brings you here
“It seems very pretty,” I walk around a theatre lobby looking at various bouquet arrangements left after an opening night, “but it’s rather hard to understand.” Every card inside each bouquet has been signed by one hand. There is only one fan behind this. However, the cards bear no signature. Instead, they each list a film title. One says, “My Own Private Idaho”, another, “Drugstore Cowboy”, yet another, “Elephant”, and another yet, “Serry”. “Hmmm..”, think I, taking a sip of espresso and turning around.
At the opposite end of the lobby stands Stanley, short hair and mystery eyes.
I take another sip, exaggerating the slowness of my reaction. I lower my eyes, to bring them up again. I empty my hands of the smallness of the cup and… what else?.. oh yeah… open my arms widely for the hug of a honey-like “ahhhh…!” As if nothing ever hurt us, Stanley and I are talking freely now, laughing and not remembering.
“What brings you here?” I say, knowing the answer. “A Russian play,” he says too seriously and too loudly to out-yell the wires of the street lamps outside. “I was a part of it tonight,” I say with dignity, “I still am and so are you now.” “I recognize that,” he smiles with relief. He stays nervous for ten minutes. I am not nervous any more. I just spent my own first ten minutes in the distance, looking at his profile and mostly at his back, having noticed him before he saw me. Time passes, the crowd around us melts. He is not nervous anymore, just close and familiar. We laugh like maniacs at each other’s jokes because we have always in the time before... ahhh... The theatre is empty now and, as if there was never anything ever, we are still talking in the middle of the hall. The past has no effect.
I get into his car. Even the car’s color hasn’t changed. “I still have the video of you cleaning the snow off it,” he shows me the video he shot with his phone and we almost get hit by some van because he is also driving at the same time. As if nothing ever broke before, we laugh. I feel like I have never left this very passenger seat. “I’m really a cowboy,” he said back then about the Volkswagen, “And this is my trusted horse, my VeeDub…”
The wires are now going, “BZZZZZ” and we are approaching the new residence of Sir Don Stanoite which he had acquired so recently that I have not been to it yet.
It’s both familiar and unfamiliar, to be here in this moment.This place is all him. Not like his last home with a transient mattress on the floor in the corner and a closet empty of any clothes. I was never invited to stay in that home. When I insisted not to be at my place for a change, he took me to his parents' house instead or, even, up North to his cottage. During that time of his recovery process, Mr. Stanley was reflecting, hurting, and taking a break. I met him while on this break. Eventually his break was over and life sprung back into those smirky eyes and cheeky cheeks. But he never took me with him into his life.
I escape breakfast the next day. My mind takes me over as it does. I now know why we hurt so much as we did back then. In reality it was not painful at all, but our minds were cluttered. We did not quite make it out. The day has come for me to see that these ideas were just ideas, never reality.
You and I are no longer statues on the frozen pond. We are moving pictures, me and you, Cowboy. My Jewish Cowboy.
At the opposite end of the lobby stands Stanley, short hair and mystery eyes.
I take another sip, exaggerating the slowness of my reaction. I lower my eyes, to bring them up again. I empty my hands of the smallness of the cup and… what else?.. oh yeah… open my arms widely for the hug of a honey-like “ahhhh…!” As if nothing ever hurt us, Stanley and I are talking freely now, laughing and not remembering.
“What brings you here?” I say, knowing the answer. “A Russian play,” he says too seriously and too loudly to out-yell the wires of the street lamps outside. “I was a part of it tonight,” I say with dignity, “I still am and so are you now.” “I recognize that,” he smiles with relief. He stays nervous for ten minutes. I am not nervous any more. I just spent my own first ten minutes in the distance, looking at his profile and mostly at his back, having noticed him before he saw me. Time passes, the crowd around us melts. He is not nervous anymore, just close and familiar. We laugh like maniacs at each other’s jokes because we have always in the time before... ahhh... The theatre is empty now and, as if there was never anything ever, we are still talking in the middle of the hall. The past has no effect.
I get into his car. Even the car’s color hasn’t changed. “I still have the video of you cleaning the snow off it,” he shows me the video he shot with his phone and we almost get hit by some van because he is also driving at the same time. As if nothing ever broke before, we laugh. I feel like I have never left this very passenger seat. “I’m really a cowboy,” he said back then about the Volkswagen, “And this is my trusted horse, my VeeDub…”
The wires are now going, “BZZZZZ” and we are approaching the new residence of Sir Don Stanoite which he had acquired so recently that I have not been to it yet.
It’s both familiar and unfamiliar, to be here in this moment.This place is all him. Not like his last home with a transient mattress on the floor in the corner and a closet empty of any clothes. I was never invited to stay in that home. When I insisted not to be at my place for a change, he took me to his parents' house instead or, even, up North to his cottage. During that time of his recovery process, Mr. Stanley was reflecting, hurting, and taking a break. I met him while on this break. Eventually his break was over and life sprung back into those smirky eyes and cheeky cheeks. But he never took me with him into his life.
I am finally in a place where he actually lives. Busy kitchen cupboards. An espresso maker. Antique furniture. Story board covered with notes on paper squares. A big luscious bed. Curtains. Stanley.
We hug again and this time this tall, solid person of a man looks like a boy, far removed from our broken story and its histrionic passages. Everything disappears: time, pain. It’s only us now, floating. I let out little moans. I kiss all the little creases of his skin. I used to be too good to notice the creases of his skin. I used to be too good to please him. I want to let all between us go. It is not about keeping a face, it is about helping each other heal. Little creases of his skin… I am tiny, wrapped up in his huge body. I call him ‘baby’ and hear him pant in this word. There is no time. There is no pain.
I escape breakfast the next day. My mind takes me over as it does. I now know why we hurt so much as we did back then. In reality it was not painful at all, but our minds were cluttered. We did not quite make it out. The day has come for me to see that these ideas were just ideas, never reality.
You and I are no longer statues on the frozen pond. We are moving pictures, me and you, Cowboy. My Jewish Cowboy.
posted by Zosja at 9:52 PM
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