Yesterday I got back in touch with Jeffrey. It had been long enough for me not to remember how long it had been. I remember a night at Grendel's with his red wine soaked shirt and my promise to pay his cleaning bill. I seem to remember the steam our breath created in the cold as we walked to the car. A long time, indeed.
I remember us squinting from the back of the Roxy during an Elliott Smith show long ago, completely absorbed and affected. When I later described Smith's performance as honest, Jeffrey understood exactly what I meant... a relief, because I wasn't sure I could explain. So yesterday morning, when I heard mention of Smith's return to Boston in the near future, thoughts of Jeffrey and him understanding that honesty swept through my mind. Such a nice surprise and an urge to talk.
He asked how I've been. Right now it's the most loaded question... and I feel sheepish when I don't just blurt out the news that has a little while longer to simmer before it's ready for mass consumption. I directed him here... to whirlygirl, for "the confused scoop, layered under depths of vagueness." He replied that he does drop by on occasion to "see what else I can be in a fog about." I was glad to see we were on the same page.
So I'm cryptic and enigmatic sometimes. And you rarely get the whole story. But there are times when intimacy feels so... pornographic. Inevitably, in a painful moment of regret, I want to swallow the secrets that linger just outside my reach. Maybe you have one. Perhaps it was wrapped up in sparkling ribbons, a gift from me to you that brought us closer. Or maybe yours was stolen without my permission. Or then again, it could have tumbled out in a moment of weakness... abandoned by both of us out of sheer embarrassment. Whatever the case, it's these secrets that draw my borders on your maps. They color your appreciation of who I am and what I offer here.
I told Jeff that whirlygirl is like a puzzle. "You need to drink your ovaltine to get the secret decoder ring to make sense of it all." When the narrative isn't concrete, apply the following formula:
[elation + frustration + heartbreak + joy] - plot = universal + lasting
Wade through this "cocoon of confusion", as Jeffrey calls it, and invent your own plot points. Layer them with spontaneity and magic. Be generous and creative. I'll give extra points for stories that combine Nick Hornby's parched humor with Bret Easton Ellis's tragic indifference. Somewhere along the way, the main character should drive her tiny white car across an endless desert, and it's up to you to select the soundtrack on her stereo. But her lipstick is always, always, always red. There are just some liberties you can't have.
What secrets and stories will you dream up?