A Late Night Requiem To A Broken Heart



He sat staring at
the half emptied bottle. Drinking was never his favorite past time. It didn’t
even come close to anything resembling a good time, but he couldn’t think of
anything else to do. Nothing would make things better, and a sinking feeling in
his gut told him that nothing could make things worse, either.

Pinching the neck
of the bottle, he put the rim of the opening to his mouth and blew solemnly. An
eerie, low-pitched moan exited the container, and seemed to match his mood
perfectly.

He should have
known better than to open up like he had, should have known better than to
share his emotions and his heart so freely. Past experience had taught him
better than allowing himself to make his heart so vulnerable, and a sharp sting
of disappointment in himself echoed in the far confines of his mind. Yeah, he thought, you should have known better than that. His chest felt empty with
the lack of reassurance that love would triumph.

Had he been a
lesser person, he would have taken steps to ensure that even if things didn’t
work the way he was hoping they would, then at least they wouldn’t have ended
the way it seemed that they were going to. But he knew better. He knew that
some people just couldn’t be shown the truth. They had to find it on their own,
no matter how hard it was to watch them stumble and fall. No matter how much
you wanted to help, you just couldn’t seem to say the right thing, or do
whatever it was that needed to be done to show them that there just isn’t hope
for some things.

He put the bottle
to his lips and swallowed its remains. Had it really come to this? Was this
truly his last option to see hope again?

No, this was his
attempt to wallow in his own self pity, he concluded. You aren’t a man, he thought, you’re
a scared little boy. He wondered what had happened to himself, and, in a
brief fit of something that might have passed for insanity, he wondered if he
would ever go back to being the person he thought he was. Something inside him
told him he couldn’t. Something pulled at the back of his thoughts, subtly
saying, No, you’ll never be the same. You
will be something far less caring. Something closer to heartless. Something
cold. And for the moment, that idea comforted him. Hatred is a far easier emotion
to control, he knew, than love. Hatred can be harnessed. Hatred can be
directed. And Hatred can be unleashed.

Let the rest of the world worry about love.
Let me have my hatred.

He grabbed another
bottle, placed the stem in his shirt, and pried the cap off, letting it fall
where it may. He chugged heavily and felt his stomach grow warmer. The empty
feeling was still there, but it seemed to be more distant. It seemed to be less
real.

He stared down the
neck of the bottle, as if hope might have settled at its bottom. He knew it
wasn’t there, but he would reach it anyway. And the bottle after this one, and
the bottle after that….

He looked over to
the clock. Past midnight. No. She wouldn’t be calling tonight. Maybe the next
day? He hoped so.

What’s wrong with you? You aren’t what she
wants. Was she right? Are you obsessive?

He became
something close to angry at her.

What matter is obsession if you love
someone? And moreover, when they led you to believe they felt the same? No,
obsession was an excuse. A ploy to push you away and question your intention.

He drank heavily,
careful not to let a single drop trickle past his lips.

He noticed that
his hand rested on the phone. Why? He was still expecting a call? Fooling
himself was what he was doing. He threw the phone on the table in frustration,
then finished off his drink while grabbing another.

Stabilit y, that’s what it boils down to. You
offer nothing stable, nothing concrete. She longs for reassurance of stability.
How many letters are in that word? Because it feels like there are only four.

He guzzled some
more, and suppressed a belch.

So many truths
needed telling. But it wasn’t his place to bring them to light. She wants to
make it work? Does she realize that it will never work unless she comes clean?
Does she know that she would be living a life of illusion if she didn’t confess
to everything?

Yeah, she knew.
She was too smart not to know. But she wouldn’t do it. He didn’t think she
could bring herself to. If she could have, she would have done it long before
now.

He caught himself
looking at the phone again. Idiot.
Pushing himself from his seat, he abandoned the phone to sit in a different
room. On his way he grabbed a bottle of rum and a shot glass. He took his seat
at the desk, placing the glass on its surface and opening the rum. He filled
the double to the rim and tossed it back.

Much better, he concluded as the liquor
coated his stomach with the warm burning sensation. The room was now moving to
its own tempo, and his head was starting to swim with the motion.

Soulmate, he thought, can you feel me right now? Probably not,
he decided. This was a one sided connection. Or maybe he was fooling himself
about the connection. Maybe he was imposing something there that really wasn’t.
Fabricating a feeling that he thought to be true.

He filled the
glass again, this time letting the liquid pause in his mouth before swallowing
it all at once.

Settling back in
the seat, the bottle of rum dangling from his fingers, he stared at the clock.
He could feel it ticking. He could
feel a distance growing greater the longer he chose inaction as his course.

It isn’t real, he assured himself. You’re just making it real. She’s putting
the distance there, not you. She’s pushing you away. And he knew that was
true. He just didn’t know why. He didn’t know what to believe. There were so
many feelings, so many events, and even some tragedies that played him to
believe the opposite of what she was currently telling him.

You’re reading too much in to things. You’re
making things up and putting them there because you are unable to accept that
none of this was real. None of this was true. You were just the in-between
time. You were just what she needed to fix everything else, and you’re a fool
for ever thinking it could have been more than that.

This hurt him
greatly because he could feel the truth in it. Cold and hard and immovable.

The real truth,
though, was that he would never really know. He couldn’t tell if she was
pushing him away because she fooled herself into believing she would hurt him
less this way. Or if she was doing all of this because she really didn’t want
him there anymore.

Had she made him
disposable?

He pushed the
thought away and put the bottle of rum directly to his lips and took two pulls.

This could be every night, if I wanted it
to. It isn’t so bad, really. I used to think I enjoyed this, didn’t I?

He pulled himself
out of the chair and went to look in the mirror.

I don’t look like a drunk. I look more
tired, though.

He pulled off his
shirt, and had to sit back down to take off his socks. He made one last pass
through the home, turning off the lights, and went to his room where he
collapsed on his bed. He hadn’t noticed that the rum bottle had been replaced
with the phone. He was preoccupied with the sinking feeling the bed was
offering him.

He did know he had
changed. He did know he wouldn’t ever be the same.

Then sleep, and
the alcohol took him….