“I wonder what happens to the places we’ve been to and where does the love go.”
“I don’t even know why I’m buying Twinning's when the daily things are long gone from those who make memories of places I don’t know anymore.”
“I wonder why do I miss London all of a sudden.”
“Isn’t that where you fled to when you’re parents kicked you out? So no one really dismantled it when it was an escape, it’s not your fault it changed, but your London is still intact in your head, our London if you must. I met you there, later... but I remember how it was, so fucking long ago.” Miles thinks. “It’s been ten years, hasn’t it?”
“Yeah. Last time when I was on Oxford street, I had a panic attack. I just felt like I’ve been elsewhere, that I lived somewhere else. I just feel as if all the people I knew were bleached away and wouldn’t even want me anywhere near, it’s odd.” I rub my arm. “I didn’t want it and I swore myself to never go there again. It’s really more dystopian than you think.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t in London, but I was there last year. It’s fucked over. All small stores closed and a sense of some fear of like a fucking death penalty and ads which remind you that you’ll get fucked over. UKIP or not, they need to stop playing that they’re soft and accepting. Biggest ol’ cunts.” Miles spits it out, as we talk over in my kitchen which is more spacious as I had found the place earlier and found a liking to it, now with Brian gone, working more to pay the rent and avoiding questions regarding my music, which Miles himself maneuvers his mind out. “But you randomly get nostalgic, mate.”
He pats on the rim of the tea mug, as I drink my black coffee slowly, as if I were back for some reason, as I close my eyes.
“It’s so odd. The world became a nazi monopoly. I’m just waiting for someone to push me on the street and beat me up for being gay.”
“Well, it can happen. But I doubt it.” Miles thinks. “We all moved thinking of that, so yeah. Y’know... back in the day.”
He sighs and I blow at the coffee for no reason, wishing I could cry, but instead my emotions bottle up until I fucking reach hotline level and hear someone with a heavier accent and then I can hear my own echo back, as if there is a meaning of missing where you came from when you move, but the problem is, your house has been burnt down and the hunt for you is announced because you’re different and gay. All thoughts get discarded, thinking of what had once been home, getting all the mind replaced for the nurtured desire of one’s to find a home within a country.
And it gets captured because the more you think of time, how something can slip by so easily like a quick silk scarf through the fingers, fear just straddles even harder, making everything fall and break, never leaving shards just to remind that nothing is forever, that we all vanish and all the tales we tell ourselves are different, just like you can’t remember tomorrow, neither will you remember yesterday or the rest of your life. And it gets worse with a polaroid, because it’s instant and done and the film is expensive.
Patience becomes more than a virtue and the back of the hand has far too many lipstick traces.
And Arielle’s birthday party at some restaurant becomes even more disastrous than it could even be, as rumors start spreading that Arielle had the feeling that her boyfriend was cheating on her. Alex was supposed to bring the cake, while I had picked up Miles as my date, as I had to watch him try and finish his tie, as I ended up looking away, recalling the last night when the party was smaller and we would just end up crashing nearly every week at Arielle’s and Alex’s regardless just because Alex had wanted to see his boyfriend. It wasn’t even that they would do anything in Alex’s house, they would just randomly talk and I would hear comments regarding me and Miles. Miles even wondered if we should put up an act, which I quickly refused so maybe that’s why and the fact that Brian was still fresh in my memory that Arielle had dared Alex to show how he wasn’t homophobic and kiss Miles for half a minute, my eyes went wide as I watched everything resolve and thankfully they barely even opened their mouths, but watching was like a time bomb, if watching those two kiss meant nothing then I figured maybe Arielle had been just as daft as the media tells us people are.
I gave my gift to Arielle, wondering why had so many of us decided to go in suits, even the girl which would hang out with the record player, I had found out that her name was Valentine through her heavy French accent, but she was as fluent in English as one may be, but I barely talked to her, but she approached me and I wondered what her age was under the whole Lolita attire, but her age being above twenty just confirmed her status, as she sat next to me, Miles calling Alex, as Arielle was talking a few friends, freaking out and wondering who was even Alex sleeping with. Watching women and their drama just seemed to remind me why I felt so alienated from them and why I wasn’t attracted to them. Valentine seemed to be silent, just like she always was and when I was returning from the bathroom, I noticed her hands in pockets talking to Arielle as they both nodded at me. I only prayed that they didn’t think that Alex was cheating on her with me.
“So you’re not dating Miles, then?” She asked me as I shook my head and she took words to think upon, as everything seemed to be patiently waiting for Alex for the past twenty minutes, the balloons themselves seemed to be unexcited as Arielle would run through the list of every woman in her head and I was surprised they never asked me, but she was thinking to confront Miles to ask him if he had known of something. I only cursed at both loverboys with the forgiveness coming from if they would both show up, only to confess what was going on behind their closed doors, but instead Miles arrived, approaching Arielle and telling her that the cake hadn’t been made yet and that Alex was stuck there, waiting. She seemed to ease at his words, but the interrogation still began as she asked my best friend to sit next to her and I felt as if we were in some classical English novel with gossiping high society as usual.
It seemed more obvious by the minute as Valentine fiddled, watching me and not holding any contact as I would seem bored, only checking on Miles which assured that Alex loved her and it seemed only poisonous to watch it, as if Brian could join this whole discussion himself, but thankfully Arielle hadn’t known my ex partner, so it was settled at that.
“Do you want to get the fuck out?” She asks and looks at me, actually desperate from all the drama and then quickly back at Arielle, which is immersed in Miles. And then she notices how I quickly glance at Miles. “If your not-boyfriend needs you, we’ll be nearby. Just text him now.”
I glance back at her, as she picks up her suit from the back of the chair.
“I really can’t deal with all this drama, Alex isn’t sleeping with any of the woman she’s scared of.” Valentine says vaguely and gets her hair out of the suit, now scared, yet sternly desiring to leave already as she fishes out cigarettes and a lighter in her bag. “Look, if you wanna stay with all these girls gossiping, feel free.”
And she turns around, walking slowly and I excuse myself to no one in particular, taking my phone and once I’m out she waits there, smoking and starts walking down the road as the buildings just get taller with more lights in them, sinking the whole surroundings like any other big city would, as we keep walking in silence and I wonder if that’s how we seem to be described as today’s companions: quiet.
“At least last year’s birthday party wasn’t bad, it was a dress up, I was a nurse. Nothing too fancy, just felt like it. Got some vintage nurse dress I remember.” She says and soon enough, sighs, lighting another cigarette and when we stop at a bench I actually wonder if she had anything in mind at all. I find it ironic how she managed to say that she wanted to get out of the gossip, because it was far too feminine as she would say on, but she would be the one biting her feelings in, holding one feminine trait instead of another and it was unfair of me to say so, because I would also hold feelings even if not often and I was the only who would speak of them and later I would realize Miles’ own confusion when neither of us were even in-game anymore. But either way, I watched her a bit confused, but not speaking out myself as I lit a cigarette watching her trying to understand what even moves she could do. And disaster seemed as frequent as life given. Loneliness seemed to stay with me that night, desire long gone and lost, too many thoughts straddling nothing as she had decided to ask me questions after all, as we had stood up, me checking on Miles with a quick call, who was only surprised that I had headed out with Valentine, but commented that he wished he would’ve done the same thing but he had to stay with Alex.
After living around small houses and trees it was comforting to go back to places familiar with one’s own mind peace. And I wondered if small cities were the answer to one’s isolation or would we all go back to bigger cities with taller buildings for us to hide anywhere at all? I wondered if we were all lost on trains with beloved.
It seemed as if women walked hand in hand with disaster, as alienation seemed to hang above us both.
“So what happened with you and your boyfriend, since everyone seems to be tormenting some ghosts of the past?” She asks, leaning against her legs, blowing the smoke out, never to show any anxiety, as I seem still to be catching everything on the surface. I hold my silence as she watches me, before leaning back on the bench and then looking around. “You want a drink then?”
Valentine seems a bit frustrated and lost and I wonder what do I even say and how shallow would I even seem and then I just shake my head and in that brief split of a second I catch my breath and I decide to speak out a bit, after all.
“He cheated on me quite a few times and we’ve been on and off through out many, many years.” I flick the ashes onto the pavement. She watches me more pleased with the fact that I spoke rather than at my past. I muse on speaking further which would strangle me into a conversation or not. “So now it’s a matter of keeping the stance of the words I’ve told him, that’s about it, really.”
“And what did you tell him, Jamie?” Valentine asks curiously.
“That I’d skin him alive if he came back.” I shake my head, not even laughing at the daft, violent joke. “I just told him not to come back.”
My voice shakes.
“I’ve never told him that.” I go on. “We would break up with some intentions and love and that time when I kicked him out of our house, I couldn’t. I was too angry at him. I didn’t want him at all, anymore. I just wanted him out and I felt that I ended up knowing nothing and believing and loving someone who never existed by the end of the day. I just felt like I was going in circles with no meaning, that my own life was a dull repetition of me forgiving him and when off thinking of him so often.”
Talking to people felt wrong if I couldn’t even talk to myself.
And there’s too much wrong feelings when you remind yourselves of lost loves which you couldn’t pursue anymore, because they overflow that you can’t even do anything with your hands whether it swings like a pendulum, you don’t have suicide on any side of life, just misery dangling even heavier like an anchor reminding whose slave you’ve been and the chains you never freed yourself from, but learnt how to walk with them until they rust off, fall with age or the violent snap of the fingers, but just like PTSD an old love comes back to haunt because no one forgets pain.
And sometimes you don’t get a goodbye in reply, when you’ve waved enough and cried on your own.
Never listen to those who say it’s easy to get over people
If you’ve loved only you can stop yourself with the harshest form of sudden death.
Fall in love eventually, just like you buy a new bouquet of roses, you’ll always have the same deja vu of loved.
Your existence will forever be a knife which I will never speak of. I was happy to see him each time, but not now, not now when I’ve decided to discard it all and bathe in silent solitude, because I haven’t had a broken love by myself for so long.
-
I tend to write this story when I get depressed or too thoughtful about things and I just muse on anything. I get anxious about stories coz obviously I judge which stories are more liked and etc and I get anxious about this one and I'm happy when I get told that it's great, but I guess just like anyone with low self-esteem I get anxious about the stories I'm more attached to. I started writing it roughly as I was getting my first signs of bipolar and I ended up chucking my worries in it, specifically when the feelings are the most intense. And in general I started writing it kind of going on one of my beloved topics regarding sexuality because there's still no guideline and we fall in love often (if we are on the romantic scale of course:) ) and I just get angry at many things and even if I myself feel very dettached from women these days, I still use that in the sense that I presume Jamie would be somewhere on that scale and it's a bit weird and unusual for me because my gender shifts when it comes to women, but I've been very distant from that and settled and gay now, so yeah. So it's still interesting to muse on and frankly I wasn't going to post this, I was pondering on Relationship Values but I ended up writing the last bits and here they are x)
With everything happening it's rather odd kind of thinking of places which people would label as home, like where you grew up and since I've lived in many places I frankly only feel like the only place I'd go back where I lived would be Colombia and that's it, but it gets hard at times since I've been living and attached to the UK for so long, so with too many memories you get nostalgic and hateful, frankly, so of course the theme of some lost home always goes on in my stories. And without realizing it I ended up shoving it here and the more I wrote the chapter the more I had places in Stockholm in my head and I realized I miss it xD since I live in another part of Sweden now x) Uni and all xD So yeah.
I also now with age calmed down and so did Callie, we kind of go back to things we've liked, as in different products we would avoid the first years we moved out, like we're frantically drinking Guaraná now or I've been back to drinking Twinnings.
I think one of the things which changed a lot for me over the years was also London, which I don't speak of but where I frankly grew up as well, visiting so often and spending there months and months at times. It's really odd to see how it became so Brit washed and fucking racist. It's really not what it was when I was growing up. My last visits was me just having panic attacks because it's just so uncomfortable. So kind of putting Jamie there was easy and having that based off his experiences, since I could use mine even if it's very briefly for a few lines. I think rather long on a few lines and then write them to have this vivid image really.
The Miles reply was me describing what Callie had described to me a few months after we moved out from the UK and she went to pick up our stuff. Never forget fucking custom controls which didn't want to let her through when she had a ticket back and she was there for a day, because they said that what if she were to stay and then they would have to use tax money to deport her (she had the ticket back and trust me, at that point we wanted to burn everything to the ground). So, shoutout to ignorance.
For some reason when it came to the party I thought of Stockholm and somewhere near Södermalm actually, I won't remember now exactly since I would be obsessed with walking all over the city and different neighborhoods and etc. And that made me miss Stockholm because well that's where me and Callie moved quite a while back and it just gave a piece of mind and I miss it dearly, but Uni xD so yeah and the apartment situation is a disaster. I feel terrible for everyone searching for apartments there, it's impossible to find anything.
I also just pick up with no proper story and I keep thinking of it as I keep writing, that's how this chapter came to be from now xD and besides the last chunks after Jamie's last speech, was on that wave and it was long already and longer than the previous and it was supposed to end there, but hey, the more the better 8)
I thought of Alex and Miles getting dared to kiss, but I ended up putting it in retrospective which I enjoyed the outcome more and the whole story and universe kind of is a big flip to all the wrong assumptions we do like sexuality and frankly attitude to queerness really. Such was the dare scene and the irony that Arielle would never think on Miles.
I always enjoy hearing stories how people met and asking on the gossip, so I just fiddled my mind around thinking how would Valentine and Jamie hit off or how did they, so I just did a weird attempt here and obviously this is an AU where Jamie has different and other things on his mind, also Jamie identifies as gay here now, so yeah.
I really based off the whole feelings of telling someone to fuck off entirely from quickly picking up the last time I had broken up with my ex, it's odd that to write angsty stuff you need to torment bad relationships you've had, obviously. But when I was growing up in my teens, when shit things happened to me (don't let me fool you, it's often that I think this, much rarer, but like weird things like odd blizzards mostly work now) I would think, cool, now I can describe this and this was one of the ridiculous reasons which would follow me to do things as well, so I could describe them. My only failed attempt at a hook up was because I wanted to try it so I could describe it. Disastrous. xD Ended fucking me up and losing faith in humanity XD
I'm not one which has it easy to get over people, since I torment myself a lot by taking out things to write or in general I think a lot, I talk a lot (Callie mostly, I literally don't shut up xD) so I end up analyzing my life 3 times a day, so it's even harder so I wanted to address that really and yeah.
I frankly am posting this because I liked the new bouquet of roses to love analogy. Seriously, I'm posting it because of that. That's how smart and thoughtful my decisions are. I've had many deja vus with people I've liked and I think main 3 perhaps or odd feelings or odd circumstances if you must. The first was this guy who resembled this other guy which frankly showed me how I wanted my writing to be and I never hit it off, so I met this other guy who resembled him. Was a disaster, but it was more of a big eye opener at the time, so yeah, looking back, I was male at that period and also when I met Callie. Also seeing Callie was a big deja vu and last one is well, the current state of affairs, really. Anyway.
The ending is more of an ode to me accepting myself and finding some peace of mind as male and gay, really. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it and my odd long rambling.
Thank you and tell me if you liked it
<3
Jamie
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