punctured and laid open to be stained, the boundaries of new realities setting and burning with newfound permanence before lapsing back into some new ineffectual, impotent, dawning realization.
‘it doesn’t have to be this way. it never had to be. you put me here, you chose your way to this place the same as I did.’
he looked back at his friend, still lost in the space between them.
‘I am sorry. I never knew that this was the way it would pan out. if I had known, things could have been different. but here we are again, me mired to my neck in your silence, waiting for your judgment which I can only guess and I cannot deserve. but you’d rather wait and let me damn myself. you’d rather I had no chance to defend myself, no possibility of absolution.’
a tear traced the shadow lining the first man’s cheekbone and he turned further from the glaring light above them both to hide it, but not before it sparkled and gleamed in judgment’s exhale before falling shaking to the floor. his friend watched the place where it disappeared, exploring the space between the wood grains pregnant with emotion but not showing it, perhaps unable, perhaps purposefully.
‘and even through all of this, through all the death you’ve sown inside me, I’ve defended you. I’ve lost friends for you. I’ve ignored the better parts of my conscience and feelings, and all for what? for fucking what? to stand here waiting for something, for fucking anything, any movement, any betrayal, anything to show me you ever gave a shit, that you would have ever felt this way about me with any permanence, that you would ever have sacrificed any part of yourself to make sure I am ok. I folded up your weakness inside me and buried it and you’ve let me grow sick with it. you let me continue to hide your ugliness and then turned away from me, daring me to prove my worth to you again and again by containing this awfulness you brought on yourself and I took from you. can you really not stand me? is it really me you can’t stand? or is it some piece of yourself now that infects me, this silence, this dishonorable resolve to keep you safe, a mirror of your own willingness to sacrifice me for your security? why would you leave me to carry this on my own? can you see the guilt scrawled on my skin? can you see how you make it permanent by not forgiving me? or can you just not forgive yourself?’
if his friend reacted he never saw it. the silence crested and submerged him where he stood in the door, some massive macrocosm of the salty blame he’d shed, a wave of heaviness and sadness which threatened to overwhelm all the resolve he had left, all the sturdy pieces that were holding up his intentions and with them his passivity. for a moment at the top he felt himself let go and saw in front of him the consequences of a new choice, a new resolve to reinsert himself in his friend’s life at all costs, to speak all the ugliness that brewed inside him and destroy all the things he kept safe in tribute to the memory of his friend, all the things which sickened them both and turned them away from the harshness of the light, now glowing and streaking like a newborn sun above him. and as suddenly as the thought had come it was gone and he was spinning, searching for his feet, then waiting for the next peak and crash. his friend watched him drown.