Inaudible
I didn’t know how to feel or even if I wanted to. Anger would have just made things worse, but to accept surrendered any feeling of self worth. I was bothered, there is no denying that, but then why had I not said anything? Maybe I was afraid of her leaving. Maybe that was it. This one time, she had offended someone very dear to her life; so much that there was a chance that person would be gone forever. I was sincere to her fault while she confessed to me what happened. “I knew it was wrong, but I did it without thinking.” We all sin. She continued,” But it happens. It’s whatever.”
It’s whatever. Such a callous stone as her words knew no mercy for the condemned. How careless that two simple words put together can deprive someone of value, of meaning, of purpose. I couldn’t help but wonder, hesitantly, if I would ever become something so worthless as “whatever” (I thought of someone asking her in a future that didn’t have us together how many serious relationships she had been in. She would reply,” Just one, but it’s whatever.”) Maybe it was an accident, or maybe it was alluding to us, or maybe she was overwhelmed, or maybe I was selfish.
Everything’s fine, I tried to convince myself, you’re just over exaggerating the situation. Maybe I was, or maybe I wasn’t. The truth yelled of love for that which is she from the top of its exhausted lungs, but why? Conscientiously, it knew what was rational and what was consequential. Why then, I asked, do you deliberately drown yourself in a sea of passion when you cannot swim? Passion. It was not something familiar, but maybe over welcomed. Love. We all know what becomes of such temptations (oh, but the language so lovely!). And of the flower? Is it blossomed and cared for only to be plucked, or is it kept alive for the sake of its keeper? The flower held truth and quintessential beauty, or maybe it was all just pompous bullshit.
This train of thought made things messy. Now time was all but comprehensible.
I was reminded of my ex. We dated for three years, we were our first everything, we were immature and all those sort of things. I remember telling each other the L word, throwing it around like an elementary crush, before realizing what and who those words were truly for. I saw that our relationship was only lust as I grew disgusted with my own reflection. I knew the type of person I didn’t want to be. So I stopped. Without that, there was no relationship, no true feelings; only time. The last time I talked to her, I wished her life to be filled with bliss and she hung up on me. She hates me now. I’m sure her friends can tell you all about that.
This was not the case though. With Her, saying that I was happy was a sick understatement. Memory threw me back to our first month of dating, after the awkwardness of first impressions. We were supposed to be watching Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but we instead laid entwined with each other and the volume turned down.
“I had a dream last night,” she sang to me. I asked her to tell me all about it. “Nope,” she smiled and continued anyway. She spoke of a dream with us buying a house together and went into great detail describing it. I remember only the bedroom; a giant bed, dark, scarlet walls, a mirror on the ceiling, and pieces of artwork distributed amongst the other décor. Above all, just atop our bed, gazing over the room was a painting of Van Gogh’s Starry Night. The movie shut off, leaving the room pitch black while I held her silhouette for hours.
She was upset. Regardless of whose to blame, nothing would change that fact. I debated calling her, waiting for her call, being angry when we spoke, or confessing my soul. I didn’t know. Then, like watching the sunrise after a night of revelry, my eyes saw something. Sometimes we don’t understand things, and other times we just don’t want to.
I called once, but there was no answer. Her voicemail made her sound happier than she really was, which was irritating. I knew everything would get better just as the earth promised. So I waited. There was really nothing else I could have done. A thought arose: our relationship was that flower. Our flower was that dream. And our dream was nothing more than hope. This was my reality, or at least to some extent.
