we only said goodbye with words

28 January 2008

when i burned paper

another short story i just finished.
--
"burning paper"

It was a little early to be drinking, but what the hell. Seriously. No matter the time of day, there's nothing like the smell of burning paper and a glass of scotch. Oh, fuck it. I threw my $200 stainless steel Parker pen, a gift Lila had given me when I got a story published for the first - and only - time, onto the flames as well, half-wondering if it would actually burn. I thought it would be oddly symbolic if it didn't. I know no one can ever really escape their own words or the reason they were written. I know I can't, anyway.

I pulled my black moleskine out of my back pocket and hesitated. I held it in my right hand, extended towards the fireplace. This notebook was like my brain on paper. Just destroying it, sacrificing it to the Gods of Tongue didn't seem as entirely necessary as the destruction of everything else being eaten by the flames. Technically it wasn't a story or any concrete sort of writing. It was just filled with thoughts, little poems, drawings. Some relics from days I don't really remember, anyway. A dry, pressed leaf. The business card of a restaurant in Manhattan I really enjoyed, with the idea for a story title scribbled on the back. A little note from Lila reading "Dinner 7:45, usual place?" in her small writing that somehow seemed to be an actual echo of herself. That kind of stuff. But then I remembered coming home earlier that day with my mind made up. And this little notebook was undoubtedly filled with little notes and memories of things her and I shared, thoughts I had about us, perhaps even something in her own neat hand that found its way into my little recyclable brain. So I thought of Hemingway writing Sun Also Rises (I don't know why that book, but it was the first title that came to mind) and threw the little notebook onto the fire. I'd already put thousands of words on my makeshift altar, but only with this hundred-some-odd pages of scrawled notes in a shaky hand did I really feel part of myself actually burn and turn to ash along with the paper. It was a very uniquely distinct sensation that I will never forget. The closest thing I can compare it to is seeing someone you love kiss someone else. Someone you gave your heart to give hers to someone else instead. It's definitely not the same thing, and I'm not calling that notebook my lover, but physically, that cold, shivering, sinking feeling that acts like quicksand in your heart, that's what it feels like.

I finished the glass, the ice cubes rattling around in it like a marimba, and picked up the open bottle from the table and took a long swig, shuddering at the gorgeous, warm feeling of the clean amber alcohol dancing down my throat. I really do love the taste. I don't just drink alone to get drunk. I enjoy the drink as a drink. I'd drink a Diet Coke alone, wouldn't I? I wouldn't call myself a cokehead. So I can drink scotch by myself and not be an alcoholic, right? Of course. Of course. I put the bottle down.

Now what?

I felt incredibly empty. I don't know how to describe it. I can only imagine that this is what the inability of expression feels like. When you have no more words, you can't express yourself. Standing there, watching basically every story or poem I had written in the last two years - every word dripping with Lila's calm, passive existence - burn and smolder like someone's best laid plans crumbling to pieces, like love falling apart, I felt this enormous void announce its presence within me. With each crispy sound of fire devouring paper, I felt the void grow larger as my words were destroyed by an all-consuming flame, far more outreaching than the one burning in my fireplace.

I had forgotten to open the flue and thick, black smoke began to creep out of the fireplace and into my apartment. I covered my mouth and eyes with my hand right hand and felt for the lever through the smoke; I found it, opened the flue, and threw the nearest window wide open. In a few minutes, the smoke that had begun to find its way into the room had vanished. I looked at the fireplace, expecting a modestly burning fire to still be melting my words away. But instead, the smoke cleared and the fireplace was empty. No ash, no wood, no sign that anything had been burning there within the last twenty-four hours, let alone couple of minutes. The only indication that anything had really happened was a bit of ash on my left hand from opening the flue and the fact that I felt like I had a million more words than before.

Before what?

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