Page 47 of Last Seen
“‘I will live a wonderful life, full of joy and happiness.’”
“Who’s the therapist now?” At Alison’s glare, I shook my head. “Fine. I will live a wonderful life, full of joy and happiness.”
Alison stood, wobbly as a colt, and she threw her arms around me.
“I’m holding you to that, Armstrong.”
“Handon,” I said. “I’m taking back my maiden name.”
Alison grinned. “Good for you! Fuck him. Fuck Tyler!”
“Yeah, fuck him.”
I poured Alison into a cab, then went back up to the loft. Even though I was bored and wanted it, divorce was sad, no matter how you cut it. I’d been promised joy, promised happiness, but all I’d gotten wasa richly oppressive sorrow, something new for me. Maybe a little rage thrown in for good measure.
The honest truth? While our marriage ended because I checked out, Tyler thinks he left me. He thought I didn’t know he’d found another woman. That didn’t matter to me in the least. What pained me was the argument at the end of it all. The hurtful things he said—because as much as I didn’t feel them the way another woman might, they hurt me in their way. That he wanted to be with someone who wasn’t always detached. Someone who wanted to make love all the time, who wasn’t dulled into a stupor by medication, unable to accept or receive pleasure. It had become a thing, I learned during our last blowout fight. Somehow, my inability to get off was the end for him.
I could. I can. Just not with him.
I had no choice, really; I had to start over. Tyler had always laughed at my dreams. I will take great pleasure in showing him that he’s wrong.
Getting into the retreat after all this time was providence and reminds me again and again that I deserve this and I need to believe in my creative abilities. I’ve always been a writer. Now I’m going to try to make it a profession.
And perhaps take care of a few other loose ends along the way. If I’m lucky.
I’m so lost in thought that I don’t see the small root pushing its way up through the cement, and catch my toe, stumbling forward. I windmill my arms to gain my balance and end up sprawled on the pavement. My knee is on fire, and when I pull up my jeans, I realize it’s bleeding. Damn.
“Whatever, asshole,” I say aloud, clambering to my feet. “I’m going to be famous and successful in my chosen career.” The birds chirp their agreement. That part of my life is over. I’m shedding Tyler like an ill-fitting dress. Had I ever loved him? I must have, to agree to marry him, right? If love is something someone like me can experience, then yes, I think I did. He was safety. A handsome, safe place to land when I struck out on my own after college, a seemingly nice guy who wantedthe same things I did—no kids, travel, culture. At the beginning, he loved that I wasn’t clingy, or needy. Turned out, he did want kids, he preferred football to the symphony, and his idea of travel was taking the Staten Island Ferry to work on Wall Street. Plus, he started to see my emotional independence as a detriment. Apparently he did want someone to fawn all over him.
I couldn’t be honest with him. Not about everything. Not about who I really am. He knew a version of me, the one I curate for people, the person I molded myself into being to fit into society. To be on guard all the time with the person who shares everything in your life is exhausting.
Little by little, the marriage chipped away. My world shrank, until I started to realize nothing was going to change.
Well, that isn’t true any longer, is it? The second I sign the papers and put them in the mail, the business of the divorce will be complete, and I will be free. I will start fresh, rise up from the ashes, become the writer I was always meant to be. After years of applications, I’m here, in the writing program at Brockville, fulfilling my dearest dream.
Yeah, you really are something. Shrinking away from it after the first opportunity to shine.
I can’t argue when he tells the truth. I hadn’t shone. I maybe glowed for a second, a heartbeat, but that nascent flame had been extinguished immediately because that blond bitch tried to get on top first.
Why did I let Brenda, of all people, get to me? I allowed a stranger to size me up and judge me unworthy. I am just as worthy as Brenda, just as capable of creative excellence. Probably more so.
So why didn’t I stand up for myself? Why had I let the whole class drag on my story?
You know why.
“Shut. Up.”
I’m talking to empty air. And the trip down memory lane has cost me; I’ve lost track of where I am. I stop and turn in circles. Thepath along the river winds serpentine through Brockville, the only nongeometric thing I’ve seen so far. The sky is a shimmery cobalt and the trees a vibrant viridian. The water reflects them both, and it is disorienting. The cabin is that way, right?
All these trees. It’s beautiful, but it’s sinister, too. I haven’t slept well since I got here. Too quiet. Too gentle. I’m used to Boston, to the sirens and bustle and the constancy of the noise. The sense that I’m never really alone, that a knock on the wall will produce one in return. Probably with a curse word to boot.
Brockville is lovely, but it’s isolated. To hear the wind moving the treetops, the hoots of an owl, makes me uncomfortable. The forest has eyes everywhere. I feel like I’m under constant surveillance. Who knew the depths of nature could be so overwhelming? That such pervasive silence would allow my soul to be noisy?
Grow up. A breeze won’t hurt you.
I grit my teeth and get my bearings—I don’t think I’ve passed the path to the cabins yet, so I must still be on the appropriate route. I continue walking the river footpath, now examining my purpose, my goals. Reminding myself that I am here for a reason, notably to break out of my old construct, to become someone new. To be a writer, I need to let go of the shackles on my own ego, allow the voice in my head to shift into something entertaining and exciting. Something real. I can’t be uneasy with it any longer. Tammy is right. I need to let go. Dig deep and allow myself to have some kind of authenticity on the page. It’s the one place Icanbe myself and no one will be the wiser. The one place I can unleash the horror and pain and cataclysmic thinking that have come to be my normal.
I see now how trite the story is. Fantasizing a husband’s death when he is caught cheating? Come on. There’s nothing new there. Nothing fresh. I could be the best writer in the world, and without a better concept, I will go nowhere.
