There is dishonesty in the world, but I mostly don’t comprehend his. He knows what I feel and he chooses to ignore it, as if I am behind a steamed-up mirror that didn’t show my true emotions, my inner self. At least he doesn’t appear to be affected or bothered. And I know he has a somewhat of an idea, I mean, I’m there. I. Am. There. For every event, birthdays, new year’s, halloween, easter for fucks-sake (easter, something I don’t care about at all. But he enjoys the quality time with his younger sibilings). I nurtured his every whim. When he was sick I learned to make chicken soup for him, just so I could bring it over and inquire about his health. And that rough time he was going through with his parent’s divorce I stuck by, even when he didn’t want me too.
I silently sat on his computer chair, tracing circles on the wooden table, as he sulked from his unmade bed—we had no conversation, no pointed stares, only silence that went on until one day he sat up and decided to shed off that weight. And I followed, no questions asked.
It’s how we worked. I’d always follow, even when I tried to pull back, like when we automatically traded off each other for other friends because I knew he liked Helen, a girl at a party.
Off they went into a room and I was stuck with Helen’s friend Whats-his-face and after we got together, weeks later he announced, “That was…” he sighed, “Rudie, that was just--Helen and I we had a connection, we were there. Together. “
And then he asked me, waited as he stretched back onto my bed and I felt like I was floating into the darkness of outer space, I couldn’t believe what I had heard. Feeling the back of my neck tingle, my cheeks redden, I could only shrug. My time with Whats-his-face was nothing close to extraordinary. More like regret etched into my skin, forever remembering when I shut myself in the bathroom, afterwards just trying to breath. In the mirror my hair was a disheveled mess and I kept rinsing my mouth and washing my hands but it wasn’t enough.
He took in my withdrawn response as shyness, like if I didn’t want to contribute to our little truth-time. He gave me a quick disinterested pat and said, “Don’t worry Rudie, it’ll get better.” I wanted to cry then because all he was seeing was that stupid foggy mirror of placidness that I had conformed to.
Helen and him dated for a while but it didn’t last and after that there were a series of girls that he had no recollection of. He would shower them with affection while I kept in mind, his words, ‘it’ll get better.’
But it didn’t. Because no matter how positive-minded I became it didn’t change the fact that he chose to ignore me. I who was by his side in a matter of seconds and yeah, sometimes he did the same for me…but not always. That was the most gut-wrenching for me.
Growing older I have now come to realize that I had always been his backup. There was a particular occurrence when I needed him the most and he didn’t show. That was a cold wake-up call. I had assumed that those twinkling eyes would be reserved just for me, but I was a fool.
I ask him a casual night he is over, why he kept me around. His face contorts into uncertainty. “What are you talking about?”
Why not tell me right in the face that he could never have feelings like I did for him instead of yanking my chain around? He’d show me this side of himself that no one had seen. He’d cried on my shoulder, confide his fears, shamelessly flirt with me; even one winter parade me around as his 'girlfriend' for his beloved Grandma. And here I am, taking it all in like a worthless puppy that would go back to the kennel.
I had hope y’know? And that hope carried me on until I couldn’t continue this exhausting selfish life, living for someone else. That’s what I am doing. Half of my heart has been reserved, collecting dust in plastic wrapping.
He struggles with an answer when I walk over to the sofa and calmly stare at him. “Rudie, don’t be so melodramatic,” he says.
My eyebrows shoot up and I shake my head. “I don’t do dramatics. I’m being serious because I now know that you have never known me like I have you, or ever taken the time to do so. So…” there is a moment where I look into his dark, rich eyes and I see everything we have…but…but it is nothing. It is all he has—I am nowhere in there and I don’t think I could ever be. “We can no longer be best friends.”
“B-B-But why?”
And I stand, slowly retreating my steps away from the life that I no longer desire, the passive life where I am half-dead. Tears had started to blur my vision and I whisper, “Because from this point on, I need to value myself.”
Quietly I open my door and he drifts out with one last expression, his head mentally turning wheels, trying to assess what had just occurr and I…see. See him as a fogged-up figure on the other side of the mirror.
