by Julia Davies
I don't know her name. Filtered through you I have random snippets of information about her, I know she has three kidneys and is several years younger than I am, I know where her parents live, that her sister has twins that went to the psychologist almost before they went to school. I know that it is one year since she had to have her wisdom teeth out in hospital, because it shattered our plans to meet, paint the town red and fall into bed; this year, this weekend you go to the hotel with her instead. I know she is six foot tall, a better match for you there than I am, although it was someone else that told me this, explaining the day after the birth why your newborn girl was such a "long" baby. You told me that she never gives you blow-jobs, after her first attempt at it many years ago went wrong; now a wicked joke between us that you could be a spit, swallow or snort type of girl. You told me so, but of all the things you told me I wonder if this last is true, or why would you be with her and not me?
Yesterday you said "Catch you tomorrow?" Words that should be hopeful, speaking of continuity, speaking of the future; the wish to be talking again then as we were today. But, but... they are so final for today; from experience I experience them as a turning off, being shelved, put away until it is convenient for you again.
Today you will not say even "Catch you tomorrow," but only that it is best we don't talk. My heedless optimism in complaining about being switched off for a short time has been well and truly slapped down. The trust that we can talk through things was broken, apparently by one flippant comment followed by a one word answer. And even as I typed "whatever" I hated that I said it, such a cliché and now it will be accompanied by the sonorous knell of a relationship falling apart at long last. This time you say we should not reply to each other, and that time will heal the pain, but you don't know how tightly I can cling onto it. You says you hope things will go well for me, and that you mean that. But if you have no intention of talking to me again you will never know how things are with me. You mean that you hope I will leave you alone.
It is as if my lips have been sewn together, each time I want to communicate with you I am pulling on the stitches, the muscles around my mouth twitch now in anticipation of the tearing pain; if I carry on I will have short stubby whiskers as the knots come loose. I can't ask even "how are you?" because my words are so potent, we are so poised over the precipice that to even make polite conversation will start us off on that luge-track again. I would prefer my words to be a gently bubbling warm jacuzzi, something you would feel both exciting and comfortable; but it seems I am instead a black run, exhilarating but fraught with the danger of crashing out, and in any case there is a sharply defined end. I would like to be a spicy Merlot, full bodied and tangy, to be anticipated and savoured each time the bottle is broached, there is a ceremony to it's opening. But it seems I must be a cheap blended whisky, my taste is harsh but acquired, as the patina of adulthood is acquired and sometimes I was just what you needed to get pissed, to blot out any sorrows and be gladly uplifted by the glamorous falseness of "having fun" and I wonder how you are drowning your sorrows now? And perhaps it is better that my mouth is forcibly closed, who knows what I would pour into it, and then what would pour out?
Julia Davies is a practised reader and practising writer & lives in Germany & this week she is most proud of is getting a stranger ~4500 miles away so excited he had to leave his desk and go to the mens room for some relief...
I don't know her name. Filtered through you I have random snippets of information about her, I know she has three kidneys and is several years younger than I am, I know where her parents live, that her sister has twins that went to the psychologist almost before they went to school. I know that it is one year since she had to have her wisdom teeth out in hospital, because it shattered our plans to meet, paint the town red and fall into bed; this year, this weekend you go to the hotel with her instead. I know she is six foot tall, a better match for you there than I am, although it was someone else that told me this, explaining the day after the birth why your newborn girl was such a "long" baby. You told me that she never gives you blow-jobs, after her first attempt at it many years ago went wrong; now a wicked joke between us that you could be a spit, swallow or snort type of girl. You told me so, but of all the things you told me I wonder if this last is true, or why would you be with her and not me?
Yesterday you said "Catch you tomorrow?" Words that should be hopeful, speaking of continuity, speaking of the future; the wish to be talking again then as we were today. But, but... they are so final for today; from experience I experience them as a turning off, being shelved, put away until it is convenient for you again.
Today you will not say even "Catch you tomorrow," but only that it is best we don't talk. My heedless optimism in complaining about being switched off for a short time has been well and truly slapped down. The trust that we can talk through things was broken, apparently by one flippant comment followed by a one word answer. And even as I typed "whatever" I hated that I said it, such a cliché and now it will be accompanied by the sonorous knell of a relationship falling apart at long last. This time you say we should not reply to each other, and that time will heal the pain, but you don't know how tightly I can cling onto it. You says you hope things will go well for me, and that you mean that. But if you have no intention of talking to me again you will never know how things are with me. You mean that you hope I will leave you alone.
It is as if my lips have been sewn together, each time I want to communicate with you I am pulling on the stitches, the muscles around my mouth twitch now in anticipation of the tearing pain; if I carry on I will have short stubby whiskers as the knots come loose. I can't ask even "how are you?" because my words are so potent, we are so poised over the precipice that to even make polite conversation will start us off on that luge-track again. I would prefer my words to be a gently bubbling warm jacuzzi, something you would feel both exciting and comfortable; but it seems I am instead a black run, exhilarating but fraught with the danger of crashing out, and in any case there is a sharply defined end. I would like to be a spicy Merlot, full bodied and tangy, to be anticipated and savoured each time the bottle is broached, there is a ceremony to it's opening. But it seems I must be a cheap blended whisky, my taste is harsh but acquired, as the patina of adulthood is acquired and sometimes I was just what you needed to get pissed, to blot out any sorrows and be gladly uplifted by the glamorous falseness of "having fun" and I wonder how you are drowning your sorrows now? And perhaps it is better that my mouth is forcibly closed, who knows what I would pour into it, and then what would pour out?
Julia Davies is a practised reader and practising writer & lives in Germany & this week she is most proud of is getting a stranger ~4500 miles away so excited he had to leave his desk and go to the mens room for some relief...
This has not got any less painful to read - the first paragraph is a fascinating conglomeration of gleaned facts and comment, the final one clever comparisons and horrific in the stitched mouth imagery it conjures.
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