DARLING, we’re standing at the edge of the precipice. I can see it now. I understand. We step back and we succumb; if we step forward together maybe we’ll survive.
What we were back then doesn’t have to be what we are now. We had our battles, but our past doesn’t have to define our future.
In your hospital room, sitting at your bedside staring into your ocean blue eyes, I remember it all…
FOUR years ago you made my twenty-nine-year-old mind toss and turn. The moment I first laid eyes on you in Granville Park I felt myself change, the very sight of you made me feel alive.
At a park bench you sat alone with a book in your hand. I remember the sunlight washing over your red hair bringing you to life. People passed by you, but you didn’t even notice, the words on the page holding you captive.
In school I was the kid sitting at the back of the classroom never making a sound, easily forgotten by so many. I had never gone after anything worthwhile in my life, especially not someone like you.
I remember being nervous as hell walking over to you. Twice I nearly turned around and walked the other way. I had to dig deep mustering every ounce of courage to keep coming your way.
When I landed beside the bench, I remember looking down at you, but that book hadn’t let you go.
I remember simply saying, “Hi.”
You finally became aware of the world around you and finally looked up. Those eyes of yours made it impossible for me to look away. Your face brightened with a gentle smile. And I was hooked, like I had taken the ultimate drug, feeling the ultimate high.
I motioned to the open space beside you. When you nodded “yes” I didn’t hesitate. I remember trying not to sit down too fast, not wanting to seem too eager, but damn it was hard to stay calm.
You put your book aside and we talked about whatever. Anyone watching us would’ve thought we were friends who’d known each other for years—it was that effortless. We clicked so easily. The world around me evaporated with everyone in it. All that mattered was you and me.
Eventually you stood up saying you had to go to work, but I could tell you didn’t want to leave. Exchanging numbers was inevitable.
Watching you go I remember thinking you were someone I’d fight a hundred wars for, I’d face death to feel your embrace.
It was no surprise a day later I was hearing your voice over the phone. I would’ve been an absolute fool not to call you.
And then it all began.
I remember our age difference not coming to light until a month later.
We were sitting at the kitchen table in my one-bedroom apartment. When I dropped the number twenty-nine, you clammed up. For a brief moment the silence between us felt so heavy. I didn’t even know what I had said to make it so.
Thirty-eight.
That was the number you told me.
Thirty-eight-years-old.
I think you were waiting for me to split and run, tell you to get out of my apartment, that wasn’t going to work. That wasn’t to be.
Nine years older.
It wasn’t a big deal. Not for this young man.
Those ocean blue eyes of yours still held me prisoner.
We reached our arms across the table, entwined our fingers. The touch of your delicate skin was more than I could ever hope for. It made me feel that together we were immortal; that no one, not a single thing, could rip us apart.
I remember a few people telling me that you and I would never make it and that what we had was just some stupid fling.
I wanted them to burn, their skin to melt away. I believed in us. I didn’t see it any other way.
We pushed aside the age difference. Forgot about it completely.
We had something that was real and true, something that was worth fighting for. You and me. We’d face the world together, hand-in-hand.
Or, so we thought.
THE days going by, so many times I was an emotionless wall.You said I was hard to read, that I had trouble fully letting you in.
I didn’t believe it at the time. I thought you were being foolish. I couldn’t see what you saw, couldn’t feel what you felt.
I blame the life I had always known, the one I was born into. A life where the men in my family never taught me how to show anything beyond the surface, that real men keep it all tucked away and hidden inside. And so that’s who I became—a man who many times could seem cold and hard as stone, uncomfortable emotion my enemy.
When you’d cry I’d hold you, but I wasn’t truly there. In body but not in mind and soul. I wasn’t what you needed.
I can’t count the number of times you just wanted me to open up more. Every time you started to get close to breaking me free, my family past would come screaming into my head and shutting me down.
Our conversations would die. You’d drift back to the bedroom and close the door behind you. It was how you escaped from our reality.
I remember at my dad’s funeral I sat on the church’s front steps with a blank look on my face, and you told me it was okay to cry. Even then I couldn’t. I just sat there like a zombie holding it all in, pretending I was so tough.
How many times did I pull that kind of stunt with you? I don’t know. Too many.
It was no surprise we came crashing down.
THREE years into what was us, I’ll never forget coming home from work that day.
When I pulled into the driveway seeing my buddy’s car out front, I should’ve known right away something was off.
It was a Friday afternoon. You thought I was working until 5:00 p.m. that day, but I’d decided to call it an early afternoon.
The moment I walked through the back door I heard you two: the sounds of two people in the throes of pleasure.
Walking towards the bedroom I didn’t want it to be true. I prayed it wasn’t. But deep down I knew. You can only run from the truth for so long.
Standing at the bedroom door I saw you two as naked as the day you were born. He was on top, his body pressing down on yours, skin against skin. You weren’t even under the covers.
You were enjoying it. It was written all over your face.
When you saw me your eyes went wide. I thought they were going to fall right out of your skull.
And then my buddy turned to face me. His eyes met mine.
He jumped right off you, grabbed his clothes from the floor and ran. Didn’t even bother to try and slide on his boxer shorts. He moved so fast it was as if he thought I was going to literally light him on fire.
Believe me, at that very moment I wanted to.
I could have run after him. I could have chased him down and beat the piss out of him. But I didn’t have it in me. Not right then. My brain was spinning too fast.
You threw the covers over your body, your naked skin slipping out of view.
I stepped into the room and the shouting began. We were two fighters going at each other as hard as we could, our words becoming our fists, punching each other over and over again.
You tried to explain. You tried to defend yourself. You tried to make me understand.
But I didn’t want to hear it. In my mind, at that very moment, you were just a cheater, and nothing more. I fucking hated you.
I wanted to spit a thousand vulgar words in your face. I wanted to make you feel rotten from the inside all the way out. I wanted my words to slice you up, scarring you with emotional wounds.
At that moment we weren’t having an honest conversation, we were just trying to knock each other out.
And so you left. You got dressed, pushed me out of the way and ran out.
I watched you jump in your car and speed out of the driveway.
All I could think was that you were running back to him.
I told myself I didn’t care. Go to him. Go and screw his brains out again. But I’d be lying to you if I said I didn’t truly care. I cared more than you could ever know.
And then less than three hours later you turned my world upside down for the second time.
I’ll never forget that phone call, not until the day I die.
The hospital told me you had the right of way at the intersection and that you were following the rules. But someone texting while he’s driving isn’t following the rules. That guy goes through the red light and into your driver’s side door.
I remember rushing to the hospital, not really sure what to think or how to feel. I remember your parents standing at your bedside. I remember not telling them why you’d raced out of the house an emotional wreck. Instead, I told them you were going out to buy milk. They didn’t ask anything else. There was nothing else for them to ask.
The three of us watched over your battered body under the covers.
A week later you were still the same. Your eyes shut. Your body still held prisoner by a coma.
THREE weeks after your accident I had dinner with my mom.
I told her about what had happened between us. Told her everything. I had to. I had to get it off my chest.
She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t even completely surprised.
She told me there’s a part of me that’s my father. I knew what she was talking about. It was the part that shuts down. The part that just stares at you when you tell me it’s all right to cry at my dad’s funeral. It was the large piece of me that wasn’t there for you when you needed me to be. And for that I hated myself.
On my way home the hospital called my cell saying you’d woken up. I didn’t waste any time rushing to get back to your side.
And so…
HERE we are, just you and me in this hospital room.
That’s good. We need it.
I grab a chair from the corner of the room and pull it over to your bed.
I take your hand in mine.
We don’t talk.
Instead, I press your fingers against my lips and keep them there. You’re not even trying to pull away.
Darling, we’ve been through our personal hell. We’ve been to war and back.
But we have the here and the now.
We don’t have to be what we once were.
Can we be a broken past, but with a brighter future?
