I have so much to say to you. All I have now is a letter, my only vessel of of reaching you. Its late and I can't sleep, too many memories invading me. I have this picture of you in my mind, its one of my favorites. We were camping, like we did so often, we were sitting in the dark, the fire had gone out but the moon was really bright so I could still see you. You had this look on your face. I don't even know if I can really describe it. It was look that showed exactly who you were. And in that look iI felt so small and I saw how small you were too. I saw how it all means nothing, and you understood that, but you understood love too. I knew in that moment that you truly knew love, you didn't just feel it, you knew it. And I knew that I never really did know it. All the times I told you I loved you were noting in that moment because I couldn't really feel it, not the way you did. You loved with all that you were.
There was this other time when we were having coffee, I think it was only our third or fourth date, and we were sitting outside the cafe smoking. It was cold and overcast, "A perfect fall evening." you said. And even though I actually disagreed I said yes it is anyway and took a sip of my coffee. I burnt my lip cause it was too hot and you laughed at me, the way you always laughed at my clumsiness, my messiness, even my sarcasm that was never very sarcastic because I "tried too hard" as you said. You said I sounmded ridiculous and I stopped trying to be sarcastic. I went back to being dry and almost humorless. You laughed at me for my lack of sense of humor that too. Most of the time I laughed with you, it was the only time I ever laughed, when I was with you, paying attention to only you.
The evening we were having coffee, I can't even really recall what we were talking about. All I remember clearly is the way your hands moved. The way you reached for your cup, or put your cigarette to your lips, or moved your hair from out of your eyes. Your hands were dancers: confident, gracefull, they moved with purpose. In fact, in all the years we were together I can't remember you ever spilling a thing. It amazed me really, how oculd you be so aware, so intune, so sure of what you were doing at all times? You seemed almost inhuman sometimes, the way you walked, laughed, danced, made love, lost at pool, drank wiothout ever really getting drunk. I always felt a little separate from you, even though when I was with you I felt almost complete. It was strange really. I also wondered if you knew thats how I felt and if it contributed to your leaving. Did you feel my separatness, the withdrawn part I always tried to hide because there wasn't any part of you that was withdawn. You were there, completely there and in the moment at all times. I had to keep a place that was all mine, where no one else could go. I know you had that place inside too, you were just better at balancing I guess. I could never be in my own space and completely there with another at the same time, that was your trick. I loved that trick, almost envied it really.
After you left I didn't speak to anyone for a long time. I took to writing and drinking alone or at bars where no one knew me. All of a sudden you were gone and I couldn't tell if you had actually ever really been there or if it had been an excellent dream that ended badly. Eventually I started coming out of my hole and socializing again. Sometimes your name was mentioned and I felt acute jabs where some form of a heart was suppossed to be. People would ask about you, not me of course. They would ask our friends in front me and try not to make eye contact with me as if as soon as they mentioned you I would burst into tears and run away kicking and screaming. The weird thing was, no one ever said you were doing okay. They always said, oh you know her working hard and what not. Things like that. It made me uncomfortable I thought maybe something was wrong and nobody wanted to say that really you weren't okay. You were actually drowning in some kind of blanket sorrow that kept you from being yourself. 'Yourself', its a mystery to me.
Once I started feeling a little better after you left I started playing guitar again too. You always asked me while we were together why I never played for you, it was because I didn't have the energy. So much of me went into being with you that those few times we weren't together, I would pick up my guitar and I couldn't play anything. It was all gone, the rhythm, the desire. Gone.
Thats what I was doing when I found out. I was playing my guitar. Not anything in particular, just strumming trying to remember songs I had forgotten how to play. I knew something was wrong as soon as I picked up the phone. It was Nicole. She sounded tired and irritable. For some reason she decided to ask me how I was doing before she decided to drop the bomb. Myabe she was nervous and didn't know how to tell me. Anyway she asked me how I was doing then there was a long pause, then she snivled a little. Finally, almost out of frustration, I asked her if everything was okay. No, she said. She's dead, Nicole said. I knew right away she was talking about you. How? You decided to get into a car accident at two in the morning. You were drunk Nicoel said. I was angry when she said that. How could she accuse you of that? The people in the car you hit died too. It was a bloody mess. I hung up the phone with out saying anything else. I stared at the wall all night. I was angry and once I even wondered if you had done it on purpose. If, maybe you were sick of it all and didn't it on purpose, or at least maybe you got into your car drunk hoping that maybe, by assident you would hit something and it would all be over. Then I got anry at myself for even considering such a thing. I didn't know what else to do. I still loved you. All of a sudden I had this need to let you into that part of me that no one else touched. But you were gone and that was it, thats there is. Your absence and my presence.
Its been a couple of months since that night. All I can think of is writing to you, I can't think of anything else I can do. I haven't said what I need to say, I don't really know what it is I feel I need to say so badly. I miss you maybe? Thats inadequate. I love you? I don't even know what those words mean. Maybe I'll write again when I know what it is. Until then, rest peacefully.