Seventeen years ago, I decided there was no room in my heart
for anyone but *her*.
Long after she passed, I broke my solemn vow and grew angry
at the miserable circumstances of my life. My thoughts and words were clouded again,
like before she saved me. I spend my days in solitude once more, despising the loneliness
yet unwilling to embrace another horror. Recently, I began to debate the cost
of one versus the benefit of another. I now venture beyond the patio, fearful
that I will see her each time.
Before I made my way home today, I caught a glimpse of her
between the market booths. Was she hiding from the persistent mist, early
July’s attempt to delay summer glory in the Pacific Northwest? I don’t mind the
rain. It poses less danger than the deep waters I have grown accustomed to.
No, it was me. I was the prey. She was following at a
distance until the time was right, but she had lost her skill as our years
advanced. I cannot place a date, but I have seen that face before. It was our
time to meet.
“You are not her,” I declared when she turned the blind
corner I had slipped past, then waited for my shadow to appear.
“Hello again, Andrew.”
Again?
“I can almost see it in your eyes. You’re trying to figure
out the last time we spoke. Are you still talking to yourself in that weird,
semi-lucid speech pattern?”
“I am,” I confessed. “On both counts.”
“God, the blog is entertaining to read, but I wish you would
fucking stop talking like that.” Sometimes, I do as well.
I gestured towards a table by the food carts, where we could
sit and talk. She was charming. She wasn’t *her*, but the fascination proved to
be absorbing.
There was no need to react when she mentioned reading my
words. I assumed everyone did.
She knew everything and had an opinion on everything. “Your
idiosyncrasies have been entertaining to follow over the years. Angela found it
‘fetching.’ Yes, I think she used to use the term fetching.”
My heart warmed with thoughts of her and our time together.
She always called me “fetching.”
“Peggy thought it was quirky, but just shrugged it off
because you were an American.”
When she spoke her second name, fear built.
“How do you know her names?”
She raised a hand to my face, a signal to stop speaking.
This was her time, her moment to share a well-practiced soliloquy.
“I first saw Angela when you brought her back home, where we
grew up. I guess you wanted to show off those old stomping grounds. You were
married five years at that point — you still looked like the 12-year-old boy I
remembered from summer camp.”
Summer camp. My first hint.
“I mentioned it to my mom. She talked to your mom. We found
out you were back from your adventures.”
I wanted to hear more, but Angela’s chapter was over.
“I kept in touch. I mean, I found you moved to Brussels. New
life, new wife, huh?”
Peggy.
“Did you know I was there when you two met? After all those
years, it was supposed to be my accidental run-in. I was about to call
out your name when I saw that stupid look on your face again. You were standing
in the middle of the street, staring into that shop. You saw her.
“I walked right up to you and whispered, ‘Elle est
magnifique.’ I already realized there was no chance you would notice me that
day.”
“Magnificent! I remember you.” I remembered a voice that
would never be *her*.
“Gorgeous. Close enough. Geez, eight months, and you
never learned the language!” Even if I wanted to explain, it was not my turn to
speak.
“Everything I planned vanished in the blink of an eye when
you saw her. I was rejected again.”
Rejected again? My second hint.
“Four times before you met Hy’ing, we accidentally
crossed paths.”
Valparaíso. Wonju. Köln. Singapore.
“Four times, but you never reached for me. You never
attempted to connect.”
I recalled a face. “You weren’t her,” I confessed.
“Never say that again!” she yelled, slamming her fist on the
table before taking a deep breath to re-center the calm and reiterate her
mandate. “Never say that bullshit to me again. You broke my heart with those
words as a child. We played in the pool, happy and laughing, until you looked
at me with those sad eyes. ‘You are not her,’ you mumbled, turned, and just swam
away.”
The pool. I remembered her.
“I sincerely apologize…” but the expression of remorse would
never reach completion. Instead, her hand to my face again cut short all insincerity.
“I thought after Hy’ing you were a broken man.”
“I was,” came my assurance. “I am,” was my affirmation.
“That’s what I thought. It satisfies me to see you this way.
I don’t try for a reunion anymore. I just like to read those pitiful words you
post, to know that you feel the way I do, I mean did.” Her slip revealed more
than she wanted.
I grew curious and had to know more.
“Then why today? What caused you to emerge from obscurity?”
“Emerge from obscurity?” she chuckled. “You are such a fucking
tool.”
It wasn’t the answer I hoped for, so I re-inquired.
“Fine, why now? What do you want?”
“It’s simple,” she revealed. Raising her hand a third time,
now directed away from me, she pointed into the crowd. “I wanted to stop you
from meeting her.”
She was beautiful. For seventeen years, my heart lay
dormant. When a drowning man cannot take a breath, there’s no need to circulate
blood through his body. I remember my childhood, slipping into the water to
stare at her body below the surface. I realized she was not *her*. Desire drained,
but I maintained a yearning for more. My body needed the oxygen only a beating heart
could provide. My lungs required the air above my head, beyond the water in
which I was drowning. I looked up as I pressed my feet against the pool floor.
Shooting to the surface, I could see air preparing to welcome me. My lungs
would soon find the satisfaction of precious oxygen. My blood would quickly
become vibrant, giving my heart the only thing it desired: a reason to pulse once
more. I surfaced, made my declaration, then turned and swam away.
There was no reason to sit and stare when I saw *her*
through today’s crowd. I pressed my feet to the ground, preparing to live after
drowning for so many years. My heart rippled in anticipation of once again
having a purpose. Before I exited our conversation, I felt a familiar breath
whisper into my ear once more.
“I stopped you so I didn’t have to kill her again.”
What will
versus What should be.
I smiled, at peace with my response to our game.
