A Million Little Pieces - James Frey [79]
It comes in waves. The waves roll deep and from deep the deep within me and I hold her and she holds me tighter and I let her and I let it and I let this and I have not felt this way this vulnerability or allowed myself to feel this way this vulnerability since I was ten years old and I don’t know why I haven’t and I don’t know why I am now and I only know that I am and that it is scary terrifying frightening worse and better than anything I’ve ever felt crying in her arms just crying in her arms just crying.
She guides me to the ground, but she doesn’t let me go. The Gates are open and thirteen years of addiction, violence, Hell and their accompaniments are manifesting themselves in dense tears and heavy sobs and a shortness of breath and a profound sense of loss. The loss inhabits, fills and overwhelms me. It is the loss of a childhood of being a Teenager of normalcy of happiness of love of trust of reason of God of Family of friends of future of potential of dignity of humanity of sanity of myself of everything everything everything. I lost everything and I am lost reduced to a mass of mourning, sadness, grief, anguish and heartache. I am lost. I have lost. Everything. Everything.
It’s wet and Lilly cradles me like a broken Child. My face and her shoulder and her shirt and her hair are wet with my tears. I slow down and I start to breathe slowly and deeply and her hair smells clean and I open my eyes because I want to see it and it is all that I can see. It is jet black almost blue and radiant with moisture. I want to touch it and I reach with one of my hands and I run my hand from the crown along her neck and her back to the base of her rib and it is a thin perfect sheer and I let it slowly drop from the tips of my fingers and when it is gone I miss it. I do it again and again and she lets me do it and she doesn’t speak she just cradles me because I am broken. I am broken. Broken.
There is noise and voices and Lilly pulls me in tighter and tighter and I pull her in tighter and tighter and I can feel her heart beating and I know she can feel my heart beating and they are speaking our hearts are speaking a language wordless old unknowable and true and we’re pulling and holding and the noise is closer and the voices louder and Lilly whispers.
You’re okay.
You’re okay.
You’re okay.
And she lets me go and I let her go and she stands and I stay and she stares down at me.
I have to go.
I stare at her.
I’ll call you later.
I stare at her.
Bye.
I stare at her and she backs away toward the far edge of our Clearing. When she reaches the edge she turns around and she disappears through Evergreen thick and I hear her step settling and her step is gentle and I hear her voice intermingle and her voice is gentle and I sit and I breathe and I sit and I stare. I am alone, lost and broken. I stare at the Evergreen thick. Alone lost broken.
The Sun is falling and the cold is running and the night is descending and I’m tired, spent and completely empty. I force myself to stand and I make my way through the trees until I pick up a Trail and then I let the Trail lead me. My feet are heavy, my body is tired and my heart is beating slow slow slow. The walk is only a couple hundred yards, but it seems across the Earth.
It takes all my strength to open the door. I step inside and I walk through the Unit and I go to my Room. As I enter, I see that all of my things my new beautiful things have been stacked on a chair near my bed. I flare momentarily until I notice a letter sitting on top of my clothes. I reach for it and I open it and I read it and it is from Ken and it says per our earlier conversation you are being moved to a new Room and it has the Room number.
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