Clear and Bright: Chapter Four: Choices

                                                       
Where did he? How did he? Why does he?

Me?

Me.

It's me I see. My face. Everywhere. It's all around me. Paintings. A veritable gallery. Of me.

"Ive looked everywhere for you," I hear him say quietly from behind me.

I do not reply. I do not speak. I do not make a sound. I am stunned into silence by what's before me, surrounding me.

I'm suddenly filled with a sense of sorrow. I recognize one. I know it. I know it well. I know who. I know the story behind the image. I know what it represented. To the artist. To him. It's my face, confused contemplation visible in every feature. It's blurred around the edges, focus diminishing, as if you can actually see it moving backwards. A haze covers it in the slightest subtle way. He was talented. His brush held brilliance, fueled to life by his hand, fed by his deep and ever pensive mind.

Alex. My Alex. My anguished love. He said he was losing me. I was slipping away from him. Fading, like something loved, but not protected from harsh elements. He was the harshest element. His love, meant to pull me close, pushed me out of his reach. That was what he said. His words, again and again. I loved him. I did. I tried. I did. He was troubled, so very troubled. He had demons inside of him, anger, rage, sorrow. For so long, he didn't let them touch me, touch us, but they were there. They consumed him. Some I knew of...

He never got over his father's death. Never came to terms with the loss of that man he loved so much. Never forgave his mother for the choices she made after. Alex was an American, moved to Paris by his mother and her romantic dreams.

He didn't want to leave his home. He didn't want to leave his father behind, all of the memories of him. She was cold. She was selfish. She shed no tears for her husband, the man who loved her, the man who had given her everything. She gave her son no comfort, no compassion. She didn't help him heal. She ripped him from everything he knew, every comfort he might find in his home. He had lost the most important person in his life, with no warning, no goodbye. His father was taken from him suddenly, tragically. His life as he knew it was forever changed, and she took everything he had left in much the same way. He hated her for that. I'm not sure she noticed. If she did, she didn't seem to care. She cared about herself. She cared about things. She cared for the countless men who left their scents on her pillows. They never stayed long. She blamed her son for that. They didn't leave because of him. They left because she had nothing to offer them. They left because she was shallow, selfish, and greedy. They left because a whore's bounty is quickly pillaged.

She didn't like me. She didn't want me in his life. She didn't like the changes she saw in him, although it shocked me that she saw them at all. He was happy. Well, he was happier. His painting brought him peace. I brought him joy. His words, said so often. I loved him, he knew I did. It took him time to believe it, that anyone could, but he accepted it eventually. I wanted to help him heal. I wanted him to see what I saw, how special he was. I gave him everything I could. It wasn't enough. He wanted more. He wanted too much. He needed too much. Me. He needed me too much. It suffocated me. It frightened me. I knew he wouldn't hurt me, but there was something that I couldn't quite wrap my head around. Something dark. It was as if he wanted to consume me. His love for me was changing. Changing him. Changing us. I tried to talk to him, make him understand. He needed to understand that he was scaring me. I tried. He didn't hear me. He showed me the painting, told me it's story. I told him it didn't have to be that way. He didn't have to lose me, watch me fade... he didn't hear that, either. He got worse. I got more frightened. I had given all I could to this troubled young man. I gave him my heart. He wanted my soul. I couldn't give him that. I left. I had to. For me.

I never knew about the other paintings. These paintings that surround me now in my beautiful stranger's apartment. He had painted me many times, but these... he must have done them after I left. They seemed to be a series, beginning with that one he had shown me. Each one more unfocused. Each one a different, more distant expression. Each one farther and farther from his reach. Oh, Alex. My heart breaks as I look at his pain. The last image cuts. It's like the others, only my face is barely visible, so far away. There's a hand reaching towards me... As an artist, it's breathtaking. As the subject, how can I put into words the pain I feel for him? I can't. There are none.

I've been looking at these paintings long enough to know their intended order. This is not the way they are displayed here. They are completely reversed. It is now that I realize that the hand reaching for my disappearing figure is not the last. Next to it is a simple canvas of black, covered in a subtle, foggy haze. Simple? No, it's anything but simple. It's tragic. Although I know I shouldn't, I step closer to see the date in the bottom corner. My heart stops. Tears well in my eyes. No. Please, no. I know this day, this terrible day. Alex painted this darkness on the day he took his own life.

I can't feel my legs. I can't breathe. The pain is consuming me. He is taking from me what I wouldn't give him. I don't want to give it now. It isn't my fault. She blamed me. Is this why? That wretched woman! She didn't even cry for him, her lost son. I cried. I cried for him. I cried until the tears would no longer come. I'm crying for him now. His hurt. His pain. His demons. His loss. His desperation. His fight. His surrender. He surrendered. I'm not responsible for that. My heart breaks to know that his thoughts were of me on his final day, but I can't carry that blame. He made a choice. I couldn't save him.

I reach out, I don't even know for what. I need something, something to hold onto. He is there. Of course he is. He's been standing somewhere behind me, giving me time. How long have I been standing here? How long have I been lost in this onslaught of painful memories from the past? These new wounds formed with new knowledge? Has he spoken? No, I'm sure he hasn't. Not since... what was it that he had said? I hear his words as if he is speaking them now ... I've looked everywhere for you... I close my eyes, and take a deep breath. No, he won't consume me. The past won't consume me, I won't let it. He made his choice. I have to make mine. Forward. I want to go forward.

I turn slowly. He's so close. My heart starts beating again. Beating hard. It's almost painful, but I like it. It means I'm alive. It means I can feel. I see sorrow in his eyes. For me. He knows he has caused me pain, but I had to see. He needed me to see. I trusted him to show me. I'm glad sensible me left me alone. I see now. He waits patiently. He knows I'm going to speak. Does he know what my words will be? Do I?

Yes. I know.

I reach up with both hands, and gently touch the corners of his down turned mouth. I want him to smile. I want to make him smile. Looking into his eyes, with a smile of my own, I say simply ...

"You found me."