Narcissa

"As though you care," I said to her, my face reflecting in the window that looked out to the city streets and cars below. She bowed her head, playing with the flyers that she had just collected from the mailbox outside the door. Silence was filled by the honks of the cars. It grew cold, ice cold and made me thought of the fridge.
"You're just trying to make me feel bad," she replied softly.
I turned my head, "No, Andria," I shook my head, "Why would I ever tenderly want to do that to you?"
"Everyone wants to make everyone feel bad sometimes," she looked up at me, the fire of determination once again returned to her eyes, "It's not as if you don't know that."
I turned back to the window, "We're poor enough already."
"What do you mean poor?"
"Aren't we poor?" I teased, sarcastically.
"I hate you, Saunder," she hissed, and left the room.
I smelled the fresh wooden floor, and sighed. No more fights, I thought. No more today. I decided to go down to the bar which I could even see from my window, down that slanting street, and I wish I never have to come back.
Andria was in the kitchen, flame blazed around her as she cried while washing a few dishes. I walked over and put my hands on her shoulder, my lips close to her ear, "Don't cry. I'll bring you back flowers."
She replied to that with a kick in my leg, and shrugged my hands away. "I'm sorry," I whispered, and left the apartment, closed the door with a click.

Andria was my other half. I thought as I walked down the street, the car's horns turning into muffled sounds as my brain began to fill with liquid. Liquid? Beer, sea water, tap water perhaps? Anyway, I kept walking. I'm not much of a person who thinks about every single thing that went through my head.
Andria was my other half, yes. I was the calm half, and she was the Mad Twin. We could be on the same subject, and she shouting, as though to protect herself from something that she couldn't see, and I sigh, or laugh tiredly, always half out of sarcasm. Or perhaps a pessimistic view, as she told me.
The bar was dim and I entered. A few tables, music playing, not a lot of customers on this sort of cloudy deadly days. I didn't know what I was doing. I chose a table and sat down. I braced myself because I was cold. I already wore a fleece jacket; but I was still cold. And I thought, I just left Andria at home alone.
How bad I am, I thought. How wrong I was.
The waiter brought a menu to me. I managed a weak smile.
I wasn't in the mood for anything tasty, but I was craving for some food, as I always was when I was down. It's like they say when a woman breaks up they eat a lot. I felt the same.
I ordered fries and a bottle of Budweiser. Not the best combination, but good enough just to fluke through lunch. I told you, we were poor.
I sighed as I started waiting. Always, always, and will never change, I thought. Until we break up, until one of us moves out, until this whole thing ends. Did she wanted it to end? I suppose so. I, on the other hand, don't mind much. I don't have strong opinions on this; I blamed it on Fate, like I was taught to in high school. The Romans like fate, and they were the stupid ones; Greeks were smarter.
I supposed I was the stupid one.
Because there were things I never told Andria.
There were another side of my life that was beginning to grow, from a very long time ago, that was always there and now is growing to be dominant. That part of my life is called Narcissa.
She was loving, daring, sensible, responsible, and beautiful. She was nearly perfect.
I don't know how she got into me. She was a volunteer, I should say. Or perhaps in your terms, you would call her a prostitute. A slut. WHATEVER.
The point is I don't care what you call her, because she won't respond to you. And that would mean nothing. That would mean she didn't hear you.
She was in and out of my life for five months now, going into our sixth. Because she had work. She had a proper job, called Secretary for Hotel Leonardi, human resources management, in the center of Cambridge. She loved Cambridge.
I asked her if she graduated from the university there. She said no. Her brother did, though.
I remembered laughing. We were in a park when we first met, she was feeding the pigeons on the ground alone, just like in the movies. Just like in the movies. How disgusting that sounds, heh?
The point is now I know her, and now my impressions are different. I don't spite Cambridge anymore, a place I never got to be in. Narcissa said it doesn't matter. She got a job, and that was the final thing you have to worry about. She said, everything else, you can always learn from someone. There are lots of Funds and circles that you would learn from faster and more than you can imagine.
Like pubs, I asked. She smiled.
(My fries and Budweiser came. I kept on remembering Narcissa.)
My anger now faded. There was no more to be feared, annoyed, to be get rid off. It was just the facts, the truths there, and it felt good. That someone can reassure you of something you never dared to say out loud, or never had a chance to say out loud. She said it all for me.
I concentrated on eating my lunch. There was a black spot in my memory, that I wasn't quite sure whether to pull myself to remember it or not. Because I certainly could, and it was up to me now whether to do it or not.

I drank my Budweiser. And I thought of it in movie terms.
Three months after we met each other, one night came the news that Narcissa was dying. I wasn't sure of the term "dying." Is she going to die? They don't know? Or could she still live for a few months? A few hours?
I rushed to the hospital since it was my name she whispered out. I wisely wrote down "friend" in the Relation column, thanked to my brain which was still sober that night. And when I saw her lying on one of those white patient beds in the hospital room, tubes in and out of her wrists, nostrils, I wanted to go over to her but the doctor blocked my way. "Sorry, you can't go in there." I remember him saying that very clearly.
I thought, well you dick, tell me what happened. I deserve to know.
"She sliced her own wrist this afternoon, Mr...."
"Saunder. Jules Saunder." I completed it for him, thinking, you don't have to tell me anything more, doctor. I get what you mean now.
"Mr. Saunder. She was found in the Hotel she worked for...." he kept on talking nevertheless, and I wasn't listening for sure. My eyes stared at the frosted little glass panel that offered the only view into the operation room. "....that wasn't the only thing. She also stabbed herself in the chest."
Narcissa. How could you ever do such a thing?
My eyes drifted back to meet the doctor's. "Is she alright?" I asked. Stupidly.
"Urm.... we wouldn't know until about ten or ten thirty tonight, Mr. Saunder."
I nodded. What time did he say?
My mind was completely blank. I didn't know how to feel. Anxious as a mother, or sad as a friend? Am I even her boyfriend? I asked myself.

The doctor eased me into a waiting chair in the corridor.
I snuggled.

I took another swallow of my Budweiser back in the bar. I cleaned up the fries in the plate with my fork, and wiped my mouth with a napkin. White napkin, I thought, just like the ones they used in the hospital to stop her from bleeding all over the place.
I sighed again, bringing the bottle of beer which was now heavy to my mouth. She was lucky she turned out alright. She was lucky. Or it was her fate. Not your time to die yet, I imagined Jupiter saying that to her. To both of us.

~aporia_flame, Apr. 24, 2005