Old And Crushed

I haven’t been home in 20 long years. Everything felt different. Old memories reappeared. Wish it were cold. Everyone outside looked dead, or old. Bummed a smoke from a punk on a skateboard, close by a woman on a bench who reminded me of someone. Her face hit me like a truck. She was my high school love. My heart dropped, and my throat became dry, thinking of the right words to say this time. Our breakup was bad, like all high school relationships I suppose, just cold. Continued through our school years acting as if every relationship since ‘us’ didn’t come up a bit short. I understood why past relationships were considered old flames because aroused fire always leaves an exhausted trace. This woman was the arson of my fairy tales. I risked being burned again, skipped any rehearsal, and decided to approach her. I had to tell her how I felt. I got closer, and her dimples that stole the spotlight from any crowd cut corners into her caramel skin. She didn’t smile much, but I remembered her wet lips. 

“Joanne, Joanne, it's me Titus,” I said. 

She smiled. And then turned her attention to the train tracks.

“Joanne, before I knew how soft a woman’s skin felt there was you. And before I understood the power of a kiss there was you. And before I felt what butterflies felt like there was you.”

I expected a euphoric reaction. 

“I know we ended on bad terms, but time has a way of revealing what truly matters. We were good together. We should catch up,” I said.

Her beautiful, hazel eyes looked toward the orange sky, like a rainbow was on the move. Maybe, it was something about my personal maintenance. Heck, I’ve been cutting my hair with a rusty razor for years. Now I’m a little upset and annoyed because this skateboard kid’s giving me a tough guy look. I just came home. And I will shape him up with this same rusty razor.

“Dude, she’s fidgety on most days,” he said to me.

“What the fuck does that mean?” 

“She doesn’t remember anything. Sometimes she forgets I’m her nephew. Been taking her to this train station for 2 years now. She wakes up at night screaming, says she’s waiting for someone to return.”

I wanted to cry. Yes. The tough guy. Her clothes were tailored for simple folk who don't keep the time of day and preferred to stay out the way of people. And then she called my name.

"Titus, yes. I’ve got a sink full of icky, dirty dishes to wash. I hope you're not hungry. Don't have much. My arms are always tied. When I see you again join me and I’ll give you a big hug. What have you been up to my dear? Don’t you ever leave me. You want to be somebody else, get surgery, but you’ll never leave me again," she said.

"See, she can't fill in the puzzle," the skateboarder said.

"How long has she been like this?" I asked.

"Maybe 4 years."

She made a gesture that floated over me, like a mist over a pumpkin patch. A train pulled into the station, brushing the onlookers with textures of graffiti. Kids ran through the patiently waiting crowds. I grabbed Joanne's hand, and had hoped our memories returned with a 'splash.' Children continued to enjoy their long-sought connection with air, and dirt. I still swooned over this woman. After all these years. She inherited her good looks from her mom, and what she wanted in life from her pops. She had an attitude from a rough block, but honestly, it turned me on.

"Joanne, remember the Sadie Hawkins dance you wore those red bottom pumps?" I asked.

The high heels matched her candy-colored thong. That night we created new ways to use a hotel shower rod. She was high maintenance but I loved to make her smile, like Thomas the Train. The effects of her disease were apparent; involuntary shakes, staring into space and acted as if she were looking for the conductor in the motorman’s cabin. But none of that mattered. I smiled at her as if in front of a camera.

“Where do you know my auntie from?” Skateboarder asked.

I still held her hand. 

“We were close friends,” I replied.

“Some of us chase who we once were. Some of us want to forget,” Skateboarder said, then he performed a trick that reminded me of these old knees.

A nurse approached the platform. I didn't know they made wireless headphones. T.V.s' showed a commercial on Alzheimer's. A disease no one thinks about until it affects a loved one. Joanne. My one true love. Memories are all we have. We must make meaningful relationships. If she couldn’t remember anything I would because that’s just how much she meant to me. But I'm lost myself. Misplaced in a time where we once young and free. It's not fair we live only to die.

“Sometimes the things we’re forced to let go free us,” I said to the skateboarder.  

Joanne looked straight ahead; patience for something that could be her dreamcatcher. The train took off. Not even a deadman’s brake could have stopped things from rolling downhill any faster! 

“We have to go. See you around,” Skateboarder said.

He put the skateboard in one arm, and with the other, we helped Joanne to her feet. She asked my name again. And I thought it best to tell her I was just a friend than to have us shuffling cards. Her hair was wild, like vines in a dead orchard. I still found beauty in her. A breeze brushed against our skin. Its timing was perfect, invigorating. Maybe that was the moment I could have. Nothing more. Nothing less. Our train left. And just like that, I realized oxygen must be present to ignite a flame I was right when I stepped off this train. My hometown was filled with people dead, or old!