The sound of fist hitting
wood awakened me in the middle of the night. I sat up in my bed and stared
at the beaming red numbers on my cheap clock radio. Two-Forty seven they
screamed out. Two-Forty seven in the
morning. I wasn’t accustomed to having guests and
certainly wasn’t expecting any at this hour. I sat there in my bed pondering
if I was truly awake or merely dreaming. A second set of knocks broke the
dark silence and
discarded any hope that I was still asleep.
The knocks echoed through
the apartment and I measured the pause between each one. The unmistakable
familiarity grasped my heart and before I opened the door, I knew it was
you. You looked so cold standing there
with your arms crossed and only a light jacket and
a pair of sweat pants protecting you from the blustery New York winter
night. You stared at me silently through swollen eyes. Your sadness stung
and I regretted every
harsh word I had ever spoken to you.
I stood there for a long
time not knowing what to say. Memories cantered through my mind, one quickly
replacing the other. There was the day you wore that flowered skirt and
you let your hair fall softly down over
my eyes as you straddled my lap.
“I’ll love you forever,”you
whispered.
“You promise?”
“I promise,” you vowed.
The time I sprained my ankle
surfaced. My friends carried me in on their shoulders. You cried because
you could see the pain in my eyes and it seemed to hurt you to see me like
that. We spent the day in bed. The day at
your father’s funeral interjected that memory . I
felt so useless. You told me later that my mere presence kept you from
losing it. It was memories like these that I wanted to always remember,
but there were also the
shouting matches and my jealous tantrums refusing
to disperse from my mind. It was a solid mixture of good and bad. Happy,
sad, angry, exhilarated, these were the emotions that made us the couple
we were before you
left. It was all I had and all I could have
ever wanted.
It was real.
I heard that there was someone
new and that you were happy. I hated hearing that you could be happy without
me and I did not wish you the best like some sappy hallmark card. I resented
your rumored bliss and
must admit that your present obvious sorrow offered
me hope. I invited you in and offered you a drink, which you declined .
There was someone and his name was Jacob. He was an architect and a very
successful one.
Unlike me, he had goals and dreams. He envisioned
the future past next week or next month. He was everything I wasn’t. You
saw a lot of Jacob and before you knew it you were living with the guy.
A few months after moving in with him, you realized it was a mistake. Jacob
viewed you more as a piece of property than a girlfriend. He told you what
to do and what to wear. He controlled you in every way. He even threw away
all your old pictures of us. With each day you missed me more and without
our pictures to look at, you were miserable. I can’t deny that this made
me feel great. It was what I wanted and what I thought about laying in
my bed, alone in the dark.
Does she miss me?
Does she think about me?
The answer to both was yes, but there was more.
You told Jacob that you loved
me and that you had to come back. He was furious. He said nobody left him
and he threw things across the room. He grabbed your arm and threw
you down. You begged him to stop, but
he wouldn’t. For a moment you thought he would hit
you but you managed to get away and you fled to the safety of my place,
which was once our place. Your hands trembled as you spoke. The anger swelled
inside and I hated Jacob the architect. I hated him with all the passion
that a mother hates their child’s murderer. It was a hatred too deep for
a person that I had not met, but it was present just the same. With eyes
of hope and anticipation and with tears resurfacing, you asked the question.
“Do you still love me?”
The question was both credulous
and perplexing. Could you not look at me and see it? Was it not written
on my face the first day we met. I would always love you, not just by choice
but by necessity. I would like to have
stopped, many times and during many lonely nights,
but my love for you was as much a part of me as my brown eyes and black
hair, as much a part of me as my smile and the way I laughed. My love for
you was predetermined, irrefutable and something I would never be able
to take back or replace. So I answered the question with the only answer
there was and the only answer there would ever be.
Yes.
The word brought even more
tears and you held me so tight that it hurt. This went on for several
minutes as we savored each second of our reunion. I took your hand and
led you to the room we once shared. You looked
at the picture of us, still on my night stand, as
I ran my hands through your hair and kissed your lips, searching for your
tongue. I tore off your clothes and laid you down on the bed.
“I want you ,” you begged.
Your hips lunged to meet
my every thrust, our eyes intertwined in something so passionate that every
inch of my skin burned with desire. I kissed your neck, tasting your sweat
as we picked up rhythm, climactically and simultaneously reaching a climax.
I collapsed beside you and you fell asleep in my arms. Once again you were
mine.
Early that same morning I
was again surprised by the sound of knocking. This time it was much louder
and before I could fully awaken, Jacob the architect was standing at the
foot of my bed. He was tall and slender. He
wore a menacing look on his face and his chest peeked
out from the rest of his body. He spoke defiantly with hatred and anger
seething from his eyes.
“You can’t leave me bitch,”
he announced.
Through terrified eyes,
you looked to me for an answer, which I did not have. I could not
wish him away.
Jacob pulled a pistol from his pants and pointed it
at you. My thoughts were cluttered and slow. There were no solutions and
as his finger pressed the trigger, I instinctually shielded your body with
mine. The first bullet
penetrated my side and as I turned the second shot
struck below my heart. I heard only the gun and the sound of your screams.
Jacob stared at me for a moment, his glare somewhat dulled, and he turned
and left.
The wounds cried death. The
blood casting a red silhouette, I locked into you eyes. You begged me not
to die and I tried so hard, but I died in the arms of the only woman I
had ever truly loved. This place is neither
heaven nor hell and its emptiness engulfs me.
I am alone again, with only your memory which neither fades nor weakens.
A whisper echoes in this eternal dark abyss and it is the sound of your
name in a voice I do not
recognize, repeating over and over.
Caroline.......Caroline......Caroline.