Written in 1998-NYC,MemphisSamantha opens her eyes to the sunlight streaming through her window, calling her into a rude consciousness. Outside, she can hear the sounds of children speaking in animation as they walk to school. Their voices are tinny, sailing through the air in a high-pitched fervor, cutting through the traffic every now and then with a giggle or a yelp. For a moment, Samantha closes her eyes and imagines herself as a girl, walking the same steps to the same school with the same kids, but different names, different faces. She recalls her own voice, equally as energetic and light as these kids, full of excitement and wonder, but happiness? She can't recall that. She searches her memory frantically. She must have remembered childhood euphoria. She remembers sounding identical to these passing children; the sounds they emit are stocked fully with glee and utter understood happiness. Why can't she remember being happy? Disturbed by this revelation, she opens her eyes again, waiting for the children to pass. This morning is no different from any other, however, and just as these children skipped out of hearing, another group replaces them. Samantha pulls the comforter over her head, pleading silently to remove this chorus of children from her window. Stop this serenade of loathing and wonder! Giving up, she stumbles over to the television, clicks it on, removing all reality of her own world and replacing it with morning talk shows. The cluttered and unimportant voices blanket all other sound, and Samantha breathes a sigh of relief.
Looking around the room with strangers' eyes, she surveys the sterile perfection of her surroundings. The area is absolutely spotless and chillingly beautiful. The only element of disarray is her crumpled bedding, and this becomes a comfort to her, an element of reality, proof that she exists, evidence of her impact on the world enclosed in twisted bed sheets and an unkempt comforter mixed with pillows tossed violently through the night. While everything else in her world appears solaced, appears calm, her sleep affirmed that she had life. The dresser, the dressing table, the shoes lined up in perfect order, just below her hanging business suits and summer dresses, according to color and style, suddenly maddens her, frightens her. She walks cautiously over to her oak dresser, a house warming present from her aunt, and opens her drawer, exposing her clothes perfectly folded, perfectly placed. Of course. Samantha feels empty, cold, concealing her desire to run amuck through her own space, destroying her own control by tossing her perfectly folded clothing across the room, kicking her waiting shoes out of place, demanding the title of disorder. This passion burns inside her in panic She decides to make up her bed to match the order of her room before the destruction compulsion consumes her sanity completely.
Kristoff lights another cigarette quickly, and draws a deep breath, concentrating on filling his lungs, circulating through his chest, blowing this beautiful smoke in a stream of longevity. His eyes drop to the telephone and quickly close. Today he will not think about loss, he will not consider the remorse pounding at his temple as he squeezes his eyes tighter, trying to erase the temptation of the telephone taunting him with the opportunity to reach out. He stabs his cigarette out in the waiting ashtray and flinches as a hand reaches up and strokes his shoulder.
"Are you alright, baby?" speaks a soft, unfamiliar voice. He turns to look at the sleepy eyed woman lying poised under his quilts.
" Yeah, I just have a bit of a headache," he offers, diverting his eyes so as not to see this woman in his bed. She doesn't belong there. What was he doing? Suddenly, he feels trapped, not by the woman in his bed, but by the one who left. The one who loved him and still left, with no promise of return other than these moments. He knows she loved him, knows she needed him, as he needed her. Now distanced by freeways and ideals, they lose themselves; he is his lovers, she in her independence. She haunts him with her devotion. His hand travels up his chest and touches her necklace. Damn it. Here she is again. Questions fill his half-woken mind; why did he let her go? Why, on so many nights, did he convince her that it was okay to leave, that she wasn't needed? Why does he feel that he is betraying her if he called, if he confessed to needing her? Why did she believe him in the first place? Why did she enter his life only to leave just as quickly as she came? She offered him so many questions on life, love, importance, wonder, amazement, and honesty. Then she was gone. She was a tidal wave to him, a mad rush of life, knocking him down, then washing him over almost gently, forgetting that he would later hurt when the bruises set in. But by the time the bruises set in, she had withdrawn. She was traveling back into the ocean, building up again. Where was she now?
He shakes his head to erase his memory and lays back into his public bed. Arms and legs cover him. He closes his eyes and prays for sleep to engulf him. He reminds himself that he chose this; He was not ready to take on that which was offered to him. It is beautiful to be so afraid of that which he has dreamed for on so many loss-filled evenings.
Sleep chastises him, as he begs for its cover. All he could feel was the breath upon the back of his neck and it maddens him. It saddens him. He remembers her breath there. It was her place. No one but hers. But she disappeared with an embrace and a defeated smile within her eyes. Her eyes! Why torture himself with her eyes!?! She used to look inside him with every gaze. She would invite him in, exposing her soul as she delved into his. Hers were the first he had seen which were not empty. He never had a chance to tell her that. He knew she was alone, wherever she was. This knowledge fills him with a horrific awe, and he knows sleep will not come. He pries himself from the anonymous arms and heads to the shower, full of anger and longing.
Samantha sips her black coffee and plans her day. She would spend two hours writing at the computer, take a long walk through the park, and spend another two hours with a notebook and a pen at a cafe somewhere along the way. She considers the people she may encounter with a smile and plods off to the shower, full of longing and recognition. "One of these days," she muses, "something is going to change my life. Perhaps today."
She slips out of her robe and steps into the nearly scalding stream of water. "It's good to feel alive," she thinks, "l won't change the temperature today." She feels a slight liberation in this decision as the heat courses through her hair and down her back, almost as a lover’s caress might have in the past. All of her lovers are in the past. She has left them all by her own means, each clutching a promise of return. She left them with no such promise, however. Instead, she left nothing neither more nor less than a gorgeous remembrance. She knew that each of them would remember her well as they traveled through life with others. Her face darkens with the memory of the children's message; what of happiness? No longer able to stand the scalding water, she furiously twists the faucet knob. Coolness washes over her in a massive wave of relief. She relaxes and picks up her shampoo with a conscious effort not to waste time remembering her past lovers. She doesn’t need to. They hang like ghosts over each move she made. They are a part of her history, and she chose them well. She treasures and dotes on these specters in waiting. They are, to her, proof of her emotional aptitude, just as the crumpled bed was proof of her life. But just as she made neat her crumpled bed before her stable and clean surroundings engulfed her, so, too, had she "made neat" these past lovers by entrapping them in memories and logic.
Try as he might, Kristoff could not shake the anger with which he had woken. Usually, the solitude and chill of the shower would center, if not calm, him. Today, however, the anger looms around his mind like a wreath, a crown of misunderstanding. It was those eyes. Now, as he drives recklessly through midtown, he feels those eyes burning into the base of his neck. He lights another cigarette and turns up his music, singing as loudly and violently as he can muster. As he sits at a red light, still screaming a melody, he pauses, feeling a new set of eyes upon him. He turns to the left to see a small boy in the car next to him, with eyes horrified to the size of saucers, staring at him. The boy can't have been more than ten years old. He stares at Kristoff with a look of awestruck fear, innocent and objective. Kristoff sees himself at that age, witnessing despair for the first time. He holds the boy's stare and weakly smiles, trying to insure this boy that there was nothing to fear, just a bad day. The light changes, and the car next to him speeds off. Kristoff sits motionless until he begins to cry, just as the chorus of rage- ridden motorists begin their impatient serenade. Tears finally flowing down his face, he drives his car to the nearby park, turns off the engine, allows his face to fall into his hands, and weeps.
For Kristoff, this despair finally broke his anger. He sits alone in his car weeping for the void of a lost lover, as his anonymous one still lies under his quilts at home. As he sits, crumpled and swollen, he feels a sense of relief for this release that has been building now for months. There is a moment in desperation that is strong and beautiful, when you realize that you are ultimately and truthfully alone, with nothing but the world surrounding your body. You lose objectivity and wishing and reveal yourself to no one but yourself. At this moment, Kristoff's tears are not of helplessness, but of recognition. Recognition of himself, of his losses, recognition that he can focus on his own pain, and let it go. He is not thinking of those he has loved, nor of those he has betrayed. Rather, he is not thinking. The difference between Kristoff and Samantha lies in the fact that he allows these moments to sneak up on him until the attack finally comes. He then deals with the aftermath lightly, but lives in fear of these moments, fearing that they may one day turn into a definition of his being. Samantha, however, greets these moments of desperation and runs away with them. She lives in that moment of desperate strength, and craves it, believing that there is nothing else more powerful. Both of them live their lives in a shell of protection; he protects himself from it, she protects herself in it.
Samantha leaves her house as a light rain mists in the early afternoon clouds. The sunlight from the morning had been only a temporary taunting as she walks to the train, her heels clicking with each step. As the train arrives, she settles herself in a seat directly across from a young couple that are bickering and weary. They were perhaps thirty years old, but their interaction forced age. They are a handsome couple, and she can imagine that they were beautiful together when they first met, and had been entranced by one another. Now, however, they seem tired, as she keeps her head buried in Anne Tyler's "Breathing Lessons." he says angrily, "So, let's fight." She says nothing, but glances at him, searching for the man she once knew, rather than this belligerent little boy before her. This exasperated and probing look infuriates and pleases him as he reaches into his bag and pulls out his own novel in competition. He pretends to read, all the while finding reasons to nudge her in the crowded train. Ignoring his childish teasing, her eyes gaze upward plaintively, and she becomes Santa Lucia with her eyes upon a platter in sacrifice. Samantha identifies with this woman who finds herself searching for the one she once knew in the eyes of silly animosity. He becomes a stranger to whom she will always be loyal. The man looks to the woman in a slight apology and offers a glimmer of peace. Sensing this change, she lowers her gaze to him, and again, they become one. Samantha's ghosts cascade into the train car as the strongest of them breathes into her ear, "Hey, you." She smiles, sighs and recalls an embrace composed of many; one on a doorstep, full of tears flowing down a leather jacket, mixing with rain ("Hey, you," she hears softly), another on a doorstep in New York City, as storm clouds are rolling in, and she is seeing the physical body of this ghost for the last time ("Hey, you”). The next embrace is against a parked car on a sweltering Memphis day, accompanied with impossible promises ("Hey, you." the voice has become softer and more insistent). Then comes the completing embrace. This one is the purest, devoid of deception. Two strangers who come together, holding each other for the first time before their separate doorways. Her hand travels up the back of his neck, and she sighs. He responds with a matching note, and they slowly pull apart. Flustered, they mutter their goodnights and scurry into their separate doorways, each pausing as their doors shut behind them. "That’s it," Samantha whispers to the stranger on the other side of the wall, and travels up her staircase as he walks down his hallway. They each reach the safety of their homes with a strange mysticism and a fearful acknowledgment that they will no longer be alone. ("Hey... There you are.")
The train jolts to a stop, and the ghosts fly away as quickly as they had descended. As Samantha leaves the station, the woman looks to her and warily smiles in recognition. Samantha's' heels click on the pavement, continuing her soundtrack. With each stride, she feels her spirit lifting, she feels herself walking away from her solitude, and into her anonymity. She moves through this sea of strangers, averting glances, muttering beauty. She is strong and smooth among them, as the sound of her steps keep the time and movement of her hips as she walks. This is her freedom, this is her release.
Kristoff looks up from his hands with a bleary-eyed satisfaction. He no longer feels her eyes upon him. His anger has dissipated in this catharsis. He steps out of his car, and begins to walk, finally noticing the beautiful day surrounding him. He feels as though his eyes are open, at long last, instead of his latest sense of narrowing. He walks through the park until he reaches the grassy, desolate area just above a small pond. He takes off his shoes, socks, and tee-shirt, and lays himself upon the soft grass, closes his eyes, and sleeps in the midday sun, with contentment stretched upon his lips. Soon he begins to dream.
His dream is one of beauty, of completion. It is not of action, but understanding. She is with him here, but not in body, not in circumstance. Rather, she is a flow of color, a soft stream of blue, flowing throughout him. There is no questioning in this dream, no fear, no doubt, only the bliss of comfort and peace. This dream is comparable to the moments they've spent; waking up in each other’s arms, never realizing that they had fallen asleep. This dream contains the reality of these two like souls who found each other briefly and without expectation. Understanding his mission, Kristoff opened his eyes and, as if still in a dream, walked back to his car and quickly drives home, leaving his shoes, socks, and shirt still strewn upon the grass. It isn't her eyes watching him now, but her soul riding with him. He pulls into his driveway and virtually flies into his apartment, with a slight tinge of fear that the woman would still be there, watching a movie and drinking his coffee. Luckily, his apartment was vacant. The only trace of the woman was a note left on his crumpled bed,
~~ ~~ , Kristoff makes neat his bed and picks up the telephone.
The phone is ringing as Samantha twists her key in the lock. She throws open the door and races to the bleating phone, keys still hanging above the doorknob. " Hello?" she answers heavily and out of breath.
"Hey, you" Kristoff breathes with relief from the other end.
“Where are you?” She asks, water filling her eyes with rush and release.
“Home” he answers. As they both melt into a stream of blue, she mutters, "lt's about time."
