Dear Maria
I want to start off by saying I love you.; I know it’s trite and has been done before but I had to get that fact out of the way. Secondly, I want to say I’m sorry. For everything. What a surprise, right! An apology from me. Cherish it. This entire letter is an apology of sorts. I never like the idea of an apology letter. They seem to dehumanize the most human of emotions, the wish to repent. Also I never like to apologize. It’s not because I believed myself to be infallible, I’ll leave those illusions of grandeur for Popes and politicians. I know I fuck up, a lot. Mostly, as you might guess, I did not like the idea of being culpable. It was just another commitment which I wanted to avoid. As long as I tried to deny my part in anything in every way, I could feel disconnected from everything, even guilt. Plus, apologizes to me always seemed more of a way to explain why you acted in the way that you did rather than to truly just own your own fuck up. Mine is a more ‘preemptive’ apology of these sorts. It’s an explanation of how I became capable of taking a life, all of which stems from my love for you.
Once again, I know this seems contrived and straight out of a horribly estrogen-infused, pity-fest of a Lifetime movie but I was lost before I met you. Well not lost because that implies that I had a vague idea of where I was supposed to be destined, yet this was the farthest thing away from the truth. In reality, I was just wandering. Wandering like an adolescent boy, but at the age of 27. I had no real job, even though I had a good education from a prestigious university on the East Coast. I was a failure in my parent’s eyes who saw me as the broken dreams of a lost generation. All I really had was a car that they had bought me years before and an apartment whose rent was so low that I could often scrap together the meager sum by the end of the month by doing some odd-jobs. I just vaguely recall those days. I would drive and smoke cigarette after cigarette, drinking diet coke after diet coke. I was a sad soul. Sometimes, I would just listen to traffic reports to hear how some horrible accident became a nuisance for people who had somewhere to actually be. It was an awkward time. Filled with momentary ambitions and half-promises.
Somehow though, I found a semblance of joy in the smallest of things. Like driving alone at nights. It was something about those lights, blurry, being left behind in the rear view mirror. It felt like movement was actually taking place, even though I was passing the same street signs time after time. At the same time, however, I was lost in the middle of an expansive desert of apathy with a mid-day sun bearing down on me with the intensity of lack of fellowship. The only thing that guided me were temptations and fleeting fancies. But these feelings were erased when I drove at night. Red light, yellow light, green light, the colors of my ineptitude. Red light, yellow light, green light, the pastel of my disgrace of the world. Red light, yellow light, green light blurring throughout the night, responding to too much dopamine and tired eyes. Red light, yellow light, green light the tip of my cigarette was like a red beacon hanging out the window waiting for whatever purpose I was supposed to find to come to me. Red light, yellow light, green light, my only friends in a world without meaning and me not searching for one.
Often after my choir with the lights, I would enter a bar, any bar, and sit in a dark corner with a half glass of heavy alcohol. No one cars about alcoholism when it has no impact on the world. I would sit in that corner and passively observe the college kids trying too hard to have fun with their cameras and their alpha-male displays of drinking as if liver disease was a trophy that they would claim in thirty years. I would watch their female counter-parts, all incredibly insecure, make up for their self-inhibitions by drowning themselves in liters of neon drinks. Red light, yellow light, green light, all I wanted to return to that existence where I knew that only three outcome could arise, but I stayed. I stayed to feign some interest in social interactions. Not so far from these boastful college kids, could I see my young professional counterparts, ties loosened, hair tossed, eyes bloodshot, backs slightly slumped as if they had finally began to realize that they had to carry an Atlas-like load to live. I could see their envious eyes glancing at those college fools, desiring what they had to surrender and pitying how those young men would just follow their tracks. Soon after two or three whiskeys, those glances would turn into lustful stares as the professionals tried to regain some of that lost impunity back by attempting to hit on the girls that the college kids brought. I closely followed this comedic-tragedy, but felt so removed from it. Lastly, usually as far away as possible from the more vocal patrons of the bar sat the last group of drinkers in a tight circle. They were oldern than the rest, much older, and showed actual feeling behing their falling faces. They had been through all those phases, all those half-truths and deception, and they had come to the conclusion that the only thing of actual permanence was the bottom of half-glasses. They were my comrades, seeing as I had skipped the whole middle part of life and found myself at the bottom of humanity. I saw these cycles nightly, and the story always ended the same, an empty bars filled with wasted emotions.
On a few nights, however, I found a fourth caste of person in that bar. People, who in an odd way, were like me. They were usually woman, drinking ‘men‘ drinks by themselves. Their fingers would coarse through their hair, gripping their head in despair. I felt a kin to them. They wore their temporary state of lostness on their face. Whenever I saw these woman, I would emerge from my dark corner and sit next to them completely silently. They would look at me first, with a glance that said “Fuck Off” but I would just sit. Eventually, they would stare with more of a curiosity than an aggressive attack. To this I would respond with a nod, not exactly an opening for a conversation. These girls were broken down, at the bottom of their existence. I was a kind spirit from the stagnant pool of human depravity, offering them comfort through temptations. I would usually take these girls back to my disgusting apartment, they did not care about the littered floors, the dirty sheets, or the lack of any hygiene whatsoever. After we were done, they would get a cab knowing that they hit bottom, comforted in the fact that now the only direction was possible was up. And I would be left alone, still looking for bottom amongst the cigarette butts and crushed diet coke cans that permenatly covered the floors of my apartment, and the floormats of my car. I often cried, for no reason really, except for the endorphins the rush of life. But this is what I lived for, I was a scoundrel to my core, a scoundrel not needing to seek any deeper meaning to support my actions or my thoughts. Retrospection, however, lends me to perceive how fucked up I really was. Recalling my life, it shocks me how far I rose when I was with you. But that’s all over now and I have fallen deeper into the dark bestial crevices of my vices, with no foreseeable climb in my future. And it was all for that fucking asshole, the one who drove you away. That damned me like a Titan, into the depths of the earth.
But let me refocus to the apology at hand. It was the night that instead of a broken insecure girl who was lost in the first feelings of tragedy, I meet you. It was like any other time at one of the bars that I frequented. I was in my corner watching the comedic tragedy of all three stages of life playing before in my life. This night seemed like an regular night of depression and sleeplessness, that would end in depression and sleeplessness. However, then I saw a young women at the bar, alone, with hunched shoulders and teased hair. You were shying from any type of interaction. On closer examination, I could tell that you make-up was smeared, lips pursed in a sliver of whiteness, your cheeks were puffy and red as if you just finished crying. This is the condition you were in when you found me. But at the time you looked like the perfect victim to my services. I approached as if it was my duty, just fulfilling my sad routine. I sat quielty next to you, ordered a cheap scotch, and I stared. I stared not at you, but the reflection from the mirror at the back of the bar. I could see everything I needed. By the reflection I saw your angelic face, bastardized and raped by your hurt and depression. Thus I was used to. I also saw you brown teased hair, off in all directions. But what struck me were your eyes. Those piercing bright eyes. A declaration of confidence, a mandate for respect. There were so strong, so powerful, so you...I was taken aback. Those eyes were staring right at me through the mirror, without the usual defiance of previous victims. It was more of a stare of tough compassion. I think you realized at that moment how fucking broken I was. You understood me in a way. My eyes escaped your 2nd hand gaze and for a moment rested back upon me. For the first time in awhile, I actually stared at myself with a critical eye. I saw my yellow skin, not fully yellow, but the nicotined alcohol abusing yellow. My dark and slightly too long finger nails were defiantly reflecting the light. My hair was tossed and matted in places. The beard on my face was patchy, unkempt and dirty. My eyes, greenish-hazel, were glassy and hopless. I was disappointed with myself. Or filled with something like disappointement. Maybe self-conciousness. I wasnt sure anyway. I felt betrayed by my own sentiments. As oon as I finished my drink, I remeber trying to retreat back into my dark corner and the detached certainty of my apathy. As I turned, you snatched my forearm firmly, you nails slightly digging into my dry skin. It was a motherly gesture, a grab of frustrated nurturing. I turned. Those eyes greeted me, cutting through all my self-hate, all my depression, all my bullshit. They were so clear, so pure, the beacons of your true worth while the rest of your body tried to convince everyone otherwise. I was naked. You just examined me. I felt like a five year old awaiting his punishment. You said nothing. I was nervous, scared, confused, and slightly angry. But I didn’t pull away. I just stood there, feeling. It was invigorating.
After a few minutes of eternity, you told me to sit down. I could recount the entire conversation for you, word for word, gesture for gesture, thought for thought, but I knew taht could quickly get tedious so I will spare you them. But I want you to see how clearly I remember that night. I remember because I was Saul in that barren bar, and you were the voice that changed me into a new man. I did not imagine at that point the manitude of the imapct that you would have on my life. I became an apostotle to life at that point. I became a man, a member of the human race. And it eventually rose out of my faith for you. But now imagine if Peter, after his rebirth, his baptism, after his experience with the his entity of permanence, was to find that he was back in that desert. Imagine that! Imagine how he would lose all his hope, all his beliefs. everything that defined him. Imagine his anger, his rage, his fucking hopelessness. Imagine that deadly combination. Imagine if Peter could pinpoint the one man that caused his death in life, imagine what he would do. You do not deserve the pain that I am going to put you through, you deserve so much more than this letter, you deserve happiness but I have to take my revenge on who I see responsible for my dejection.
Again, I apologize for that tangent. I am writing this all at once, I need to. If I tried to break it up, if I tried to think this through my resolution might change, and I cannot let fear stop me from my just retribution. Also the bottle of Jack is helping a little. I was never the most eloquent writer, but this will be my masterpiece I think.You can tell when someone is faking it, you know. When they attempt to write about tragedies they have never experienced, you can feel their imagination running in circles trying to grasp the complexity of those emotions, but you can tell. It doesnt mean that their writing is bad, they could have the greatest prose of all time but I can almost smell the insecurity that every word was chosen with. The careful craft, but its all built on sand. On a false base. That is this is going to be my masterpiece, because it deals directly with the only thing I knew about for certain. My love for you, and the pain that you leaving caused.
You gave me your number at the end of the night and went your way. I sat in the bar, alone except for some of the more dedicated drinkers, and did nothing. Not a single thought ran through my head. My whole body felt numb (I was pretty drunk at this point) but there were two places that internally burned with great intensity. It was the forearm that you had clutched, and the my chest right under the breastpocket in which your number resided. I sat with my eyes set at a thousand yards. I was tired, really tired from what I remembered. The emotions that I had felt that night were so numerous and so intense that my body was shell. I went back to my room, shuffling my feet. The coke cans clanged and clinked and was like a procession of my exhaustion. I laid down, and slept. The deepest sleep.
The next day I awoke to the deepest exhaustion. Deeper than anything I had ever know. I had no idea why. Most nights I would only sleep for a few hours and feel awake. Well not awake, but conscious. Conscious may be overstating it also, but anyway the point is that when I woke up from that sleep, I felt near dead. Every single action that used to define my days, my weeks, my years, now seemed insurmountable. All I wanted to do was call you, but at the same time I was petrified. It was odd. Without apathy or alcohol to lubricate the process, I was just as awkward as I was when I was the 17 year old virgin. But I had a goal now. Something to strive for. I had a picture of the world, bright, colorful, purposeful, and beautiful painted on the front of my mind. It was a picture in which I was with you. I laid in bed the entire day, and stared at the phone. I examined every inch of it. It was slightly off-white, not by design but because of filth. I could slightly make out my finger prints up and down the receiver. It was an older phone, the one connected by those cords to the base. The cord always was my favorite thing about that phone. The way it curled, the way it always fell back into the same position, the way you would curl it around your finger (of course I didnt know about that then). Then their were the numbers. The rubber buttons were opaque, with a dirty amherst color. The black numbers were worn down, only tiny bits of black residue denoted the numbers. The phone was pretty pathetic. Finally I decided to make that call. The call of a lifetime. I slowly dialed your numbers, my fingers becoming heavier with each digit, my will disentragting with every tone that followed my fingers. I felt like a teenage boy asking a girl to prom, or a policeman dialing the number of his partner’s wife to inform him of his death. Yes, I know these are radically different feelings. I don’t care though because that is how I felt. Then the ringing began. With every unanswered ring my heart sank, my hope began to vanish. I felt so helpless. I never had much to control in my life, but I was it’s master. I was king of the unimportant, the monarch of all that is worthless, I was the dictator of all which is disgusting and momentary. But I knew how to handle it. Suddenly though, I was deposed. I was taken from my position of prominence and thrown into the life of a pauper. And that phone just kept ringing. I hate this-I thought. Why am I doing this to myself-I exclaimed. What is wrong with me-I exalted. I was perfect were I was-I said. But the phone just kept ringing. I didn’t want to give you the satisfaction of rejecting me through negligence. I wanted to throw that phone across the room, console and all because I was at the point where none of my insecurities were visible to me, but now that slow ring was the blinding light. And it just kept ringing. As I was just about to give up, to retreat back into my bed and forget all about this forever, and continue to live my life in complete and utter squalor, you answered. The ringing continued in my mind.
When you answered, I was both surprised, in a pleasant manner, but sick to my stomach. I remember that I offered a both timid, depressing and incomprehensible hello. You asked if you knew me. I said we met the night before in the bar. You had a glimmer of recognition as you asked me what I wanted. I want to see you again I quietly said. Sure. When?. Can you get coffee in twenty minutes?. My throat seized, my mind went completely blank. I hadnt been on a date in ages. A real date, during the day, where people could actually maybe make out my untended hygiene, my worthlessness, my despair. Sure-I answered.
Holy shit was I nervous. You could probably sense it. It did not take a fucking Sherlock Holmes though. I had probably smoked 4 cigarettes in a row, my nails were bitten to their ends, and my hand was shaking like a heroin addict. I looked like a mess, I assume. I sat in the corner of the coffee shop as I awaited your arrival. The noise, the brightness, the young fucks getting their coffee in order to go to work, or for some fucking odd recreational purpose were suffocating me. I felt trapped by noise and laughter. I sound like a fucking serial killer, don’t I. I sound like some ill-adjusted nutcase who was just waiting to murder those who were not as I was. You were late, like always. Sure, I was an irresponsible man-child but at least I was punctual. I was ready for my doom to come, to come like a fucking wave and knock my dilapated boat off its fucking course and straight into the fucking oblivion of black water, to come like a poor Swedish girl I once fucked, crying in a mixture of ecstasy and bliss. A climax cryer. I was like a climax cryer. So aware of the shame and the indecency of it all while still trying to find joy in something that did not seem completely right in my own mind. Then you entered. You walked in, as if a string quartet followed your every move, your legs bouncing to every note, your hair swinging to the slow melody. It was like a old princess movie, where the birds and the animals sung at your arrival, and I was awestruck. It was the day of reckoning, the numbers on the red digital clock slowly (but all too quickly) slowly approaching zero ominously. Your eyes scanned the room and finally rested on me, with a look that resembled excitement. I could recount every detail of that date, but that would just be a waste, plus I need to finish before my willingness to follow through with my objective is waning. So I will hurry. We went on a few more dates, and I was experiencing the noon of my happiness. The solar rapture had reached its peak and I drinking all the deep rays and feeling the tingling climax of its warmth. I started to live a life that resembled something that was normal. I cut my finger nails, I washed my face and hair, I stopped smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. I felt that I had reached the end of the tunnel, the light was right upon me. We moved in together and I got a job. A job that was embarrassing, but a job nonetheless. Our relationship was a tango, or what I would imagine a tango to be (my dad always told me that dancing was for queers and insecure men who hadnt worked a day in their life). But I imagine it to be a tango in the sense that we were both moving with grace through all the small mishaps and all my man-childness. You were leading of course, but still. Suddenly, the spotlight shown on us too early and the dance was cut short.
I dont even remeber the fight that ended it. I probably did something stupid, I did a lot of idoitic shit back then. I think I quit my job and we needed the money or something. But anyway, I thought it was temporary. I was depressed of course. But I thought that sooner or later, us two soul mates, baptized in our mutual darkest moments, would come back together and we would live something akin to a happy ever after. Then, you got smart. Then you wised up and realized you were too good for me, and I was too fucked up for this world. You got a new boyfriend. I hate that motherfucker. I spent so many nights, drinking and smoking, crying and grinding my teeth, dying and trying to find my old self. I want to fall back into my old cycle, but you made that impossible. I can never be the same. So I have to do something drastic. I have to remove the thing that ruined our relationship. I need to kill.
So I sit here with a gun in my hand. Waiting for the right moment to take a life. But there is no point in being coy anymore. This is my last letter. My swan song of apologizing. My scream of repentence. I hope you will forgive me. Forgive me for putting this on your shoulder. Forgive me for putting the Altas type load on your back. I hope you loved me. I think you did because of all that shit you put up with so long. It is unfair of me to put this on you. But I was a lost ship on perputually broken water, who at first had no place to stay but was adept at traveling the open sea. Then you were my port and I could see the advantages of tranquility and safety but after I lost you the sea seemed impossible to transverse. Nautical metaphor, wow, that may have been the stupidest thing ever. But it is true.
I write this because no one else would care. My parents would care because they will lose their son, the one who was a college graduate who was lost for a bit but would have found his path eventually. They will lose the hope for another me. But you will miss me for me, the one who never found his way and was not destined to.
Perpetually a lost boy in a man’s body who found rapture with you for a fleeting hour.
Perpetually your Saul,
What used to be me.
