Ro Se

Rose

	Jeremiah was silent, watching the rain turn everything outside his window
liquid. I tried to not look at him as I packed. 
	"This is the way it has to be, Jer." Everything I said, I'd already said a
thousand times, a million if you counted what I'd said to myself. There was
no response from him, and I wondered briefly is he was even there anymore,
if perhaps his spirit had floated away with the humid breeze whispering
through the half-open window. I suddenly needed to see his eyes, to at least
see him blink, to know that he was still in there. I touched his shoulder,
and it twitched, like a bird trying to free itself. 
	"Jer..." I said hesitantly. He turned, and looked at me, his brown eyes
showing no emotion. He stared at me for a minute, and I felt him searching
me, studying me like a book. No one could make me feel as vulnerable as he
could. Then he turned back to the window, and I dropped my hand. 
	"This is the only way."
	"Whatever you say." He said it coldly, surprising me. I'd half expected him
not to say a word until I left, and if he did talk, to sound miserable. He
didn't sound miserable; he didn't even sound angry. He sounded strong,
detached, and icy. Usually so emotional, it frightened me to hear him like
that.

	I walked through the puddles of water, oblivious to the rain running down
my hair and soaking my shirt. I'm not one to go wailing about past mistake;
my motto is /no regrets/, but as I stumbled through the city street to my
new apartment, I couldn't stop myself from rehashing everything that had
happened between Jeremiah and I from our first meeting. 

	I tuned my guitar, smoking a cigarette and listening to the music blasting
from the stage. I hadn't gotten to the jam as early as I'd wanted, so my
name was near the end. Somewhere in between listening to the music and
playing it was the reason I had started, and I went to the jams to remember.

	I kicked back and surveyed the crowd. I'm a big fan of people-watching; I
think you can learn more about yourself from watching other people than
almost anything else. Tonight there wasn't anybody particularily
interesting; the drunk jocks out to get wasted on a Friday night, the
jammers, and Andy, the bartender. I stubbed out my cigarette and waited for
my name to be called.

	I noticed him in the middle of my first song. Normally I ignore the
audience completely on stage, but he caught my attention immediately. With
the lights on everything is outlines and ghostly shapes, so I can't really
say what drew me to him, all I know is he threw me so off-balance that I
nearly missed my cue and missed more than a few notes.

	At the end of my two-song set, I jumped off-stage and immediately lit up,
feeling slightly stressed out. I tried not to stare but I couldn't stop my
gaze from wandering over to him. He was with 3 guys, they were laughing and
drinking. I assumed they had come in together; that or he made friends fast.

	He turned, rather slowly, and met my gaze like he knew I'd been watching
him. I nodded at him and he got out of his chair and walked towards me. He
had black hair he kept having to flip out of his face, brown eyes, and long
slender hands with delicate wrists. He leaned over and yelled in my ear,
"You were good."
	"Thanks," I yelled back, knowing that I was far from my best, and bordering
on down-right bad that night. He smelled like fabric softener and something
spicy...cloves, I guessed. "Sit down."
	"Sure." He had a crooked grin and white teeth, and I found myself smiling
back before I even meant to. "My name's Jeremiah." He offered his hand.
"What's your's?"

	That was the beginning. We would meet up every Friday night, and sometimes
during the weekend. It took a while but I slowly started learning things
about him, like that he had dropped out of college, he was learning guitar,
and that he worked at a law firm as a mail clerk. He had a tiny rose tattoo
in the middle of his left wrist, usually covered up by a watch, and scars
tracing up the inside of his arms. I noticed them the first time I saw him
in the daylight. I noticed them, but he never mentioned them and I never
asked. 

	I watched him over the steam of our coffees as I lit a cigarette. Normally
very high energy, smiling and cracking jokes, today he was quiet, and seemed
to be focused soully on his clove cigarette. When the silence lengthened and
started to feel awkward, I spoke up.
	"Hey man, what's going on? You seem down today," I said as casually as I
could, trying to cover my concern. For some reason I was always a little
worried that he would find out how much I had come to care for him over the
weeks.
	"Oh, it's nothing." I looked skeptical, and he smiled for the first time
that day. "It's just, my parents are in town." He paused to take a sip of
coffee. I raised my eyebrows and waited. That was the trick with Jeremiah;
never pry, just...listen.
	"Um," he said nervously, wiping his mouth with his shirt sleeve, a habit
that drove me crazy. "My parents..." He paused again, obviously unsure of
whether he wanted to delve into this. "They're kind of conservative. They
believe I should go back to college and become a lawyer or something.
They..." He looked out the window, watching the fog billow around outside. I
could tell he wasn't telling me the whole truth, but I knew there was
nothing I could do about it. I nodded as I exhaled a lungful of smoke and
stubbed out my cigarette. 
	"I hear ya. My parents think I should give up music and do something to
insure my future. That's a direct quote," I added, hoping to make him smile,
but he didn't. He kept staring out the window like a statue. "Jeremiah?"
	"I like your apartment," he said absent-mindedly.
	"Jer?"
	He looked startled. He turned and looked directly into my eyes, and I felt
my heart slam around inside my chest. I felt like a turtle who suddenly
found it didn't have a shell to protect it anymore. I felt like an ant who
suddenly noticed a very large boot about to come stomping down on it. I felt
really fucking sick to my stomache. 
	I don't remember who initiated it, or whatever. All I remember is the next
thing I knew, we were kissing.

	So where did it go bad?
	I often ask myself that, and I've never been able to find an answer. Maybe
it didn't go bad. Maybe it was just the way it was meant to be.

	He and I were together for six months, we lived together for three. It was
mostly good, but every once in a while, he would close up, and spend the day
staring out the window, smoking a clove cigarette.
	He always said that I was the only one he could tell the truth to, but he
never did. He never told me why he would retreat into himself, he never told
me the story of those half-faded scars.
	One night I came home to find Jeremiah unconcious on the floor.
Painkillers, attempted suicide. His parents came to town. I described myself
as his roommate, and they told me it wasn't the first time. It wasn't even
the second time. He'd tried to o.d. on painkillers once before, but he'd
called his girlfriend before he'd passed out, saying he would always love
her and he was sorry, and she'd called an ambulance.
	I went home that night. I felt bad for leaving him but I hate hospitals and
his parents practically kicked me out of his room. I found a suicide note on
my dresser, but couldn't bring myself to read it.

	That all happened a month ago. When he came home I made him tea and held
his head on my lap. He couldn't stop crying but he made no sound. He didn't
say a word to me until three days later. 
	"Did you read this?" he asked. I turned and saw he was holding the note
he'd left me. 
	"No," I replied shortly. I'd been chainsmoking since I'd found him that
night, and my clothes all smelled like they'd been soaked in nicotine and
tobacco. I'd tried to cut back but my hands shook when I didn't have
anything to do with them, and holding a cigarette was as good a thing as
any.
	"Why not?" His voice sounded wierd, deeper than usual.
	I looked at him hard. Then I shook my head and went back to sorting the
laundry. "I wanted to hear directly from you. I wanted you to tell me why.
The note was a cop-out. I only would've read it if you had died." I said it
harshly, and winced afterwards.
	"Oh."
	I straightened and sighed. His back was to me and he looked so vulnerable.
I felt like I'd stabbed him in the back. 
	"Why did you do it, Jer? Why won't you talk to me?" I'd softened my tone,
and his head bowed. "Why didn't you talk to me?" I touched his hair softly.
I realized that I'd started crying, and that if I tried to say anything else
my voice would have that terrible choking sound, so I waited for him to
answer.
	"If I'd talked to you before...you'd have given me a reason to stay.
And...you wouldn't understand. I don't want what I do and think and feel to
affect what you do."
	"Was it because of me?" I didn't even know I'd thought that it was until
I'd said it.
	He still wouldn't look at me, but he shook his head and turned partially
around.
	"I've been trying to do away with myself for eight years."
	For the first time in the five months that we'd been together, I
acknowledged his scars. I took his right hand and ran my thumb up the scar.
I looked at him and he met my eyes.
	"You wouldn't understand," he whispered.

	So here I found myself, backpack containing the last of my things from his
apartment. I'd stuffed his suicide note into my pocket before I left, and
someday maybe I would read it. In some ways, I had hoped that I would feel a
weight lifting off my shoulders as I walked away from our life together, but
when no weight removed itself, I realized that it was for the best.
Sometimes, we need the baggage the past brings.
	A taxi roared by but I didn't stop it. I wanted the summer rain.
	"You wouldn't understand," he'd said, and he was right. 
	I didn't.

• inspired by DancingOnTheMoon, & Bobop, & Alex Garland (both really excellent authors).