Page 99 of Two Marlboros

Suddenly grief lunged in, and it took possession of my heart abruptly, and squeezed it so much that tears began to trickle down and mingle with one another.

I was astonished, trembling, as the monster of pain devoured me, and it bit at my neck, injecting into me shame for the thoughts I had had and was still having, and I winced at the hardness with which I had driven away the thought that Nathan might become a set of blank pages that I could hardly wait to fill. And for a while I had, without even realizing it. Only, my pen had run out. There was no more ink, which I had wasted all on the pages of my imagination, and that was okay.

I welcomed it as another sign that I needed to go back to my already finished novel, because I didn’t feel ready to take a chance on someone other than Oliver. It was too risky. I couldn’t suffer anymore.

“Hey, are you okay?” Nelly asked again.

“No,” I answered in a rush, then swallowed because I didn’t want to be betrayed by the lump in my throat.

“Is there anything I can do for you?”

“No.”

No one could do anything about it, because no one could grant my wish to have back that life full of certainty that I missed so much.

Nelly said something else, but I did not listen. I was not interested in stupid clichés or that melancholic concern of hers. I greeted her without much ado, and only when I hung up the cordless phone the grip of guilt got loosen.

The darkness of the hall was comforting. The flickering ceased almost completely, but not the tears. Those continued to fall, without me having neither the ability nor the will to stop them.

I turned at the exact instant a sound of footsteps reached me. Nathan stood there, uncertain of what to do, and it was atthat moment that I threw everything back, including the dreams and the ideas I had put in my head. There was nothing left. Therehadto be nothing more left.

Oliver was enough for me.

“What happened?”

Was he enough for me...?

“Go away.”

“Why?”

It’s all your fault, I thought.Yours, and of the stupid dreams you make me have.

“Go away,” I repeated. “You can’t understand anyway.”

He crossed his arms.

“And why couldn’t I?”

And there popped up yet another person who wanted to have a saying in my life. Yet another one who was not resigned to the idea that I did not ask for that situation. I had not asked for Oliver to die, and for me to be forced to rebuild my life when the one I had was just fine.

Nathan had meddled far too much, also in a way I did not like and could not control. He was now looking at me with that compassionate look in his eyes that I detested in everyone, that distressed expression that they would forget about once they got back to their lives.

But not me. I could not forget. I would never be able to. Because Oliver was dead, for God’s sake, because I had seen him thrown onto the asphalt, because I had seen him disintegrate as a human being, I had fucking seen him...

“...And it’s all my fault,” I whispered through tears, the kind I hadn’t cried at his funeral, or even afterwards. And I repeated it again and again; it had been my fault, because so was the fact that I had thought of replacing him with Nathan, the same Nathan who was reaching out to hug me and whom I chased away.

“Sorry, I...”

“Stop feeling sorry for me! Everybody fucking stop it!”

I hid my face behind my hands and cried again.

“Oh, sorry,” I heard him say, between sobs. His expression, however, had something strange about it. The pity was gone.

“I’m really sorry,” he continued, and in a few steps, he was in the kitchen, where I heard him grab the markers and slam them into the case one by one. I looked out to see what he was doing, but he swept me away and headed for the shoulder strap in the living room to shove everything in.

“You have an appeal you don’t even realize you have,” he said again, pointing his finger at me. “People who love you, and even reject them, like they annoy you! I never even hadoneperson who ever asked me how I am! Not even one!”

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