I woke from the haze of the opium in the wee hours of the morning. I tore away from the smokey den, and quickly left, returned to my senses, and stealthily made my way back to the Opera.
This was no way to live, or a way to pretend to live. The game was not really lost, was it yet?
It was a chill and crisp Parisian sunrise. The sun was peeking through between rooftops and burning my eyes with its glorious brightness, as I slid between alleyways and the sounds of morning markets to make my way home to the underground. The sunrise brought me back to the harsh reality I had chased every single moment of this unwanted life.
I had forgotten myself. Love will do that to a person. The feeling of self-loathing I had been nurturing since our last parting had passed to a degree, as I was coming to realize it was that same feeling that had undone me and brought she and I to the impasse at which we now stood. I had turned her away, had led her into his arms, and I had no one to blame but myself.
I chose the opium and not reconciliation, because I lacked the ability to manage my own romantic affairs with a clear head. Oh, my self-hatred, you rear your ugly head at every turn. . .
And what exactly had I lost at this point? Some moments of her precious attention? I'd witnessed a friendly embrace, the acceptance of a dinner invitation. She had not removed my ring. She had not denied me or been unfaithful at this point in our very unique relationship. Our relationship. I say those words to describe the strange, tenuous, and absolutely wondrous connection we had created. Something so precious that if I could hold it in my hands and hide it from the world, I certainly would.
Maybe, I had already done that to an extent, made such a tenuous cocoon around us, so as to hide our love (was it love? Dare i touch that word?) from the world above us. Trying to hold something sacred, the only sacred thing I would ever capture in my hands. HER. Always her. I had, after all, stolen her away to an underground labyrinth, devoid of light and humanity. Devoid of gossip and chatter, and the garish undertakings of an Opera house. Absent were the gossipings of chorus girls or the yellings of managers handling finances. Absent were the concerns of worrying where the next meal would come from or how to pay for a new pair of ballet slippers. I had given her life some security and stability, I must admit. I hoped I had given her more than just that.
I had grown weary of my self-imprisonment of solitude, so completely bereft of light. I needed to breathe. I needed the night air and the sensation of her arms tucked under my own. I NEEDED HER. And I just had to find a way to get past my self-doubt, my loathing of humanity, and allow her inside my soul. But that very thought terrified me, for there was a darkness in my soul that an innocent should never breach and know. I had to find a way to make her see that I was not completely lost to this loathsome darkness which both entranced and terrified her. How to do this, I did not yet know. I could only think that I must begin by once again opening up our communication. I would have to bare my soul and my past open to her, and take a journey through my memories that just may very well be my undoing. If she took this journey with me, I just might make it out to the other side and find some joy and, dare I even dream of it, happiness?