As I sit here, having finally said what I've been thinking my whole life, I
only remember something I read a long time ago in some book: Losing all
hope is freedom.
It could be true. Then again losing all hope could mean that you're trapped forever because you have no will to be free.
It's kind of a contradictory statement.
I've lost all hope, but I don't know if I'm free or trapped.
Jake spends about a half hour in silence, either wandering around the room or watching me or just staring at various objects.
"You're wrong." He finally says. I scoff. That's about all the kid can tell me- I'm wrong, wrong, always wrong.
I might be wrong, but I know exactly what I'm talking about.
"You can't blame Batman for all that. You can't blame him for everything." Who else is there to blame? I can't bring myself to hate Wayne, and I can't bring myself to get angry with him for any of it. There's no one else to point the finger at.
"Why not? Tell me whose fault it is then. If not Batman then who?"
"Fine. For example, you could blame everything on your wife. She had the son that made your life a whole lot more complicated, she fought with you until it pushed you to hit her and pushed your son off a building, and then she died, leaving you alone."
I feel mixed up. Horribly mixed up, like I don't even know who I want to blame anymore.
"How could you even think of blaming Lyd-"
"I said for example, Mr. McGinnis." Jake interrupts abruptly. "The real person at fault here is you." Yeah. This kid will make a GREAT psychologist. Tell your patient that it's all his fault.
I almost laugh again.
"Me?" The kid gets angry again.
"Yeah, you! Wake up, McGinnis!" Wow. Haven't been called that in a while. "YOU are Batman! Batman is not a separate entity! He's not some darker side of you that you can blame every time something goes wrong! He's you."
I start to get that feeling you have after being socked in the stomach repeatedly. I feel the fear you get when you know the scales are being tipped out of your favor, that your whole carefully constructed world is ready to fall down around you.
"You can keep blaming everyone in the world for the woes of your life," Jake continues, "Say that outside factors caused everyone to die, caused you to have to miss your life. But you didn't miss your life. You've lived it, just like everyone else. Like everyone else you've had to make sacrifices and choices, and barely any of them were easy ones. And you're the one that made them, not Bruce Wayne, not your wife, not your children, and not Batman."
If you believe in something long enough, if you spend your life constantly reaffirming that everything is because of one thing, it eventually becomes fact, not fiction. At least to you.
Is this supposed to make me feel better? That the downfall of my life is not, in fact because of Wayne-Powers and Batman and my devotion to both, but simply because of ME?
I can't reply. I can't say anything. I have no language left.
"We're all responsible for our own actions, Terry. No one makes our choices for us." Jake finishes, rubbing his forehead as if he's exhausted.
Like all good defining moments in life, the realization just presents itself plainly, like it was lying there all the time and I just kept looking past it.
I chose to be Batman. Obligation, responsibility, and pressure are outside factors. In the end, I made the choice.
I see myself smashing things in the cave, screaming in rage that Wayne could have left it to me, and I wonder how I could have done it, how I could have blamed him when I was the one that begged to do it.
You live long enough and you forget how things started. You hold a grudge for years and by the end of it you can't even remember why you started holding it.
How could I forget that I'm the one that started this whole thing? That even after I got revenge on Dad's killers, I'm the one that had to convince Wayne and was elated when I was finally trusted to be Batman?
I still can't speak, too overrun with my long-held hatred and my long- forgotten decisions.
"Maybe I'm wrong." Jake starts again, looking like he's a hundred years old. "Maybe you're right, and you've just been loaded with nothing but pressure on all fronts your entire life and you never really chose any of this. But there's no kind of obligation that would make someone keep doing something they hated for this long. The only thing that could make you keep doing it despite everything that happened to you is that you loved doing it."
That's the only way you can keep going. If you've lost everything, the only thing that will make you keep going is wanting and loving what you do. Knowing that you still have a job to do.
"No. You're right." I finally say.
I still have a job to do.
It could be true. Then again losing all hope could mean that you're trapped forever because you have no will to be free.
It's kind of a contradictory statement.
I've lost all hope, but I don't know if I'm free or trapped.
Jake spends about a half hour in silence, either wandering around the room or watching me or just staring at various objects.
"You're wrong." He finally says. I scoff. That's about all the kid can tell me- I'm wrong, wrong, always wrong.
I might be wrong, but I know exactly what I'm talking about.
"You can't blame Batman for all that. You can't blame him for everything." Who else is there to blame? I can't bring myself to hate Wayne, and I can't bring myself to get angry with him for any of it. There's no one else to point the finger at.
"Why not? Tell me whose fault it is then. If not Batman then who?"
"Fine. For example, you could blame everything on your wife. She had the son that made your life a whole lot more complicated, she fought with you until it pushed you to hit her and pushed your son off a building, and then she died, leaving you alone."
I feel mixed up. Horribly mixed up, like I don't even know who I want to blame anymore.
"How could you even think of blaming Lyd-"
"I said for example, Mr. McGinnis." Jake interrupts abruptly. "The real person at fault here is you." Yeah. This kid will make a GREAT psychologist. Tell your patient that it's all his fault.
I almost laugh again.
"Me?" The kid gets angry again.
"Yeah, you! Wake up, McGinnis!" Wow. Haven't been called that in a while. "YOU are Batman! Batman is not a separate entity! He's not some darker side of you that you can blame every time something goes wrong! He's you."
I start to get that feeling you have after being socked in the stomach repeatedly. I feel the fear you get when you know the scales are being tipped out of your favor, that your whole carefully constructed world is ready to fall down around you.
"You can keep blaming everyone in the world for the woes of your life," Jake continues, "Say that outside factors caused everyone to die, caused you to have to miss your life. But you didn't miss your life. You've lived it, just like everyone else. Like everyone else you've had to make sacrifices and choices, and barely any of them were easy ones. And you're the one that made them, not Bruce Wayne, not your wife, not your children, and not Batman."
If you believe in something long enough, if you spend your life constantly reaffirming that everything is because of one thing, it eventually becomes fact, not fiction. At least to you.
Is this supposed to make me feel better? That the downfall of my life is not, in fact because of Wayne-Powers and Batman and my devotion to both, but simply because of ME?
I can't reply. I can't say anything. I have no language left.
"We're all responsible for our own actions, Terry. No one makes our choices for us." Jake finishes, rubbing his forehead as if he's exhausted.
Like all good defining moments in life, the realization just presents itself plainly, like it was lying there all the time and I just kept looking past it.
I chose to be Batman. Obligation, responsibility, and pressure are outside factors. In the end, I made the choice.
I see myself smashing things in the cave, screaming in rage that Wayne could have left it to me, and I wonder how I could have done it, how I could have blamed him when I was the one that begged to do it.
You live long enough and you forget how things started. You hold a grudge for years and by the end of it you can't even remember why you started holding it.
How could I forget that I'm the one that started this whole thing? That even after I got revenge on Dad's killers, I'm the one that had to convince Wayne and was elated when I was finally trusted to be Batman?
I still can't speak, too overrun with my long-held hatred and my long- forgotten decisions.
"Maybe I'm wrong." Jake starts again, looking like he's a hundred years old. "Maybe you're right, and you've just been loaded with nothing but pressure on all fronts your entire life and you never really chose any of this. But there's no kind of obligation that would make someone keep doing something they hated for this long. The only thing that could make you keep doing it despite everything that happened to you is that you loved doing it."
That's the only way you can keep going. If you've lost everything, the only thing that will make you keep going is wanting and loving what you do. Knowing that you still have a job to do.
"No. You're right." I finally say.
I still have a job to do.