שאול (pt. 4 - a strange[r] interlude)

She called to say
-I found your number on a bank receipt somewhere in the lining of a coat i haven't worn in six years due to the fact that it was buried in a box out behind the grave we dug for our first dog when it died suddenly from what they called an ear infection when i was that age somewhere between what would have made it traumatic and what would have caused me to simply shrug and call it a fact of life because i was looking for an old letter you had written me that i decided i was finally ready to listen to even though it had gotten lost in the mail and ended up somewhere in the french alps or maybe india because i always got those two confused when i tried to remember the exact location of that scar you had on your hand that you got from an accidental knife wound while slicing up that twelve pound bag of potatoes for some soup or other you never got around to making which i was looking forward to even though i understood you'd never get around to bringing it down to the post office which is fine considering they weren't around back then and i knew i had your number somewhere which you told me to use if i ever needed in case of an emergency.
-Is this an emergency?
-It's too slow to be an emergency.
-So what's on your mind?

She proceeded to say much more.

-But before i go any further, she asked: Have you been practicing?
-My diatetratonic scales?
-No the what to say the intaking it all in in quotable bursts to vomit up later on strangers' shoes.

I stopped because i didn't know what else to write. Looking back i knew instantly that it all pointed to me being a fraud. I knew i wasn't, but i also know what it's like to catch a reflection in a window and want to be that guy. So really... what the hell do i know.

But she was waiting on the line and i had to say something.
-"What is weight really when you say the weight? Thirtytwo feet per second, per second. Law of falling bodies: per second, per second. They all fall to the ground. The earth. It's the force of gravity of the earth is the weight."
-Yeah i've read that before but i don't want that i want the from you that is you and not something else an other not you.
-Nobody really honestly ever wants that from me.
-But i do.
-Then you're a liar.
-Well then can i ask.
-You know you can.
-Have you ever heard the same song only to realize that you wrote it with your life in such a way that it's enough to be what you never got in the first place?
-On a monday not so very long ago.
-Then you know what i mean.
-If you mean that we walk down residential streets listening to a song that is the apologia to our hearts that no one is ever strong enough to give of themselves because they are the more broken versions of ourselves that we could never imagine without their years and bad eyes that happened while they weren't noticing because they were busy being us with the sameness that we now know as being unknown because in our ears we've got the music they should've sung from perches of passenger side pillows in darkest hours when our eyes were closed and we were unknowing and unknowed until then before their leavings without explanations, without the same old sames olds, without... anything really just a leaving that leaves us and leaves us feeling left handed awkward left behind and left? Then yeah. I've got a vague idea.
-Exactly.
-That's the probably and the most ridiculous thing you've ever said.
-Yeah, well i don't read French, Spanish, German, or Latin, and my Hebrew's less than great so you better remember what Shaw said.
-I don't give a fuck what Shaw said.
-And i don't give a shawing fucking shaw fuck what you give, gave, or gived, you can at least remember what you wrote.
-I've never written a word in my life.

She paused as if reading the reading of the dictionary of my life's denotations.

She spoke as if knowing the knowing of the dictionary of my life's connotations.
-The worst part is not being able to tell whether you've managed to somehow climb out, or if instead you've fallen back in without noticing.
-I may have said that in passing to the blind, deaf, and dumb of another's subconscious i never met when i was sailing around the world as a-
-Yeah well claw your way out mother fucker claw your way out until your fingers bleed and your mouth fills with dirt just claw your way out mother fucker claw your way out.

She slammed down the phone and i was left with a ringing in my ears i hadn't experienced until since.

I had so much more to write, but she was so right it pretty much finished me.

I didn't expect to hear from her again for some time.