My love, did you know
That ten years ago
I was wind-tossed and wrecked by you?
I asked over the telephone, "Did you ever receive your package?" You had not. So many things lost.
(A week later the battered box arrived at my door, having exploded somewhere around Maspeth and now missing a few of the gifts I'd packed. The birthday card survived. I threw it away.)
"Hmm, I sent it awhile ago." I tried to sound cheerful, but the fact that I perhaps carried much more sadness than mirth was evident upon my last visit to New York. I'd sensed it the morning I was to fly back, a panicky feeling that caused me to apologize over and over for my behavior on New Year's Eve. Behavior that was born from a longing to make us work and the discovery that you were moving on without me. It was desperate, it was not pretty, but it was love.
You ended it over the phone. It was your birthday. I couldn't quite grasp why you hadn't done it a couple of weeks prior, in person. As I fell to my knees howling, fistful of white blouse over my heart, I was glad you had not. Before the phone call ended you mentioned something (tearfully?) about keeping in contact. I said I didn't want a pen pal. This was before Facebook. We did not remain in touch.
What followed was an anniversary of sorts:
February 21st, one month, he's just going through something, he'll call. March 21st, two months, I'm slacking, teachers hate me, should I visit the city? April 21st, I was to move there soon, maybe he'll remember and change his mind? May 21st, my own birthday, I smiled, had the very best of friends surrounding me, and got black-out heartsick drunk.
By January, I was in California. I was living alone for the first time, I was lonely, I was cleaning toilets, I was acting, I was happy, I was miserable. Sitting in the theatre during a break, other actors were asking a new guy about his birthday plans. My body trembled, a little shock, as it occurred to me that your birthday was coming up. And with it, the end to this awful anniversary of what ifs. It had been an entire year. And you had not changed your mind.
"When is your birthday?" I asked the new guy.
"January 21st."
