Long Distance Lover

by Rylee Swann

  Who did this email make feel better? YOU! Who would feel better if you paid me back that money? YOU! If years upon years from now we run into each other at say...some sidewalk cafe in Paris, I’d bet money that you’d still tell me that you “wanted to come to New York.” A word of advice. Don’t. Bite your tongue in half before the words ever leave your lips. I don’t give a flying fuck what you ever wanted to do. I only care about what you actually did and did not do. Further, if you were ever to again utter that there might have been other selfish reasons for you wanting to move to New York, rip the vocal cords from your throat before speaking them. No woman, including me, wants to hear that her man had ulterior motives besides just wanting to be with her.

  Yes, you were and are a sick alcoholic. But you cannot fall back on that as an excuse for everything. AA says we should look at alcoholism just like any other illness. Well, let me tell you that the person who is sick with the flu and coughs on someone else knows exactly what they’re doing. And you knew exactly what you were doing to me all that time.

  Despite all the lies, I believe that I knew the real you. And I loved him. I would have done anything in this world for you, and for all the time I was with you I did. I am trying to shake loose of this crazy connection I have to you. I don’t know why I’m telling you this but...a couple of days before Carrie emailed me that one time I had this overwhelming feeling that I was going to hear from you. Then, a couple of days before I found this email waiting for me, one of the songs that is meaningful to us started playing in a store I was in. I left, went to my car and on the radio…another meaningful song. I switched stations, twice, and more of the same. I found myself saying out loud that this was not a sign.

  My psychologist didn’t think this was crazy at all. She mentioned something about spiritual forces and the fact that we had such a strong mental relationship over the physical.

  Whatever. You owe me about a thousand more I’m sorrys and I don’t even think that would cover it. I loved you, I still find myself missing you, but if this email was the best you could do...then I don’t know what more to say.

  ------

  From: “Rooster Boy”

  To: december7@hotmail.com

  Subject: RE: The end is the beginning

  Date: Fri, 20 Oct

  I’ve earned your hate.

  For so many lies, I have bought and deserve your hate, but hate me for the lies, don’t ever accuse me of infidelity because it simply is not true. I lied to you, but I never led you on, I never cheated on you. The married woman, the other women, were all fictional, as made up as the person I told you I was. I lied to Carrie, I lied to you.

  I would make up affairs so Carrie or other friends would drive me to the Sault and drop me off at a hotel. I would get drunk and call you, or just get drunk, there never were any other women. Until I got back from treatment I wasn’t willing to get honest with anyone. The several times I went missing while living at Carrie’s I got a hotel, and got high. For some reason I thought it was acceptable if I smoked dope, at least I wasn’t drinking. There never was a married woman, or any other women. Never was I unfaithful to you.

  Hate me for all that hurt, hate me for all those lies, but please don’t ever think I was anything but completely faithful to you.

  As for Tara, when you and I were not speaking Tara and I dated for exactly a month. I bought her a ring, but it was not an engagement ring, and it was almost four years ago now. It was not the ring meant for you. There was no pregnancy scare, we were not engaged. Monstrously cruel? Definitely. I was a very sick person.

  About moving to New York. I wanted to be with you. I wanted the life we talked about, the matching sweaters and the hot chocolate. I wanted you to know that I really did want the life we talked about, I did want to be with you.

  I think about you every day, how terrible I treated you, and I wish I could take it all back. My last e-mail was not meant as a salve, or to ask for absolution. I am sorry, and I wanted you to know that I did love you in the only way I knew how, and to apologize for the wreckage. In no way did I think it was a making of amends. There is nothing I could ever do to make right what I did to you, I know this.

  I hope you can find the apathy toward me that you crave. For my part I hope I never find indifference when I think about you. I do hope that one day I can smile at a memory of you, without the regret, guilt and shame that follows right after that smile.

  -------

  From: “Dee”

  To: ab_boy_north@hotmail.com

  Subject: RE: The end is the beginning

  Date: Sat, 21 Oct

  You missed my birthday. Again.

  -------

  From: “Rooster Boy”

  To: december7@hotmail.com

  Subject: RE: The end is the beginning

  Date: Sat, 21 Oct

  Let me make it up to you?

  ------

  After all that, unbelievably, she let me. And I wormed my way back into her life. It was too soon for her to let go of me. We’d only been apart three or four months.

  Jesus, what a bastard I was. How can I possibly win her back now? After all the lies, the deceit, my sickness? She finally escaped it all, and now I’ve given up my entire life for the dream of her. Moved from Canada to New York. I could see it all in her eyes at the police station. She still hates me, and rightly so.

  How the hell can I meet with Dee tomorrow? What a colossal mistake it was to come to New York. What the fuck was I thinking? I wasn’t. I should have reread those emails before I ever made a plane reservation.

  Fuck, I want to drink.

  I need a meeting.

  Checking the local AA schedule from my phone, I find that one is starting in an hour. Cramming everything back into my box of shame, I grab my jacket and head out the door.

  5

  December

  This morning when I wake, I think I had a nightmare that Jayson was here. That I saw him, spoke to him, made plans to see him today. My stomach churns as I realize the worst part about the nightmare is that it’s true. I didn’t dream it.

  Jayson Fox is here.

  I’m going to see him soon. Unless I change my mind.

  And, I do change my mind about a thousand times while I eat breakfast and shower and pick out the outfit I’ll wear.

  I have to see him. He’s helping Isaac, and I have no doubt because of that I’ll run into him again. That would be awkward, to say the least. Better to get this meeting over and done with now rather than drag out the inevitable.

  Yesterday, I took Isaac home, and had a chat with Gemma after he went to his room. I told her most of what I knew and she hugged me, tears coming to her eyes. We sat in companionable silence for a time while she processed the information.

  She finally said he was a good boy, and I agreed.

  I assured her he would get through this with flying colors.

  I didn’t tell her who his addictions counselor is. It wasn’t the right time for the situation to be all about me. Besides, I was still processing everything too.

  In fact, I think I might even be in shock. I mean, who stands in front of her closet endlessly debating what to wear for a meeting with a man who means nothing to her? I need to snap out of this. What I wear, what he sees me in doesn’t matter one little bit.

  That doesn’t stop me from choosing a pair of skintight jeans and a lightweight red and black sweater that hugs my body, emphasizes my large breasts.

  When it’s time to leave, I pull on a pair of leather riding boots and check myself in my full-length mirror one last time. With a wry smile, I nod at my reflection. I look good. Let him stew over what he gave up.

  I don’t dawdle as I walk the couple of blocks to the café where we agreed to meet. It’s a nice place, very down-home, and I’m welcomed like family whenever I’m there. I reach the entrance, smiling as I always do at the old wagon wheel out front, and take a deep, steadying brea
th. Even so, my hand shakes a little as I push open the door.

  As my eyes adjust to the darkened interior, I spot an arm waving. Squinting, I find that the arm is attached to Jayson. He’s already here, not making me wait for him as he used to do, but I don’t allow this to set me off-balance. I give him an up nod and head to his table.

  He smiles broadly and stands when I get there.

  What the hell?

  Since when is he a gentleman?

  The square rough-hewn wooden table seats four. I set my handbag on one of the extra chairs and sit down across from him. At least he didn’t try to pull out my chair for me. I might have fainted in shock.

  There’s a moment of silence as we appraise each other. He looks good, I have to admit. Tall, broad shoulders. Flat stomach. Healthy. Handsome as ever. With an aura of easy assurance I’m sure he doesn’t feel. He has to be as anxious about this meeting as I am.

  “Thank you for coming,” he says. Oh, that voice. Low, deep, it still gives me sweet chills.

  “Did you think I wouldn’t?” I don’t meet his eyes. Instead, I reach for the specials menu that’s propped up by the condiment bottles on the table.

  He chuckles self-deprecatingly. “I thought there might be a chance I’d get stood up. I’m glad I didn’t. It’s good to see you, Dee.”

  I don’t respond in kind. “You said you had things to tell me?”

  Janice, the waitress, arrives. She’s holding a round serving tray and sets a steaming cup of coffee in front of Jayson and a cup of what smells like cocoa in front of me.

  “Thank you, Janice,” I say while raising an inquiring eyebrow at Jayson.

  He simply offers me a small, amused smile. “Do you remember how we first met?”

  Picking up a spoon, I swirl it around in the cup, watching the tendrils of steam as they float toward the ceiling. “St. Louis.” The words come out automatically, without thought. Like we’re two old friends reminiscing. This is dangerous ground. I better watch where I step. Landmines are everywhere.

  Another chuckle rumbles in his chest. “Technically.”

  “Well, it was St. Louis,” I say, like I need to defend myself. “An online chat-based role-playing site set in St. Louis anyway.”

  “And you played a vampire who became human who became a mage.” He’s teasing me. Just like he used to.

  At the time, I didn’t know the rules of the game well. It was only later I discovered that a vampire couldn’t become a mage, much less human again.

  Finally, I look up and meet his eyes. How easily I could drown in them. Eyes so dark and stormy, always raging with dangerous depth. I did drown, for so many years. My brain yells red alert but I don’t pay attention, don’t turn away.

  “Why are you here, Jayson?” I ask, my voice so low it’s almost drowned out by my madly galloping heart.

  One of his hands disappears below the table as he reaches into a pocket of his jeans. He pulls an object out and places it on the table, pushing it across the surface toward me. A bronze coin of some sort, but not real money. On the surface, there’s a big X in the middle of a triangle and words I can’t read at this angle.

  Again, I raise an eyebrow at him, silently urging him to explain.

  “It’s my ten-year chip.” He glances down at it, laying there between us so innocently, before his gaze comes back up to me. “I’ve been sober for ten years.”

  My mouth drops open. This is huge, especially since he tried and failed so many times I lost count. I want to be happy for him, I really do, but the burn of old pain still lies just beneath the surface.

  “Congratulations,” I manage, like I mean it, and then realize I do in fact mean it. There was a time I wanted him to suffer as much as he’d made me suffer, but I’m not so sure that’s the case anymore. A little over ten years has passed. I’d be a shriveled and old bitter woman if I still held on to that venom.

  “Thank you,” he says softly, his eyes lighting up. He’s proud of his accomplishment, as well he should be.

  “When did you move here? Why…?” It’s time for some answers. Surely, his sobriety is something he wanted to tell me about but there must be more.

  He offers a little half shrug. “A couple of weeks ago.” He pauses. “March twenty-seventh to be exact.”

  I’m stunned. If this were a boxing match, the referee would be checking to see if I’m too punch-drunk to continue the fight. I reach out and pick up the chip to cover my shock. Turning it over in my hand, I keep my gaze on the metal disc.

  “You got here on your birthday?” Where a moment ago my heart was racing, it stops dead at this news. I have the fleeting thought that someone should call the paramedics. Have them on standby.

  Jayson’s parents weren’t big on birthday celebrations, so birthdays never meant much to him. In my family, they were a huge deal. Maybe because I was an only child or maybe simply because it was an important date—the day their only baby came into the world. When Jayson told me he didn’t celebrate his birthday, I was horrified. I couldn’t imagine such a thing. By phone, he and I talked about it again and again as I tried to convince him what a special day it was.

  When I told him on one particular late-night call that his birthday was the most important day in the world because it brought him into the world for me, it clicked—he loved that—and from then on we celebrated both his and mine.

  Looking back now, everything he told me about his birthday could very well have been a lie. A ploy to gain my sympathy and feed his illness. He lied a lot back then, a narcissistic self-hating attention seeker. Or, it could have been true. In those days, I didn’t yet know he was an alcoholic or a liar—or at least to the extent that he was.

  None of it matters now.

  I need to concentrate on not reopening old wounds, at least not any more than they’ve been ripped wide with Jayson’s sudden appearance.

  “I didn’t plan it that way. I originally was set to come here a month earlier but the cement heads screwed up the last piece of paperwork and I had to wait.” He’s the only person I’ve ever met who calls people cement heads when he thinks they’re being stupid. It always makes me smile. Used to make me smile. “Anyway, I do have a lot to say to you, Dee. It’s hard to know where to begin.”

  I pick up my hot chocolate and take a sip. It’s hot and tasty and I focus my attention on my hand wrapped around the warm mug. If he thinks I’m going to make any of this easier on him, then he’s the cement head.

  I guess he comes to the same realization, and continues with the little speech he’s here to give. “I’m in the U.S. legally. When I had a few years of sobriety, I decided to give back. I went to school and got my addictions counseling license. I work with teens mostly but…you were always there, in my mind, and I knew that everything I was doing was for you.” He stops, takes a deep breath like he’s about to sink beneath the surface of a bottomless ocean. “I—”

  “No.” I set down my cup and hold up a hand like a stop sign. “There’s only one thing I want to know, Jayson. That last phone call. When I…called you and you…you rejected me.” I have to keep it together. I refuse to break down in front of him now. “Why did you do that? Do you have any idea how much that hurt?”

  He sighs, nods, his face crumbling in anguish. “I’m so sorry. I was still in the throes of my sickness, still so selfish…” He pauses and rubs his face with a hand. “Fuck, I am really sorry. I handled that so badly. I hadn’t been sober long enough. I should have explained what was going on with me then, but I guess I just couldn’t. Talking to you, falling back into those old habits would have destroyed any progress I’d made.” I suck in a breath and he looks up sharply at me. “Not that any of it was your fault. That’s not what I’m say—”

  In a flash, I’m reliving one of our moments together. A pivotal moment that only a few weeks later became the catalyst for leaving him behind in Canada and returning to New York.

  We were home, in our apartment, and his sister was visiting for the weekend. Jayso
n took that as an excuse to drink vast quantities of vodka with her. She got buzzed, he got shitfaced, and I tried to live my life around the chaos of that night.

  “Dee, I wanna talk to ya,” he slurs.

  Sadly, I understand his drunk-speak, having heard it often enough, and ignore him. This is my least favorite time to be with him.

  At one point, he grabs my hand and starts dragging me to the bedroom. “I wanna to tell you something.”

  I dig in my heels until he lets go.

  Carrie urges me to go and find out what he wanted. She harps on me until I throw up my hands and do so.

  I stand in the doorway of the bedroom as he sits on the bed and finishes off his glass of poison.

  “What do you want?” I cross my arms over my chest.

  He laughs at my annoyance. “You’re so cute, I love you, Dee, you know that. You have to help me. You have to keep me from drinking, right? You have to do it. It’s on you.” He isn’t laughing anymore. He is dead serious.

  Three weeks later, when I realized our relationship had died that night, I packed up my car and left Canada. Left him.

  I had to get off the crazy train. His drinking wasn’t my responsibility. It wasn’t my fault. I had tried and tried to help him. He was the only one who could help himself. I was going to die if I stayed. Not literally, but the me any decent person could respect would be dead.

  And, now, today, here he is telling me it wasn’t my fault. I’m down for the count. Someone throw a white flag into the ring. Stop the damn fight. I can’t go on.

  It’s too hard to believe anything he says.

  I’m still holding his AA chip and toss it onto the table. It spins and wobbles as I abruptly stand, rocking my chair back.