gone


In the Spanish heat… the pressures and anxieties of life… her Frenchness opened up and consumed me whole. I was swallowed and unable to return to a life before I had met her, a life where thoughts were of ordinary banalities and trivialities. This was an all-engulfing flame and I was burning in its ferocity.
And yet, now, I sit here in this quiet room and suffer a deep sense of sadness and despair. I feel like everything is out of reach. I feel like I have done nothing good. The cats I cared for for all of those years are now alone and abandoned in a shelter. The people I love are distant and silent and involved. My parents live on the other side of the world and feel neglected. There is something in my blood and yet I do not fear death, I greet it and I shake its hand. When I am gone my parents will grieve and the others will say ‘oh, that guy, yes, I had a drink with him once’ and they will turn to their partners and ask what they should have for dinner.

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