Authors Note: Yeah yeah I should be working on the next chapter of Changes and the Changed, but think of this as a little interlude. I wrote this poem and really liked it but couldn't bring myself to post it alone so here's a little companion piece. I don't like the title of the poem though so somebody give me some ideas. I hope it's enjoyable. I'm sure I've gone crazy with commas and it may be a little much for some but try it out and let me know how ya like it. Happy reading :)
It's not often she gets fan mail, granted she's an accomplished writer, owner of a few awards but her type of writing doesn't warrant many fanatic fans. She's a poet, and as far as writers go they're at the bottom of the barrel of celebrity. Once and a while she gets emails from aspiring poets gushing over her first book, a staple on any college reading list. But it's not like she gets recognized on the street, or numerous interview requests from fancy literary magazines, but she's okay with that, she's sure if it were the case she'd find it terribly annoying. Helga, above all, has always prized her privacy.
However, on the eve of her 28th birthday she received a letter, not an email, not a bill, but a handwritten letter. She was pleasantly surprised, if not slightly suspicious, as she stopped mid step on her stairs before the front door, where the object in question lay harmless below her mail slot.
She lived alone and so the house was quite as she crossed to pick up the single yellow envelope that stood out garishly against the blue of her welcome rug. For a moment she thought it might be some lovey-dovey happy birthday from her older sister. It seemed more than likely that Olga would pick such an antiquated method of well wishing, but as she turned the note over in her hands she found the top left corner empty. The mystery left a scowl dangling from her face.
In her small but handsomely furnished living room she picked up a forgotten mug and crossed to the open kitchen, throwing the dragon embossed cup into the microwave and setting the timer to reheat. With a long manicured nail she tore at the back glued flap pausing momentarily to remove the now warm tea. She took a sip before placing the drink down and diving into the envelope.
The paper was soft and handmade the kind bought at ridiculously overpriced specialty shops. On the perfectly crafted paper was a poem written in a handsome but delicate script. She read it slowly her eyes opening ever wider after digesting the meaning of each word.
For My Bully
He romanticizes the memory of
Her shadowed scowl, young and
A liar her spitballs never make
The impression that she is hiding.
His memory forgets his half lidded
Half responses. He forgets that he
Lets her scowl and throw frostbite
Phrases, all the while reciting
Reasons to be nice.
Yes many times
He overheard and then purged
His eavesdropping
Her declaration of undying love
And madness
The way she hid behind
A façade of trash.
He romanticizes the memory
Of her prickled responses, her long
Limbed girl stature, her mystery
Though at the time all he wanted
Was simple pre feminine mystique.
Now, yes now, as a man
He romanticizes the memory of
A girl who knew of adulthood
And all its failings, it's drunken
Bully like nature, its disappointment
Before the age where most
Are let down.
Now, yes now, as a man
He pines for the girl who
Knew of love first.
On her fifth reading the paper slipped from her hands only to take up the task of abstractly removing foreign streaks of wetness that made trails down her face. There was no question who it was from, there was no mistake to what it meant, and yet it did not lessen the pressure that settled over her lungs.
Fifteen years was a long time. Fifteen years was a long time to still remember, to still dredge up any sort of feeling, which is why she cursed at her self confusedly. It shouldn't matter what it said, what it meant, because even the notion of what it implied should mean nothing because it was fifteen years ago and the subject was a closed book. But wasn't it her closed book, wasn't it her subject, what she had made a career from? Wasn't it what she did for a living, and wasn't it what she had won acclaim and awards for?
She was 13 when she left him, her locket, and all her notebooks on his doorstep. She told no one where she was going, not that many cared, and her one true friend had left for Kumamoto the year she turned eleven, so, as she had hoped there was no one to tell him where she had gone to, if he at all dared to ask.
Distance had not changed her much, but she was quieter now. She was still unaccustomed to the gestures of love and found it hard to trust the sincerity of such gestures from others. She was a woman who did not hope for things, she was pragmatic and a realist, though some, at times, had called her a depressive.
But then there was this letter there was this letter that changed everything. Her bitterness, all the excessive obssession and years of reasoning, her problems and the blame now shifted. She could no longer place it all on him, or at least not like she did, she could no longer truly harbor the center of her anger, the feeling of being unloved, unlovable around the notion that he had never seen it, never known it or felt it.
Her chin tilted down and her vision cleared as two pearly tears dripped from her lashes. They landed gracefully on the overturned discarded letter. With it's back facing up her eyes skidded and stopped on a little scribble, written just as delicately on the bottom right corner.
It read:
Please come outside if you, like me, wish to pine no longer
It was raining, like the day she was born, like the day she met him, like her whole life, it felt, without him. She tripped on the welcome mat as she tore out the door. Her hair was drenched in mere seconds as she stood helpless on the front porch, searching desperately from right to left, but there was no one. The streets were empty, a wet dreary picture of ruined watercolors.
Her shoulders sagged, and though it was a cold march rain, she sat brokenly on the first step of the cement stairs. There were no thoughts as she sat soaking, only the heavy labored breath that might have been the telltale signs of a woman sobbing. The sound drowned out the pounding of the rain, the beat of her heart, the echoing steps of a man running.
It took her a moment to notice that her face, just like the last time, was the only part of her that continued to be wet.
" I'm sorry, gosh I'm so dumb I should've just waited, I was getting really cold, and I've been here for a while and I thought it would take just a second, the coffee shop was just around the corner, and… here take this, it's warm."
The umbrella was black, generic, and small but it covered her completely as he placed the steaming cup between her fingers. Her face lifted and he was there, 15 years and he was there standing grown and handsome, her handsome, the unnoticed quiet face of a kind man.
All at once she discarded his coffee and stood knocking the umbrella. He felt strong beneath her fingers, strong and real. Her hands like black spiders disappearing beneath the slick fabric of his raincoat. They crawled up his warm neck, and he shivered, his own hands tentative and shy found the edges of her bony hips. His eyes were still so green, so true, after all these years, so sincere. Here was her gesture, here it was and this time she did not second guess it or ruin it with words she could only make work on paper. And so with lips barely used, and a tongue more accustomed to lashing she kissed him, hard, in the rain she was born in, in the rain she met him in, and the rain he came back to her in.
And when they were thoroughly soaked and satisfied he asked her "So, did you like my poem?" And with decisive laugh, that to anyone else might have sounded cruel, she answered, " Doi Football head!"
Fin
Let me know how you liked it or a better poem title. I don't remember if she was crying that day when she walked to pre-school but I imagine it makes sense. Review time! ya know how much a like it.
Much love - Twilightfucker