Broken Girl(75)

The manager of the apartment complex is shaken up, he’s mumbling about Mandy and her roommate and the trouble this whole ordeal creates for him. He pushes the door open and gives me a couple of minutes in Martie’s sister’s place.

I step in and immediately I feel just how tiny the apartment is. Two beds, a kitchen area with a small two-person table and a small couch in the center of it all make up the place. Looking around I notice a collage of pictures taped on the mirror mounted on the inside of the front door. It feels invasive to look at them, but I can’t help myself. I didn’t have the opportunity to meet Mandy. So, looking at the pictures, I’m not prepared to see Rose, my girl next to Martie’s sister. My mind tumbles back to Martie’s call. “A pimp beat the shit out of her and her piece of shit, hooker roommate.” My body flushes with a chill as I look back up at the pictures and see one with Rose and me. Suddenly, the idea that she can be seriously hurt matters more than what she does at night. The fear of never seeing her again spikes through my veins, piercing my heart. I have to get to the hospital, I need to make sure Rose isn’t badly hurt. I forget about Mandy’s ID and I hightail it to the hospital.



I pull out my claw hammer and begin to demolish the rotting porch railing. A job I’ve been doing for the last several weeks, it helps me channel the spastic energy when it has nowhere else to go. It feels good to rip apart something I’ll eventually replace. With every swing, and every point of contact, I feel myself letting go, even if it’s for a fleeting moment.

I get three feet of the railing taken down and the ambush of thoughts I have about Rose keep coming at me like a freight train. As much as I try and keep myself busy, I can’t stop wondering what’s she doing? Is she thinking about me just as much as I’m thinking about her? Did she get my letter? I know she can only give me what she has available and God knows, I want to teach her, tell her, touch her, and bring her to a healing we both can embody.

A familiar relief reaches into my body as I think about that day in the hospital, knowing she was okay and wasn’t the one lying in that hospital bed. I would never have wished Sybil to die, but knowing it wasn’t the woman I love gave me a second chance at a life with her. To know I have a second chance at the possibility of nestling into her breasts, dragging my nose across her delicate skin, inhaling what my heaven smells like. I want to listen to her breathe, whimper at my touch, bathe her in my words. I want to collect her broken pieces scattered between us and create a future with her.

I’m chained to her, connected, I feel it, being away from her is killing me. I’m struggling to carry the emptiness of not knowing how she’s doing. When I think about her, it’s as if life was being poured into my soul, but her not being here with me is as if my life is slipping through my hands.

What if all I’ve done was create more pressure by sending her the letter? What if she doesn’t want the same thing anymore? I know I can't force her, heal her or save her from her thoughts. I want her, every tiring, twisted, frightening, exciting emotion that makes her who she is. The last six months I’ve been determined to get my life ready for Rose. I’m not going to be an empty shell of a person lingering in a purgatory filled with empty promises nobody wants. One thing I know for sure, I don't want her in anyone's bed, but mine.

I’m literally imploding without her.

Unseasonably hot for the fall in the bay area, I drag my arm across my brow stopping the rolling drips of sweat from getting in my eyes. I take a minute to look around the world I’m creating, hoping that if or when Rose decides to come home to me, it will be what she wants. I think I’m doing the right thing, it feels right. I pick up a couple of rotting 2x4’s, tossing them next to the porch in a semi-organized pile. Stay physical, Shane. Keep busy, move forward. Trying to keep my mind from swirling and my heart from thrashing faster in my chest, I head inside the house for a bottle of water. I swig the bottle dry in a couple of gulps. My eyes burning from the sweat-beads that made it past my brows, I blink and tear up to stop the pain. A physical pain I’d take any day of the week, compared to the emotional pain of not having Rose with me.

I think about what I wrote to her and how I poured my soul into that letter. Professed my love and told her that I want to work on making a life with her. My mind twisted off into visions, and just like anything else, they morphed into the reaction I dreaded from her.



“Don’t you see you were something special to me, Shane? You were something different than any other man in my life. I fought so hard trying not to give you my heart, tried so hard not to open the ironclad lock, because I knew I’d get hurt. But you found the key, you found my weakness and exploited it for your own needs. Whether you knew it or not, whether I knew it or not, I gave you my heart. And just like that, like everyone in my life, you broke it and now you’re gonna walk away never looking back.”



Doubt attacks my thoughts . . . What if she read what I wrote and interpreted it wrong? Will I ever be enough for her, or is she going to wait until my words render her numb and she stops listening? Worry flashed through my head, rippling down into my fingertips. Son-of-a-bitch, within seconds I regretted sending it. I didn’t want anything to inhibit her personal growth, or finding her way back to me. What if my words threw her over the edge, or she isn’t getting back to me because she had to go back to the streets? A pit swirled in my gut. If she’d just respond to the letter, then I’d know and I wouldn’t have to live in such f*cking limbo.