You Love Me(You #3)(133)
I know, Mary Kay. This is no time for doubts. When you wake up—and you will wake up—it’s gonna be you and me against the world. I promise. Your eyelids flutter, I think, I hope—I wish we were alone—and I stroke your hair and say it all out loud. “I love you, Mary Kay. You fell, I know, but now you’re gonna get better. I’m gonna take care of you every day, I promise. You got me, you’re my love. I’m here.”
The Meerkat is a Centipede. Quiet.
Epilogue
I left America. I had to. How much tragedy can a person bear? Okay, so I didn’t cross the border, but my new home feels like another country. I live in Florida now, smack dab in the center, close to the Kingdom, yeah, but I’m not close as in Closer. I can pretend it doesn’t exist. I am alone. Safe. And I get it now. I’m better off on the wrong side of the tracks. You were special, Mary Kay. You saw something in me. But in the end, you turned out to be like my past coastal elite loves, too tangled up in your blue roots to pave a new road with me. No more hackneyed American dreams of a love that conquers all for this Florida man.
The shop is closed, as they say, and I turn on the lights in the Empathy Bordello. It’s too dark and it’s too bright and I’m trying to move on. Last night I watched a documentary about RIP Sam Cooke—he gets me—and I wanted to know more about his music but it was mostly just speculation about his murder, as if that’s all that matters. I am so sick of this obsession with death, Mary Kay. What about what we do with our lives? Licious meows—his brothers are back on Bainbridge—and you were right. He is the best cat, a baffled king on a perpetual victory march, as if he always just composed “Hallelujah” and if you were here, you would say that every suffix needs a prefix and I miss you, Mary Kay.
I do.
I wanted to build a life with you and I did everything right. I was a good man. I volunteered at the library. I opened my heart to you and I believed that we could be happy in Cedar Cove. But, like so many Sassy American women who trust their feelings, you spoke your truth and got thrown down the stairs. My heart is broken. Permanently.
I can’t talk to you so I play a Sam Cooke song, the one where he’s sad about a woman who left him. She broke his heart—she stayed out, she stayed out all night—and he begs her to come home. He offers his forgiveness. You can do that when the person you love is alive. You got pushed. Life does that to us. But you lost your footing and fell down the stairs because you were wearing socks—I warned you—and now you’re in a coma and you can’t burst into the Bordello to tell me you regret leaving, leaving me behind. You’re like every woman I ever loved. You didn’t walk away. You didn’t stay out all night. You left the fucking planet.
You wanted this Bordello before you ever met me and I wanted us to have Christmas together and leave the lights up all year and now you can’t even see our jukebox. You can’t do the most important thing we do as people: evolve. Apologize to your child for being human, for being a mother, for letting empathy make you go blind.
I look at my phone just to make sure it’s real and it is: They’re pulling the plug tomorrow. Thought you should know.
Nomi didn’t even call to tell me about you—she texted—and I flip the switch on the pink neon Open sign in my bookstore, where I serve Cocktails & Dreams alone. You didn’t help me build the Bordello and I can’t blame Nomi for being cold and I know she’ll be fine in the long run. She’s not one for empathy—I still see her hovering over you, I still hear those words, she’s alive—and it’s not her fault, Mary Kay. She’s moving on with her life, studying our fucked-up environment at NYU and young, wounded female victims turned sociopaths thrive in New York City and I should know.
I’ve been hurt by more than a few of them.
I try to stay upbeat. There are people out there who do love me. Ethan might visit—but he would bring Blythe—and here I go again, replaying it all in my head. I loved you like no other. The EMTs arrived and they gave me hope. The United States Injustice System cooperated this time around—cause of injury: accident—and there was no biased “investigation,” no online crazies trying to blame me for your fall. I tried to be the guy with a girlfriend in a coma—we have that book in stock at the Bordello—and I was dutiful. I was there. But every time I went to get a soda I came back to find one of your Friends in my chair by your bed. Erin disappeared and Fecal Eyes swept in with her multigenerational family of lookie-loos and I know you wouldn’t want me sitting there with that woman who brought out the worst in us.
I loved you. But my love wasn’t enough to save you. Now you sleep in a mechanical bed while a machine does all the heavy lifting. I was the man of your dreams—I didn’t think someone like you existed—and you always wanted to dance with somebody (who loves you). And I did love you and we did dance. But from the moment we met, we were stuck in the middle of the circle. Your Friends and family were holding us hostage every step of the way because they didn’t want you to be happy. And look how that worked out for them.
Your best friend Melanda is watching movies at Fort Ward.
Your husband Phil is snorting heroin in heaven.
Your brother-in-law Ivan is blogging about his new gambling addiction.
Your buddy Shortus is in hell doing CrossFit and your daughter Nomi is alive but motherless.