Notice

I took a lover the summer after you left. Or was it me who left? Can you leave without going anywhere? Of course you came back, you always came back, but that time, the last time, you had finally gone too far. I refused to answer the door, I unplugged the phone.

But the next summer I took another lover. He was fit and fine, especially when you factor in his age. He read newspapers. He collected art. He had two defunct families, three jobs to support them, tattoos and a personal library. If either of us had been inclined to spend the night, we’d have had plenty to discuss over breakfast. But, it was an arrangement of convenience; he did not have the time, and I had no desire, for anything more than a tumble and toss between the sheets. I thought this might make me feel alive again. I thought maybe, if nothing else, he’d fill the gap.

And it was amusing enough, I suppose, until one night when, afterwards, he said hesitatingly into the darkness, “I know your ex-boyfriend.”

“Oh yeah?” I said, sleepy and bored, thinking he meant the Ex, “How do you know him?”

“He hangs out at the bike shop. Ex snowboarder? Talks about you a lot. Says you dated for a long time.”

“Dated?” I exclaimed, realizing he meant you, then added quickly, hoping I sounded cynical and cavalier, “I wouldn’t call what we did dating.”

His laugh sounded relieved, “Yeah, so I gathered.”

I am instantly enraged with you, the ruinous romantic, still discussing me with strangers. But in the same moment , inexplicably, as though tricked into confession by either the shock or the wine, or the combination of both, I hear myself say, rawly, “Still, I don’t know if I’ll ever get over him. It still feels, every day, like I’ve had a limb amputated.”

“Yeah,” he says again, though biting and hard this time “so I gathered”.

That night I come to several conclusions:

First, as he tries to kiss me, gently, sweetly this time like never before, instead of feeling like love or caring or tenderness, it just tastes like pity on my lips and I feel like an invalid, I reach conclusion number one: I can never see him again.

Conclusion number two follows quickly thereafter, as he attempts to make love to me, instead of having sex like we used to or even just did only an hour before: I cannot do this anymore, with someone I do not love and who does not love me.

Which leads all too swiftly and frighteningly to conclusion number three: I am too broken, and human and wrong for anyone to ever actually love me.

On the cab ride home, watching the sun rise over the Osborne Bridge I remember the night we met at your favourite pub, the nights we spent in your van, illegally parked or otherwise, and all the fights we had on every street corner, restaurant, coffee shop and bar in the heart of the city. Conclusion number four: if my own heart is ever going to not ache again, I am going to have to leave.

I give notice to the Corporation, the landlord, the city and its streets.

I am done with this.

I am through with this.

This means you.