I Don't Understand

The man that has introduced himself as Gary smiles. The smile is warm and loving. It radiates a gentle heat. He is a sun. He brings life. There is calm here. She looks around her. Her eyes are searching. Searching for something that will allow her confusion and anxiety to abate. Trying to make sense of her surroundings. Trying to make sense of herself in the context of these surroundings.

Thoughts assail her, as they do us all. But these thoughts are dark ruffians stalking a Victorian landscape in her mind. There is no safety in these internal streets. She needs to find her way home to the rooms she is familiar with. Familiar places and faces are what she desires above all else.

So many angry, combative thoughts. Weaponised words that don’t belong. She doesn’t belong. She yearns for the return of that feeling of belonging, comfort and safety.

She says the same words that she whispered uncertainly just now. Ashamed of her vulnerability. Ashamed at her inability to make her mark in this place. Knowing that there is something wrong, but unable to identify what that may be. Questions form but they make no sense to her. They lack the fit required for her to bring them out into the world provided to her. Something is lost in transition and she has to swallow down an overwhelming fear that it might be her. Lost and lacking the wherewithal to speak her truth in a way she can make sufficient sense of, let alone make anyone else understand.

“I don’t understand,” she says more firmly. There is an angry conviction here. She has to assert herself. Clutching at what she can in order to keep her head above the surface of a madness that silently mocks her beneath the noise of alien thoughts.

The man who says he is Gary smiles again. She knows that smile. Knows that this is a gift from him to her and only her. There is a well-crafted intimacy here. No words are needed and this is a relief for her. A tiny crack of light that promises to illuminate the missing pieces of her jigsaw. She tries to return the smile and almost succeeds. A memory of happiness jostles forth, but it is pulled back by a crowd of angry feelings. Still she holds onto it. Willing herself to be in this moment. Wanting something different for once. The difference being what once was and should still be.

He extends his hand, carefully, leaving it there between them. Close to her own, but not so close as to be a threat. Instead it is an invite and he allows her the time and the space to consider it, “can I?” he asks with a tenderness that hurts her. He’s giving. His words place the onus on himself and allow her everything. She can refuse him and there will be no consequences. He is here. He is safe. He wants her to know that. She imagines that he would be good with animals. This gesture reminds her of something and she grasps it at once.

“I had a dog once,” her face creases as she tries to focus through a thick fog at the memory of the dog, instead she sees something else. Fragments of a recollection that she knows must be true. Memories have to be true, or else why would we store them for later reference? “My brother would raise his hand to the dog ever so gently and allow it to approach and sniff him. My brother was a gentle man. You remind me of him. What did you say your name was again?”

“Gary,” he breaths the word into the world and she takes it into herself hungrily.

They are holding hands now. She isn’t quite sure how this has happened, and despite the tinge of guilt at this simple intimacy, she feels better for it, “I’m not sure my husband would approve of me holding hands with you Gary,” now she smiles and there is a playfulness in it.

Gary grins, “I’m sure he’d understand,” he replies, winking a complicity, “how about we have a nice cup of tea?”

She considers this proposal, “a big mug of tea would be just the thing,” she nods, “I’m thirsty.” She realises she’s parched. Her mouth dry. The prospect of the tea fulfils that pressing need and more.

Watching the man who’s name she has forgotten. He is economical with his movements around the kitchen. Yet he flows in a dance he has practiced any number of times. There is a quiet joy in this ritual of his and when he presents her with the mug that sighs a magical whisp upwards, she feels an inexplicable love for what has occurred. The simplicity of the act speaks to her and she smiles as she understands what it is saying to her.

They share silence as well as their tea and she finds calm and peace in this. Experiences a sensation of sinking down into herself whilst at the same time rising above the torrent of noisy activity in her brain. She lives in a construction site, but she is not clear what it is that is being built in her mind. Cannot bring herself to consider the alternative.

The companionable man seems to know when the peaceful ceasefire is about to be broken. His words are a blessed distraction, “come with me, I have something to show you.”

She is intrigued. Her intrigue is a question she welcomes. Standing, he offers her his hand and this time there is no reluctance when she accepts it. There is a strand of trust now and she wants to follow that thin thread with him.

He leads her out of the kitchen and through a living room where a dog stirs in its bed and looks at her with a familiarity of recollection before returning to its nap. They go on into a smaller room that she would say was an office were it not for the collage of photos festooning three walls. The light from the window in the fourth wall dappling the images and transforming this space into another, welcoming world. She has taken so few steps, but she is far away from where she started. The details of her journey here are already insubstantial.

She feels his arm slip around her waist and she responds to him. Her body fits with his perfectly as she rests her head on his shoulder. He is the jigsaw piece she found without looking. They were meant for each other and she feels this meaning now. It lights her up as her gaze falls upon one of the photos. A small freezeframe of this very tableau. A happy couple holding each other and smiling not for the camera, but for each other and their love.

“Oh Gary,” she sighs.

He guides her around so she is facing him, cups her face in his hands and looks deeply into her eyes. Discerning her. Understanding the woman before him via the love he has for her, “it’s OK, my love.”

He says this and she feels it. Feels the truth of it. Knows that she is loved even before their lips meet and she loses herself in him. Her safe harbour. The light of her life. She holds onto him for dear life and feels the warmth and comfort of his love as he holds her and anchors her in this life of theirs, even as the storms rage fiercely inside her besieged mind.