Disintegration: A Fragment

Before you killed him, the Romantic wrote two last things. This one which is a fragment and I post with only the comment that the person on the stairs wasn't me, and one other that I am saving for a more opportune time.



The world as I had known it, as I had believed it to be, as I partially constructed it, collapsed on a Tuesday at 1:30 in the afternoon. An odd time for a world to collapse I guess, but then again is there every really a good time for it to happen?  I'm not in some doomsday cult that predicts worlds ending on certain days due to the Mayan calendar, global warming, or too much methane coming out of cow's asses. My world collapsed when it collapsed because I found something out that I had suspected for months, and then the collapse. It ended more with a whimper than a bang, as these things are wont to do, but it ended nonetheless, and I fear that this might be the last thing I write for a while. Actually, Since  I both fear and know the Rationalist, and his feelings (if he has feelings). I am fairly convinced that this might be the last thing I ever write period. If you ever had any fondness for me, and since Tuesday I have begun to doubt that, you will read this and forget it. If you ever want to remember me, and I doubt that you will, go back and read the stuff I wrote for you back when I was wooing you. Some of that stuff is quite good, this will not meet any standard of goodness.

Knowing him as I do, and I do know him, I fear that I might not even be granted the time to finish this properly, but I will do the best I can (which has rarely been good enough), with the time allowed to me. I don't know why you did it, I will probably never know why you did it, because as I said, my time here in this collapsed world is drawing to an end. I am the Romantic, I am the guy who got you, kept you, and thought made you mine for a considerable amount of time. Even now, even after you collapsed my world like a ton of bricks falling on the first little piggy's straw hut, I won't "out" you. I will write in vague terms leaving out the identifying details that would lead to people sussing out your true identity. This is both the last favour you'll ever get off of me, and no promise that the Rationalist will do the same for you. He is a bastard, you know this, he knows this, and I know this. Bastards can be useful, and to give him something to do, I have left a lot of detailed records for him to sort through, and do with what he will. I can't stop him, but I am not exactly encouraging him. It really doesn't matter to me what he does with them, because when he finds them, I'll already be dead as dead can be, and will be past the point of caring.

Of course, there will be gaps in those records. No records are totally complete. He won't have provable evidence of the things we said to each other during those lazy, naked afternoons or those "stolen" trips out of town. He does have shared access to our collective memory, but as for those conversations well it will be his word against yours, and who is going to not believe you? Your carefully crafted, but ultimately fake, reputation for being "above it all" will stand you in good stead if the Rationalist tries to use the "my word" approach. After all, he's a cunt, and few people like him, almost everybody loves you, I did. The fact that they have the wrong impression of you, and of him for that matter, won't matter. You will smile sweetly, and say all the right things to get you through. It's what you've done for years, the several years before we were together, and several years that we were together. You're a well practiced, well drilled, well proven liar. I am certain you are of the opinion that your lies will see you through any trouble in your future, and maybe they will. You seem to come out smelling like a rose when things go pear shaped, and trust me sweetheart, this too will go pear shaped. It's what you do, make things go pear shaped with your lies, and then use another set of lies to walk away blameless. It is quite the talent, and we should all use the talents we have as much as we can, otherwise it is just a waste.

I can hear you (barely), and others (more clearly) saying "you're the Romantic your world has collapsed in the past, and yet you survived." This is entirely true after all, even I admit people have done to me what you did to me on Tuesday, but sadly for me it wasn't on this scale. You were at least three of those previous collapses rolled into one, final, devastating, and eventually fatal disaster. The awful part of it, the part that probably proves to be the fatal bit, is that you knew it.  You knew it, because my dumb ass told you. I told you the plan I was following when I met you all those years ago, a plan that would be almost 60 percent complete by now IF I hadn't met and fallen in love with you as hard as I did. I told you that too, I told you the new plan, the future plan, the happy plan, and I foolishly believed you when you agreed to it with me. More the fool to me. I won't live to see if the Rationalist reactivates the original plan or not, I suspect that he will, but again I will be as dead as dead can be (thanks to you), and I don't care.

I did say that "almost everybody" loves you, you do have people who aren't exactly fans of yours, we all do no one can live their entire lives without enemies (at least not well), and the Rationalist knows this too, I don't know (and again will be dead so can't care), what he will do with that info, but caution is a good word to live your life by, I wished I had. Ah but wait! There is the tread on the stairwell outside my door that I've been waiting for. I knew it was coming which is why this post is slip shod, I tried to get as much of it out as I could but it seems as if the devil is at the door, and since I purposefully left it unlocked there is nothing left for me to do but say good-bye my sweet.