by James Valvis
It’s the day my divorce became final. The judge asked us if there was any way we could salvage our marriage, and we shook our heads and said, “No way.”
Now I have it in my mind to get comforted the way only someone who loves you can comfort you, so I drive the hour to my girlfriend’s house but when I get there I’ve forgotten about it.
I don’t know, I’ve grown quiet, brooding. My wife (now ex-wife) had cried. She was bitter, brutal, too honest; and the hour drive, alone, has let things settle inside me.
So I’m sitting there, girlfriend across from me, neither of us talking, but especially me, and I’ve got the newspaper, trying to think of anything but myself, when my girlfriend says to me, “Why did you come here?”
“Excuse me?”
“Why did you come here if you’re going to be like this?”
Well, why I came escapes me, and other things escape me as well. Like, why have I ever come here?
“I don’t know,” I tell her.
“I don’t know?” she says. “Is that the only answer you can give?’
It’s one of those sad moments when things begin to end, when the high wire of love snaps, and you have nothing to do but fall.
I’ve felt it before with many things, women, friends, jobs, good things that die, just die.
Now there is an argument. (There are always arguments, but you never know why they happen, or how to end them, but I guess it’s part of the process of knowing when to quit.)
Then I get it in my head she’s upset I’m not happy my divorce is final.
Oh, how can I tell her failure is always sad, and saddest of all is the failure of love; even when you recognize the love hasn’t worked, the sadness remains and endures.
But our argument continues, holding us, as it perpetuates itself under the guise of proving a point, what point exactly we’re trying to prove I don’t know, except maybe that we’re both screwed.
Then suddenly it’s over; it’s over but it is not. The argument leaves a residue.
And later there’s love but it’s not as good, Later there’s hope but there’s not as much; and the day becomes ash, becomes night, becomes death, like a woman gathering her things to run, run, run.
And still later I’m inside my car, the cabin thick with Florida’s wet heat, asking myself, “So why did I go there? Why do any of us go there?”
I don’t know.
Yes, that’s the only answer I can give.