Featherweight

I sat in the darkness of my car, my hands gripping the steering wheel, with the lights off and the cold air entombing me inside. Though my memory escaped me for that vague moment in time, I could still remember that I was slouched over, my back bent and sore. Hanging my head, I felt a fierce exhaustion sweeping through me. My whole body was heavy and sweaty, riddled with unknown ailments and of course . . . years of lying.

I just sat in my car for what seemed like hours and hours and hours. Time soon dissolved into dusk, and dusk stumbled into night. I was tired and nauseous as well as other things--I feared I may have conjured up an illness other than alcoholism. I was . . . sinking, into some summer from the cooling embers of guilt; I was like the sun.

Am I going crazy? No, I'm just going down.

Jack came to visit me. He chased down the night, as I stayed there leaning into the steering wheel of my car. I knew that he would always be there for me, to give me comfort--no, not comfort . . . loss. It isn't the feeling of death or a sad story on the news . . . but when you're running through the cricket crowded grass in the dark night, your ankles tickled by sweat and greenness, never catching that one moment right in front of you. It's always, always ahead . . .

I will never find my way out of this darkness, will I? Never mind my foolish poetic ramblings. Never mind.

Setting the bottle aside, I leaned back to lose myself in bouts of wonder, of how I could have been so stupid, so gullible . . . so merciless. I didn't mean to hurt anyone, honest. I just . . .

I suddenly heard the harsh halt of tires and the soft closing of a car door. I sat, watching with blurred vision the familiar figure in front of me which approached with caution. Under the warm light of the lamppost, he came traipsing up in his innocent fashion.

I needed him . . . but I didn't, at the same time.

I saw him wave out of the corner of my eye, peering through the foggy, rain stained window with eagerness and curiosity. Ironically, I was furious with him for not being furious with me for leaving like that. If I was him, I'd pump me for answers and then bash my skull in.

I opened the door after a minute or two -- I don't remember how long it was, actually -- and he crouched down next to the door with his hand resting on the inside handle, gazing at me with curious eyes. His breath was very close to mine, suddenly. In and out, in and out. I could feel the clashing sensation of pure and impure oxygen burning against my skin while he adjusted his awkward stance, silently waiting for me to recognize him.

"Oh, look at you now," he said, his voice dripping with a combination of surprise and melancholy "Let's get you home. You need some rest." I think that was the moment I forgot everything.

I could only hear the sound of fluttering wings when he pulled me from the seat of the car. His familiar hands were gripping my arms; I could feel the worry emanate from their bones. His mouth was moving but I could not hear the words. My lips tingled and were so very tired of poems and angular words.

Birds flew from my mouth. They disappeared into clouds in endless and dizzy migrations from the deepest secrets in me. My whispers were the wind under their wings; their hums were the beats of my voodoo drum heart. They appeared upon each other like a great white canvas--a pure, distant, milky ocean.

* * *

He growled through his gritted teeth into the unforgiving halls of his large estate; his voice emanated from a part of him I had not known before . . . some dark place, where all traces of sympathy were cleverly raked from the shores of his insides by impending waves of rage.

A crushing sensation approached me when his took his hand to his chest, as if he was holding his ribcage together. I had never seen him cry--no, sob like this in all my life. The look in his eyes persuaded me to wait for him to speak.

"How could you do this to me?"

His eyes lingered on mine, hurricanes twisting in their lids from floods and critical winds. I stumbled back a little against the dining room table with my hand outstretched, bruising the back of my ankle in the process.

I deserved it.

"I--I can't . . ." His words were completely broken apart. Sobs wrenched through his chest like a fucking seizure. Guilt had done the same for me.

"I'm sorry," I whispered pathetically while I averted my eyes to the wooden floor. Silence occupied the space between us for what felt like hours, and when I looked up from the unbearably boring dust motes between the floorboards, I found his eyes again. He gave me a look that destroyed all chances I had of making amends with him.

"'Sorry' doesn't even begin to describe you."

* * *

The rain pounded against the window of his truck, and I felt the sickness toss in my stomach. The awkwardness of the drive guided my breathing into violence; being with him, right there, right next to me, drove my capillaries into madness. I feared the naturally satisfying comfort of easy breathing was now irretrievable to me.

It was strange, the way a pair of lifelong friends, not to mention brothers, could be so silent after a day like this. To this day, I'm still not sure what the air smelled like in the cab of his truck. Perhaps it was the scent of stale cigarette smoke, or the peeling leather on the seats, or the abundant stalks of wheat that surrounded the road as we advanced toward the secluded house outside of town.

Maybe, just maybe . . . it was his awaiting breath, stitched with nicotine and the eagerness of asking me all kinds of questions. Judging by the intense quietness, I am sure he struggled with holding his voice--it pummeled against his lips and made abrupt coughs into his hand when he turned corners.

I know the feeling.