IV. The Fight
Have you ever been so angry that you couldn’t rationalize? Truth and falsehoods start to blend together into a muted gray color and paints a portrait that I can’t understand. Despite what angle I try to cast the light onto, I only see a shadow of the truth.
It is that irrational fear of the unknown from where anger is bitterly conceived, within an isolated and frigid womb.
We spend so much time putting the pieces together in what we idealize our relationships to be, but it takes no effort at all to recklessly smash it.
It was an auspicious way to start a new relationship, in the midst of a storm, after all, out of destruction comes new beginnings. Claire and I continued to see more of each other, late night drinks, gallery openings with dinner. Plans were seamlessly threaded together.
Within seconds of just pulling out my phone in the morning and checking my messages, the tightly woven story came undone. I saw pictures of Claire out with a strange man, an alleged friend, dining comfortably and enjoying a film together. Only a sliver of a whole night is seen and every fear is bridging the gap between each image. It’s a sick feeling to think history could be repeating itself, like hot coals burning through the insides of my stomach. I felt slowly suffocated by its impenetrable smoke.
Still locked away in bed, I gaze up into the vastness of the barren ceiling searching for answers. Our lives are enclosed by a four-walled mental barrier, a well-kept retrospective vault, and proceed to shut ourselves off from the world just to lay in a room surrounded by dusty memories in the form of trinkets and pictures. But I didn’t want to drag myself out from my own comfort to face a sordid realization.
As I close my eyes, my memories of Claire bloom into pulsating thoughts, spreading lovingly like liquid dandelions. She freed me from tumultuous chains and I no longer was a slave to a vicious past but instead I breathe in fresh honey air in the realm of the unimaginable. Yet, those golden dreams grudgingly dimmed and the unimaginable seeped back deep into the soft ground. They remain buried far below to unassumingly rest in solitude with my remaining shattered fragments.
I didn’t think. I didn’t question. I act and it all begins with an accusation.
I phone her and ask without hesitation, “Did you enjoy your date last night?”
Claire, completely dumbfounded retorts, “What date? I didn’t go on a date. I caught up with a friend from college.”
“I find that hard to believe,” and just like that I spew out a lie, “You know what? Forget it. I shouldn’t care about what you do on your free time if we weren’t even together to begin with.”
A faint whimpering starts to come from the other end and she retaliates in a frail whisper, “That’s not true and you know it. That’s not what you’ve told me before.”
I didn’t want to listen to her explanation. My voice began to overpower hers despite the weeping in the background. Some often say they see red or feel dizzy when they’re enraged. I see nothing but the past.
But it didn’t end there and by force, she endures my nihilistic havoc as I persisted with a consistent attack on her character.
I call her every name in the book at the cost of imparting grief on the woman I cared so deeply for. Fierce dissolution is a blind remedy, for there is no other solace in delusion. Like a broken dam, it senselessly rushes out:
You should be ashamed of yourself. You use guys for food, for tickets. You’re nothing better than a gold-digger.
You act like such a noble person. You pretend like you care about others but you’re a hypocrite. You only care about yourself.
You’re a liar. You always act high and mighty. You’re not a good person and you never were.
I never said we were together. You’re making things up. It’s all in your head.
The sound of her hanging up breaks my fit.
It was finally over for my sake. I don’t plan to ever look back on this. I start to collect my things and get myself ready for work. Opening the blinds to my bedroom window, I peer out. The sun is hidden behind a gray sky and a dense fog blankets my backyard.
