Your ex-girlfriend made a tumblr and now all you can do is stare at
her face. She posts pictures of herself dressed in black, with beautiful
big hair and the saddest eyes in the world. You know that when she
looks directly into the computer camera, she pretends that it is you on
the other end but she isn't ever going to return your phone calls, even
though you call collect from the only pay phone left in the city but you
are calling not only collect but internationally and so it is double
expensive for her. You and she would joke constantly about the kind of
phone calls you would accept collect, internationally, maybe someone
from jail? Although, I guess, you would joke and she would laugh but she
didn't know how to joke, she did know how to laugh, and that's what you
liked, initially, about her, is that she wasn't always trying to joke
around, she didn't give you a lot sass, she didn't give you a lot
sarcasm or snark, she was just loving and kind and loved to crinkle her
big nose up and laugh at your jokes so you joked a lot and she didn't
but laughed a lot and that was endearing. So, you call collect because
you find this tumblr page with pictures of her in black, looking sad,
looking defeated, and then there are other pictures of her with your old
friends back in the big city where you fell in love with her and they
are looking at the camera and not missing you a bit, not missing your
presence one second. And you are certain, after being certain for long
enough, that she has told them all what happened, that you fell off,
that you fell down into a black hole, that you couldn't get yourself
out, that you keep calling collect internationally from the only pay
phone left in another city, the city you are from, but not born and
raised in. You remember when you brought her home for the first
Christmas break you had from school and how your mother, drunk and
careening, insisted that you don't sleep in the same bed but by the end
of the evening, she was tucked underneath your arm, her back to you, the
stick-and-poke tattoo that she was mortified of, so embarrassed that
she wouldn't wear anything that showed her middle back, which was fine,
she didn't need to anyway. You would trace her tattoo with your fingers
while she fell asleep and she would eventually shake your hand away, a
sign that she had had enough. That first Christmas, you snuck out and
met someone that you once loved, but in a different way, at a bar
downtown where it was loud and the other someone was drunk, having
already been there for hours waiting for you. You couldn't tell this
other person about her, the one at your parents house, you couldn't tell
this other because this other wouldn't understand about love and
falling in love in a bigger city, the way it feels to be in love with
someone that was so pure. The other gives you snark, gives you sarcasm,
yells at you, tells you that they had been waiting at the noisy weird
bar downtown all night for you, where the fuck have you been, its 1 in
the morning, I love you, they say, I never told you before but I am in
love with you. I have to go, you say, I have to go. Wait, the other
says, please wait, where are you going, you just got here. But you slam
your drink, make the other pay the tab, and run up, up, up and out back
to your parents house. You have never forgotten the way it felt to get
back into bed with her, to know that you left the other exactly where
you found her long ago, to know that the future was not downtown in some
whiskey bar but right in your parents house, it is almost Christmas,
you are going to leave from your parents house to her parents house
where you will bask on an island in the sun and celebrate the birth of
Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Her parents greet you with hugs all
around, they love your face, you are so handsome her mother says to you,
he is a real catch she says to her, keep him, he's beautiful, you will
make gorgeous babies she says to the both of you.
After how many times you call and she doesn't pick up. You slam
the receiver down how many times, so many times, you slam it until the
mouthpiece breaks, until it breaks into so many pieces. You slip on the
ice and hit your head, you are bleeding but not very much and you worry
about the blood and how much is coming from your head, worried that
maybe your head doesn't have too much blood in it anymore, aren't you
supposed to be bleeding much worse than that? How many times and she
doesn't pick up.
Your friends email you after a week or so. You have gone to the doctor
for stitches and when you ask about the blood and your head, he looks at
you as if you are some sort of fucking moron. Everything is fine, he
says, everything is fine. You are lucky it wasn't a larger wound, ice is
dangerous. Maybe you should invest in some of those ice things you slip
over your shoes like the elderly wear and he chuckles and you nod but
don't understand and don't know what they are. Your friends email you
after a week or so and tell you to stop calling her and tell you they
are no longer your friends, they were her friends first in the big city
where you fell in love. And stop looking at her tumblr page, they say,
she can track the ISP address, she knows its you.
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