Come Back

"Come back," I call, to no reply.

-

I remember a lot.

It's a cliché to say that.

Perhaps? Or is it more cliché to say you don't remember as much as you would like to?

What if we are all just a measure of both?

I remember the time I walked a beach in North Uist with nothing on my feet but callouses and an ingrained toenail. It was torturous.

A whirlwind of emotions rips through me. I stumble through the wreckage of another night with Johnnie Walker and Jim Beam and spot a familiar mug.

The mug was unremarkable—except for its existence. That’s what elevated it. That's all anything, even a simple mug needs to raise it from its humble purpose of mere practicality.

I don’t quite recall how I know this, but I believe it belonged to someone I held in the highest regard.

A gift? A token of love, perhaps.

Love. Such a trivial word.

Lust—the world drags it through the gutter, but it was something sacred. Untouchable.

The way the room curved and swayed when they moved—

Their voice like liquor or velvet, lips like the holy word—soft, sacred, dangerous.

They spoke incantations, not simple stories.

And I? I was transfixed, transposed.

Songs and ballads for hearts, breaking over again at the mere thought of separation.

Why do I remember the way they moved but not their name?

Why does the world feel hollow where they used to be?

The face is blurry. But the space they left—the shape of the world without them—is distracting, distressing, disheartening.

That walk along the beach in North Uist. The torturous walk with nothing on my feet but the sores of a thousand other walks and an ingrained toenail. That was in honour of them, of her I believe.

"Move on, move on."

That's what so many people say.

How can you move on if you’re not sure you ever moved in the first place?

For all anyone knows, these could be the words and concocted, distorted retellings of the past by a raving lunatic.

I was a raving lunatic around them. Love and loyalty can do that. When tested and proven, in equal measures.

That I remember. Thinking of what I remember—I remember reading that nostalgia was once considered a psychological disorder. Does that mean I'm disordered?

For romanticising the past and remembering someone from the void left in their wake?

Still, I should probably just take my "medicine" and let oblivion swallow me whole. Again.

Losing something—or someone—precious isn't the hardest part. It's trying to grip the memories tight enough to stop them from dying.

Time, as it moves on, strips them down for parts and feeds them to the great black hole in our minds.

I found a stray hair. It was not mine.

Blonde, with red highlights. Smelled just faintly of grape. Or maybe nectarine.

Softer than cotton. Even the finest Egyptian cotton. The connection, the connective tissue it offers in my mind masks the hollowness, the emptiness of a single strand of hair. Lifeless and without a body. Yet, it's what I need. I. Think. So. Anyway?

Different from my thinning grey. That smells of regret, sadness and stale whiskey.

If someone were here and is no longer here, surely they must have existed, for if they didn't exist, there would be no evidence of their existence?

Yet, my memories are fading and my memories are not memories anymore. They are more poorly learned lies I tell myself. I tell myself that everything will be okay and that if I just move on.

The debate rages on in my mind, though. I forget how long it has been there, at the forefront of my mind when I can't sleep.

I'm cursed to play back this debate in my mind and out loud. My cabin of solitude is safety—from prying eyes and ever-curious ears.

Sipping more of this dark amber elixir, I'm sure I see someone across from me. Surely it can't be? Wait.

-

"Come back," I call, to no avail.

No. Alone again.

Was I ever not alone?

Without—wait. Where is that hair?

Searching for it, among the unopened letters to names I don't remember

and the ashes of cigarettes I don't remember smoking.

Whose hair?

Whose... hair?

If I could find it, I could decipher it. Decode it's makeup. Come to know its origin?

On a cellular level? Would that give me the serenity I desire?

Would it transform something toxic into... sacred? Or just more poison in a prettier bottle.

Maybe it was hers. Maybe that night—the last night—we argued. Just a silly disagreement. I think.

But, like the sandcastles of my memories, when the tides of time come to shore, the hair has disappeared.

If it disappeared.

That means it was here, though.

That means I'm not losing my mind, right?

The hair was proof. And now it’s gone. So what does that prove? Nothing or something?

A hair is just a hair, but it's forensic.

A song on the radio plays that echoes the memory of a person no longer here.

"We're just two lost souls

swimming in a fishbowl,

year after year.”

-

"Come back," I call again into the silence.

I am alone again.

Was I ever not alone?

Without. Always without.

"All we love, we leave behind."

Maybe if I gaze in the mirror,

at the wasted remains of a once-dignified

or at least coherent and lucid individual staring back at me.

He can't help me, and I can't help him. We are lost.

The more I forget, the more gets left in the dust bowl of the past where my mind can’t reach.

I can't "tell Heaven from hell." Maybe I need to experience both...

-

"Come back," I call

".… How I wish, how I wish you were here."

But still alone.

Always, forever. Empty.

There’s so much I remember. Too much.

"The same old fears, wish you were here"

I remember more than I care to.

That’s the problem.

It’s all a cliché—memory, loss, longing.

But that doesn’t

make it any less real.

*

Thanks for reading!

Author's Notes: This is my first entry for the Vocal+ Summer Writing Series, which I am quite excited about. This story is for the You Were Never Really Here Challenge. You can find out more about both, by clicking either of the following links -

There is a line from "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd and "All We Love We Leave Behind" by Converge in the story.