|
it had been the most magical night of my life - still
and I will not deny I might have been mad as a hatter.
I had had so much free time. My husband was gone to LA to ride the connections he'd made on a prestigious ILM flick. I had finagled to not have a job. It was March. I didn't have a lot of daily friends, and I chose to delve deep into my writing and the
meaning of life.
yup.
and I had had the most perfect marriage. it had been decorated lovely. the music was good. the lighting was excellent. the sound system rocked. we were fine on bills. we owned homes. we laughed. we were social. we were safe. it was easy.
I had tried loads and loads o'times to find some purpose.
I had gone to school to be a teacher. I met someone I thought was tall and cute. it was very lady chatterly lover lust except I didn't really realize it until the dream I had of making love to him, and we didn't talk in lab class. it was a quartet.
then cuculorus happened.
and I went to the soapbox and he was talking to Zach, and I just went,
"Hey!"
and it was like meeting an old lover
we sat on a couch, didn't move from each other, and I swear to you
children
we fell in love
or a fantasy. but I cry when I type it. it seems real. it's so hard to tell now that I'm crusty.
and the adoration and the sparks and the walk home and the talking.
we didn't kiss until the night was almost over, and I kissed him because I didn't want him responsible, but I knew we'd kiss.
I've told this story before, but that's what I do.
I had said at the bar that I had wanted him to see my home, and that I was happily married, and my husband was secure.
but I had fallen.
I wanted him.
he was right beside me in all of it.
god I miss him sometimes.
but I'd put him in the box the best I could.
and he left my house after that one kiss. It was pre-dawn - dazed. it was obvious. I did the ole Richard Linklater thing and we didn't give our phone numbers, and I said we'd see each other if we'd see each other, and I knew he'd show up at my door.
and the next day, I woke up in my beautiful curated home that I had decorated to my aesthetic desire, and I was in love. Everything had shifted hard. Birds were singing. I walked outside, and the day before I had needed a coat. this day was the real first day of spring and it was like pollen had burst in a shower onto the outside - my car was covered - the world was flowered.
and the frogs sang that night. I thought he would come. He didn't come.
I saw him in a bar a few immeasurably long days where I just walked seeing beauty everywhere in a dream and hoped for him. I had no idea where he lived except for downtown, but I knew he'd been at the soapbox.
Finally, we saw each other. there.
we went to my home immediately. it began.
"why didn't you come?"
"I looked everywhere trying to find your house. I walked the streets over and over and couldn't find it. I was so stupid."
"we were so stupid not to get phone numbers."
and we talked for as long as god would let us - we made love all the time. we shared music. we dreamed of going to savannah when he got his marine biology degree and making glass jellyfish for art to sell. We smoked on back porches listening and didn't talk. we talked all the time. we were together, and then it all came crashing down, and the people with the stick and strait jackets came.
as was correct.
and after I got out, I looked for him again after mark had left, but of course it was broken. I mean. shit.
and I went to LA to join my husband, packed all my stuff, walked inside dead, my marriage was over, but I had nothing else and why not try.
it was over.
we divorced in LA.
I came back to wilmington on the luckiest of daze 7/7/07 and stayed with a cocaine loving comedienne who was the coolest. I was shattered. numb.
Before this, I had come back one time when I was in LA after the divorce - flown back - stayed at the front street inn. The Lover and I had picked right back up melting, and fucked like sparking. The room was elegant and cool and historic. The next morning when I said goodbye, I said "keep it light. keep it light." He looked at me with his soulful brown eyes, "Keep it light" and smiled and left.
Before I had left Wilmington, I had given him a suitcase with all my writing - the record case actually.
and when I came back ion that year of 2007 on July 7th - I eventually ran into him. The gal I was staying with reconnected us when I told her over porch drinks that of course it was my secret dream that it had all been worth it, and I hadn't ruined my life and my marriage for nothing. so she found him.
he was presented to me, but it was broken. different.
we tried. we went to his place.
we snorted.
we rolled.
we were done.
"you don't want me anymore."
I was dry.
I remember being in his tawdry room and going, "god in heaven, this is how you live. who did I think you were." There was no sheet on the bed. It was cluttered with junk and rollerblades and smelled a bit rotten. He seemed shiny. I asked him, "are you depressed?" He answered, "of course, but now that you're here."
and he was tall and dark and haunted and told me as I was getting dressed, "by the way, I read all your writing." he looked me in the eye and touched my face. "Don't leave. I love you kristen."
and I would have killed a --
but it was finished.
|
