The room was ordinary, neutral
color patterns to induce calm, objects of familiarity to fake home. This was a place built for the passage of
time, and that it did. Years came and
went; the seasons waged their war on the trees. But behind an ordinary window, in an
ordinary room was simply forgotten.
Dante was unable to reproduce any
memory of the woman who sat down next to him.
Maybe she was some remnant of a world he once knew, or of a place in
some time that was once his. The way she
couldn't look at him, the way she sat closer than a stranger would, but just
beyond close enough to persuade engagement.
It was as if she was waiting for something that would never come, and
she already knew. I guess now and then
we wait anyway.
Dante chose his words carefully,
as he always did.
"Some time, I suppose that
we had some journey together...," he said quietly.
She closed her eyes to hide the
wound, but her face flinched; he spoke as if asking about some trip to the
grocery store, some undefined event of little consequence. Dante hardly noticed, his mind wandered a
treacherous path these days. His gift
was lost.
Some words are meant to induce
pain, spoken harshly, sharply. Some words
just carry pain with them wherever they go, an intrinsic property of the
meaning attached to them. These words
were of the latter, I imagine.
"Yes…yes it was some
journey."
She spoke but five words. The endless character of what she wished to
convey choked her of breath, and the moment of opportunity passed as she
drowned in the things we leave unsaid.
Some journey to him was an unknown endeavor, a question; some journey to
her was one that a life is built about, an identity.
He slipped out his lucid state,
moments which continued to become less and less frequent occurrences as time
progressed. She stayed a little longer,
an action of self-vindication, a method to ease the guilt and pain. She left the note on the nightstand, its
edges worn with age. He sat on the
corner of the bed, deep in thought. Dante
always looked like he was deep in thought, and maybe he was.
He didn’t notice her leave; he
didn’t remember she was there. For him,
there was no before and after, there was only now; now was bitter, and it
burned like whiskey. His world wrenched
dry, wrought by the hammers of some wretched smith.
Seeing him was like tearing open
a wound. His eyes were no longer soft,
they were intense and piercing. His
smile was no longer genuine but a tool used for distraction, a feigning reflex
to buy more time. He was constantly
calculating, trying to put the pieces together.
She forced a smile to the
nurse. “He was all I ever wanted…I just
never knew it…”
Her words were turbid, hurt
bursting through every syllable, and they were all that was left of her. She was hollow, as empty as the universe; the
nearest piece of light too far for the mind to conceive.
“He lives in some other place
now, beyond the reach of such things, sweetheart,” she replied.
The irony was thick enough to
smell, to taste, to touch.
As she walked to her car she knew
that tomorrow would never be the same; its luster gone, its brilliance
swallowed in loss.
He noticed a letter on his
nightstand. The words, beautifully
written, looked familiar. The
handwriting had distinction that he couldn’t quite place.
Dearest
Friend,
It seems like such long and
tiresome periods exist to define the space between our hearts. You don't really know who I am, and it stings
like a dullness too deep to discriminate; you've never really known who I am.
But I've known you. With a smile on my
face and with joy in my heart I have paid you attention, never losing a moment
on you. Like the child is fascinated by
the penny, like the innocent soul plays in the imagination, I too have believed
such things about you. There are no
words for that which you've inspired in me, just know that it's lovely. You've been lovely. You've been my muse. When I think of you I fill with the
bittersweet, and struggle to fight the wonderful tears that encompass a nature
unrelenting; waves on the shores of my mind.
It knocks at my door; I stare out from behind the windowpane that
becomes my allegory. I suppose some
would call me mad, but I've read stories about beautiful places, and those who
inhabit these worlds are often mad as well, and I enjoy them so. Maybe it's not such a bad thing, to be
mad. I thought I read about you in a
Dickens novel, and then I thought I heard you in a song…I thought I touched you
in a dream. My waking hours are long;
they reach into the smaller moments, where I spend my mind poor. The bits and moments in between have been
filled with you. My dearest Friend, you
haven't aged a day. I've seen the Mona
Lisa, but it was your smile that brought mystery to my life. I've heard the Fur Elise, but it was your
laugh that opened the windows of my soul.
The breeze flowed in, and it stole my heart away. You were there, when I first saw Rome, and
you were there, when I first felt love.
I'll never grow old, dearest Friend.
You taught me not to grow old.
The
audience goes quiet now, the passers-by in the street. No one needs to say it; no one needs to break
the silence that comes for peace of mind.
It's been quiet for so long, and I miss you so very much. I'm just a picture in your world, but this
picture is mine and not yours. Drawn on
a simple piece of paper, you may not remember me at all. That was long ago,
when you created, when you were small.
You were my artist; you splattered color on all of the white. Like rain it all poured down, and like rain
it helped life along. I sense you
everywhere I go. Sunshine beams through
the green of the trees, washing golden over the earth, sparkling on the
riverbed; it’s your eyes. Nature speaks
with the flutter of wings and the buzz of the bees, the hummingbird drinks and
the wooly bear crawls; it’s you breathing.
Shackled to this cold, bus stop bench, it’s bleak and gloomy, as the
paper wrappers and wispy snow whisper down this road of concrete. Seems I’ve come a long way from the place where
I first knew you. The road doesn’t end,
and I see you less often now. You’ve
become less than real, and more than any dream.
It seems that such long and tiresome periods exist to define the space
between our hearts. You don't know me,
but I’d like to believe I've known you.
I suppose I’ll never be sure, after all it’s been so long. I’ll write it in a letter, one I’ve never
meant to send. The boy puts the firefly
in a jar, with all the wonder in the world he watches until its light goes
away. If you knew what you were, you
would no longer be what you are. If only
the boy knew that the price of his wonder would be the cost of a life. No, you must never know, my dearest
Friend. I know who you are, and what
you’ve been to me. In relativity I find
you, magnificent as the stones on Easter Island. There has been no sadness like
this sadness you have touched me with.
The most vast and immeasurable feeling that I’ve ever had. It spills when I move. I love you, dearest Friend. With all that I am, I love you.
If there was any peace left in Dante,
maybe hidden beyond the surface, the last of it melted away. He could feel his chest getting tight, his
stomach sour. He remembered this
feeling, it was loss. It was dying. He walked slowly to the window; the letter
slipped from his fingertips and hit the floor.
The industrial carpet absorbed the sound it should have made; the sound
of a world collapsing, the sound of something infinite falling to its end. No one came rushing to aid. No one heard this cataclysmic event. The god damned carpet covered it up. Dante simply gazed out the window. The skies were threaded a peaceful grey. He loved the sound that the rain made on the
leaves, on the rooftop, on the pavement.
She took her life just a few months
ago. I like to think she no longer
suffers, sometimes I think that he suffers instead. He came to her funeral with the aid of the
hospital staff, handed me a note. He
didn’t speak a word, just nodded his head, turned, and walked away. I’ve not seen him since then. I suppose I just don’t want to remind him of
the world he’s left behind. I don’t want
to remind him of her.
The End
