A Friend’s Apartment
Today tried so so hard.
I spent the afternoon scrubbing the bathroom and kitchen of my friend’s apt. as she is in the latter stages of moving out. I was exhausted, mentally and physically, and all I could choose to do was focus on the task at hard, trying so so hard with every spot and stain removed to feel validated, to feel useful, to lend a helping hand. I didn’t want to let Trish down again. I’ve done it enough times. She’s a great friend, the only friend I have pretty much to whom I feel like I owe something. I’m careful not to be an intrusion to my friends. I don’t ask for many favors. I don’t ask for much of their time. Maybe that’s the problem, I’m too passive there, not assertive enough. Her, though I owe something. For all she’s done in trying to help me achieve my dreams and happiness. For letting her down time and again with my drinking to combat my sadness (something for which she is very concerned about and has let me known repeatedly) For the worrying headaches I surely put her through because of my behavior, my words, my thoughts. Anyway, I still feel really bad I wasn’t able to assist her with the move yesterday for sake of drama prevention. I know she told me not to worry about it because she was looking out for me, not because she actually thought drama would happen, but because I am stubborn enough to pretend things are fine even when they aren’t. Trish is an expert on reading body language. I can’t hide my motives around her. And she would be able to see right through me if seeing Sara made me the slightest upset, and she wasn’t going to allow that to happen to me. So I scrubbed and scrubbed. Barely exchanged words. I was that tired and running on who knows what left. Afterwards, while waiting for the U-Haul truck to arrive, I leaned against he wall with my eyes closed. Trish brought a pillow and led me to what used to be her bedroom, and I took a nap. She even draped a blanket across me even though it was 100 degrees plus. I thought it was sweet.
The finality hit me. Although in real honestly, not much has actually changed. She isn’t moving crazy far, and it shouldn’t honestly affect very much what social engagements we do partake in, but in other ways, yeah it changes a lot. A lot of memories in that place, even though I can’t say I was over there all that often. I’d go stretches of a couple to a few months without visiting, then in spurts be there every week or so. The earliest memory was with Casey going swimming with a group of friends. Hanging out in Trish’s apt afterwards, talking and stuff. That was a couple of summers ago, and it is possible that memory may not be totally accurate. Then a couple of weeks after Casey leaving, Trish inviting me to her place for hamburgers, the first time really I spent time with her one on one. Then Sara came by and we stayed up until 2am watching movies, going to Wal-Mart, throwing stuffed peeps, making me feel like, you know, I can make it through this. The party that fall done after a 11-12 hour workday that turned out to be quite a giant mistake, a mixture of alcohol, severe crankiness brought out by sleep deprivation, and the start of a heartbreak. Hanging out this past spring, drinking so much I had to be restrained from stumbling out onto Campbell Rd at midnight, watching her cats go crazy, making her and Sara laugh with my witticisms, jumping up and touching bears on the nose, bears that would mean something later, showing them some of the reasons I indeed drink; it loosens me up. That might have been the happiness night in 2013 thus far. Spending Valentine’s Day afternoon fixing that bear up juuuuust perfect in her room. The times this summer where I would meet up there to go swimming after dark and have Trish and Sara unsuccessfully teach me to swim, but it was still fun as hell having them try and baffling them with my inability to “get it”. Good memories, for the most part, spent with some of my closest friends.
When I was working at the customer service desk at the grocery store, I took delight in closing the registers and various machines: the lottery machine, the Western Union, the money orders. I felt like an angel of death slowly killing the store every night. So I felt familiar sleeping in a room that consisted solely of myself, a pillow, and a blanket, closing out Trish’s apt in a sense. I think I was the last person to fall asleep in that apt. Two years ago, NO ONE would have placed money on that. A tired, nearly broken man, exhausted by this month. A month that saw a close friend move to Oklahoma, another good friend declare for the Air Force and hasn’t spoken to me since for no known reason, Trish moving, albeit only 20 or so minutes away, Sara currently in exile from my life while I clear my head, and discovering today that despite what my car note book says, I have another year on my loan, meaning I have to live with my debt another year. This month has one more chance to break me, and then it will fail to do so. It’s trying so so hard. Brands survive; it’s what my family does.
The angel of death bids good night.