Aftershock

This scene in an episode of True Blood got into my head and it’ crawling around and I can’t get it to leave. They’re doing V and they’re tripping hard. They come down from it and back in reality, it was all a dream, etc. When out of nowhere there are aftershocks. Remnants of a dream filtering into the present. Remnants of a nightmare too. Strong emotional currents from a past life woven into the mundane. I think it’s stuck up there in the space in my brain because I’m having the same thing happen somewhat frequently these days. I know it’s a false. it doesn’t even matter. The content of it, the richness of the feeling, it resonates and I can’t shake it. I’m laying in bed watching TV and the screen flashes and I’m in my old bedroom and we’re laying there and he’s touching my hair as I wake up. And it makes me feel beautiful and innocent and cherished. This simple act. Snap back into my body and I shake it away. Just a dream. A part of our life that wasn’t true to the overarching theme of it all. Just a blip. But I continue watching TV and it’s there haunting me. That feeling. That memory. It’s in the curtains, in patterns on the hard wood floor. Watching me. Reaching out to me. This sickly beautiful memory. And I’m brushing my teeth, looking in the mirror and I see us standing, his arms around me and I almost cry. I don’t see the hate, the psychotic emails, the drunken voicemails, the cards, his sick, desperate attempts at grasping on to something dead and decayed. I don’t see that at all. I see our first date at that bar in Richmond and how he held the back of my neck when he kissed me the first time. Touched my cheek. I’m wracked with sadness. Irrational stupid sadness. How can someone so long gone, so dead in my mind, so insane be so alive and vibrant in these dark recesses of my thoughts. I shake myself awake again and again only to drift back there. I’m watching him sleep. He’s got his arm around me while we watch bootleg movies on his shitty laptop. All these innocent simple things that I loved. I’ve been pushing them away since I broke up with him. I’ve held fast to all the crazy he puts out into the world and stayed strong in my decision. All the rest dammed up and now it’s flooding me all at once. All the men I’ve met in my life, all the men I know now – none of them are what I need. None of them. That’s a sad realization to come to. I can’t make any of them become what I need. I want to believe there is someone out there, which is insane because I don’t even want to be with anyone now. Just want connection. Some improvement on the past. Some real, human connection. With someone who gets me. This longing that feels like all the blood vessels in my body have been pulled out. This longing is why I’m remembering these moments with Anthony. In those moments I allowed myself to believe in happiness and oneness and connection. Those moments were just ambiguous enough that they allowed me to go there. These threads they hung on by are what fueled me to continue. Those threads are what seep into my consciousness still. Despite logic. Despite time. Despite all the growth and love and experience I have taken in this summer. Despite. If everything truly is connected then it follows that the threads from us will always haunt me and follow me and break in at random. They may wear thin but they’ll always be there. Silly human hearts. Silly wanting another person to be with. In this time, this in between, no relationship, no commitment, I’ve explored my own wants and needs and feel certain I can’t settle ever again. I date, but quickly see fundamental flaws that leave me unenthused and bored. And it’s so easy not to care, for weeks, months at a time. But then there’s an aftershock. And I’m left stunned standing there. Empty with ghosts flashing toothy smiles in my mirror.