Though it seemed awkward to sit in the
car outside of the hotel listening to music, neither one of us left. He put on
one of his favorite Zeppelin songs, trying to prove to me the greatest drum
solo of all time. "If you want to go inside you can," he said, "you don’t have to
sit here and listen to this. You’re looking at me weird.” I argued, “I am not!
I want to listen, I really do.” We stayed in the car for almost an hour
listening to song after song. Finally we got out, and started playing with a
slingshot he bought at a gas station that day. We shot rocks into the street
for a while, he looked over at me and smiled, I felt nervous. Finally we walked
to the hotel. His shoe had come untied so he lifted his foot and looked at me
and without saying anything I bent down and tied it for him. We walked into the
elevator, didn’t say anything as the doors closed and elevator went up. The
doors opened, and I walked out to go to my room. As the elevator doors closed
he said goodnight, then went up to his room.
We were planning on hiking that Friday before we had to head back, but instead we ended up leaving early because of a snowstorm that hit up north. It took us eight hours to get home. On the road I played Mississippi John Hurt, and he remarked how he had never met anyone else who had heard of him. We stopped and had dinner at an Indian restaurant in the town I used to live in. He kicked me from across the table. I started texting someone and he told me it was rude to text at the dinner table. On the way back to the car, I showed him where my business had been, he smiled.
The next Monday we went to lunch
together. It snowed all weekend, and there were plies of snow on all the bushes
outside the building so when we got back he told me to build a miniature snowman
with him on top of the hedge. We made snowballs, stacked them on top of each
other, stuck sticks in for arms and a nose.
Everyday there were moments when he’d
smile at me, push me, when we would tease each other and stare. We sat next to
each other at lunch and at meetings, went to each other’s desks to talk, stuck
together at company events. I asked him stupid questions just so I could talk
to him, he called me for no reason. People started teasing me about him,
assuming there was something going on between us, saying he had a crush on me.
And though technically there was nothing going on between us, it felt like
there was.
I read Asimov; he read Vonnegut. I
listened to Neil Young; he listened to The Talking Heads. I talked about
Mormonism; he talked about Catholicism. I gushed over Whitman; he gushed over
Blake. We talked about the meaning of truth, talked about our families, met
each other’s friends, discussed the news, shared a desire to make a difference
in the world, went to concerts together. At the last one he found an empty
space, took my hand and made me swing dance with him. "This is what
friends do?” I kept asking.
I told
him about the rumors. I told him because I wanted to see what he would do, how
he would react. I had no expectations. I thought it was funny. But he got
upset, talked about how this could ruin his reputation, how he could get fired
for these kinds of rumors. I had to calm him down, assure him that he would not
get fired; all would be well because nothing had happened. But he was still
upset. The next day we had a company meeting. There was an empty seat next to
me. Normally he would have sat down next to me, but this time he didn’t. He
went to the other side of the room and didn’t even acknowledge me. We ignored
each other.
It’s been two months since he’s been gone, and
despite my attempts at keeping in contact with him, I have no idea what he is
doing or how things are going in his life. He doesn’t share with me. He keeps
his distance. He has his own friends in his new city in his new life and he
doesn’t give me a second thought. He doesn’t need to anymore. I’m not around,
no longer an obligation. I regularly hear about him from other people who he
actually keeps in contact with. “You haven’t heard from him?” they ask, rubbing
salt in my wound. When they talk about him, he sounds like a different person
to me, or maybe my perception of him has changed, or maybe I never really knew
him to begin with. Sometimes I wonder if he even existed; it feels as though I
made everything up and our relationship meant nothing. I was
just convenient. I was just fun in the moment.
And so I’m left behind feeling sad, empty, and
delusional, trying to figure out how to let go.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I listened to Remain in Light for the first
time, at the perfect time. So many questions I’m afraid to answer of the time,
late at night, a couple beers deep, synchronously during a text conversation
with a friend on a similar subject. The music moves in and out; layers of
melody and harmony interlaced with layers of rhythm that fit the conflict.
Dissonance and chaos, coherence and simplicity.
I watch her. She is simple and complicated,
frustrating and easy, carefree and moody, patient and short-tempered, clueless
and intelligent. I want to be near her, I want to touch her, to talk to her, to
look at her. I notice the curve of her body, the color in her eyes, her face in
mischief, and in happiness, and in thought. She watches, brushes against me,
smiles, shares, discusses, argues. We are electric, but we are silent. The
timing is off, and we both know it, though neither one of us will say it. There
is a dichotomy between what is palpable and what is desired, which leaves a gap
that is evident but not acknowledged.
There is something beautiful about the
silence, something beautiful about leaving the gap unacknowledged. We keep
living, interacting, and watching without the complication of making our
feelings known by saying. We understand each other by how we act towards one
another, how we look at each other. The mystery remains, the excitement intact.
Words are futile. Expression through speech often leads to ruin, and we both
understand.
And yet satisfaction comes from
expression. At times I wish I could tell her how I think she is
beautiful, but I don’t. I am afraid if we acknowledge the gap, the thrill will
leave. Maybe we will find out there was nothing there at all, it was the
secrecy holding it all together. The dichotomy works, it is what keeps the
desire strong. I can feel her growing restless, attempting to vocalize what we
have kept silent. I ignore her restlessness and keep my distance, hoping that
will satiate her desire to talk. I don't think she understands what I could lose.
When I go, I will say nothing. I will leave, she will stay, our lives will naturally separate, we will both go on to find others to love, others willing to acknowledge the void that we won’t, and it will work, and we will forget about each other.
