So Close

“I knew you weren’t coming back. That boy coulda drop dead at your feet and you woulda have curled up next to his corpse.”

Mark said that. Mark knows pretty much everything ever. And I have to admit this to be the absolute truth.

I am gone.

I’m also not supposed to mention Him, but I have once, in passing, when I was listing off all the things I had to go through, get through, and live through out there. Whoops. His ex did stalk the fuck outta me. These things happened, no point in denying them. Kinda proud of surviving really.

And ya, a fucking lot of it sucked, hard, bad and overwhelmingly. I felt like I was in a boxing match, just hit after hit, but I wasn’t punch drunk…I was actually drunk.

A lot of good happened too.

I saw whales and dolphins.

Funny story actually. My second time whale watching we came back to harbor and there were 4 boys out on seadoos, I felt a little twinge of “I wanna be doing that.” Instead of having to rush home to get to work after having this amazing day. I dismissed the thought as quickly as it came. I didn’t think much of it really, until later that night, when I found out by fluke (give me one pun) that the boy was on one of said seadoos, and it became a metaphor for how things were. I’m over here doing one thing, he’s over there doing another… close but never quite right.

So be it.

I am gone.

I went to the quarry with Mandy today. Had the sunroof open. Coffee, smokes, open road and the music cranked. I haven’t been swimming this year. No wonder I was mega-super-ultra-depressed, surround by water and I never went in past my knees. I fucking live to swim, I was at the quarry 3 days a week last year. Closest I came was walking into Middle Cove with my dress pulled up as far as I could, I wasn’t wearing panties or I woulda tore my clothes off and dived right in. Again, so close.

Speaking of…

As we were driving, I started telling Mandy the story of Mister, and it started a little something like this.

I had a broken car. Mister found me a mechanic, picked me up, took me to get a birthday cake for Lucifer Luu (a girl I worked with) and got me home. Pretty knight in ‘shining’ armor if you ask me.

He then fetched me the next day with coffee and we went for a drive to get the part I needed. He drove this big fuck off diesel pick up that made that amazing rumbling noise that gets me a lil wet, not gonna lie. It was one of the first nice days we had on the rock, I was in a t-shirt and jeans, sipping coffee (he remembered how I take mine, bless him) smoking a Marlboro, country music playing, driving with the windows down and I laughed.

He asked what was funny and I replied “Nothing at all, I am just perfectly happy in this moment.”

And I really was.

“Cute man/boy, big pick up, back roads and country music, good company, good coffee and in this exact moment everything is just fine.”

He smiled so big his eyes crinkled up at the corners.

He thought that was really cool. He thought every fucking thing I did was so fucking cool. Not only did he tell me with sparkles in his eyes and sheer reverence in his voice, he took photos. Wrangling his big dogs and getting them to heel and listen. Walking barefoot everywhere. The way I fuck, the way I look, the way I touch and talk.

I do love when I can be IN those moments.

She said “it’s so cool you can do that.” So we spent the rest of the day doing exactly that, enjoying the moment. Floating, jumping, sunbathing, chatting, making fun of the white kids down the way trying to rap and getting serenaded by so many cicadas.

She asked me to finish the story of Mister on the drive home and I sucked my teeth and chuckled in a cynical way that made her go “Uh oh.”

Ya, uh oh.

I don’t want to go through it yet one more time. I already said it once today. And ya Brandon, I cried.
Every time I scroll through my phone looking for this or that I am reminded of what he said and did…and worse, how I felt. I thought…ha, how many times have I ‘thought’ something that turned out to be bullshit. I thought that maybe, just maybe, I had to go back to that island because there was a man/boy there who thought I was made out of magic. I remember sighing this deep sigh of fucking relief and thinking, “okay, there it is.”

There it wasn’t.

The kicker is, I am made out of magic. I forgot and he reminded me, and I haven’t forgotten since.

So he did serve a purpose, all of it did. All the things I ought not to do. Waiting is on the list, I think it is the list.

Giant said he was sooooooo looking forward to me coming home and stopped messaging me 6 weeks before I got here.
I messaged him a happy birthday and he invited me over.
I am not going over there.
The Last One must have some kind of homing beacon, he messaged my first night home. At least he has some sense of self awareness and said “I know I wasn’t very good to you and you deserved so much more.” No apology, but that’ll do Donkey, that’ll do.
And no we aren’t having lunch.
Hulk wanted me to fly to BC and see him, but something came up, something important to me and I have to see it through.

Not a boy this time, a job. Something I really want.

I had a lot of isolated joyful moments out on that island. Sometimes alone or with the girls. Sometimes at work, the night Smiley and friends came by and treated me like a princess. The night I found the biker with anxiety and we hid in the corner until it was time to leave. The other time I babysat one of the seadoo boys because we were both overwhelmed with the masses out on George Street for the festival. Midnight drive with the Nope. Stolen kisses here and there. Miracle Mondays where me and Tina 2 (now 3) Chains made over a grand. Girls chilling in my clean bedroom, finding time to write, feeding my coworkers and listening to the silence because they loved what I fed them too much to talk.

There IS magic in the little things, and me.

Thanks Mister.