Chapter 25
AMELIE
PLAYLIST: HOLDING ON AND LETTING GO – ROSS COPPERMAN
“You don’t have to do this,” Jane says, with one hand on my back as we stand in front of my studio. The hospital released me against medical advice, but Jane assured them she would take proper care of me.
I don’t want to be cared for.
It makes me feel incapable.
Less of a person.
We are standing in front of the door. A door I can’t open. Because everything behind that door reminds me of all my failures. How I failed El. How I failed Jane. How I failed everyone.
Every piece of furniture in that studio reminds me of El. She furnished it. She decorated it. She lived here. It was practically hers.
My eyes wander into Jane’s.
I feel sick to my stomach as I stand in front of a door I can’t open.
Paralyzed by the loss.
Broken in pieces.
Crushed by guilt.
“Come,” she says and walks me back to the stairs. You sit here, and I get whatever you need. Just tell me.”
I sit down and stare at my hands.
I feel so useless.
Incapable of doing the most basic things.
I just sit there, spiraling into the crushing numbness of the endless void I am left with.
I can’t even run from myself anymore.
Jane returns.
“Let’s go,” she says.
But there is nowhere for me to go.
She appears in front of me, holding out a hand for me to take.
“I don’t have anywhere to go,” I say.
“You have,” she says. “Take my hand.”
I take it.
She pulls me up.
She takes my phone to unlock the elevator.
We ride down the elevator.
We get outside.
I see the Porsche standing in front of the door.
I stop, staring at it. It is when I remember.
‘You can drive to something, Teterboro Airport, for example, where I’d have a plane ready within an hour, and we can go anywhere in the world. Paris—Hawaii. You’d love Hawaii, it’s freedom.’
El asked me without asking to come to Hawaii with her. And I didn’t realize it. I should have said yes. Should have gone with her.
The hollowness inside me drags me even further down.
And then, I am pulled away.
By Jane.
I want to hate her.
But I can’t.
Because she is here.
We sit in a cab.
We get out of the cab.
I registered the house Jane lives in.
I just do what she tells me to do.
Get out of the cab.
Walk up the stairs.
Wait.
Stand.
“Come in,” she says.
And I come in.
She is letting me into her home.
She puts my duffel bag and backpack aside.
Removes my jacket.
My shoes.
I just stand there, letting it happen.
Like a useless shell.
“Do you need to use the bathroom?” she asks me.
I nod, not quite knowing what I am agreeing to.
I really don’t.
She shows me the door to a bathroom and walks me in.
I stand in the middle of the dark-grey tiled room.
I am exhausted.
I just sink to the floor and lie down flat on my belly, with the side of my face resting on the hard tiles. They have a slightly matte surface, which gives them a soft touch.
I just stare into nothingness until Jane lies down in front of me.
She just lies there with me.
Not touching me.
Not talking to me.
Just being with me.
At some point, her cat appears.
She brushes herself against me, rubbing her body and face against mine, purring.
It’s the first time I register something outside the pain in me.
I lift my arm and pet her.
She is as black as the void in me.
My palm caresses her soft fur.
It feels good. So good, I lift myself off the ground to sit up. She climbs on my legs and curls up into a ball.
I pet her.
And we just sit there.
Jane still lies on the floor, watching me pet her cat.
“You can get up,” I say.
“I don’t want to,” she answers, smiling weakly at me. “The floor is one of my favorite places to be.”
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“What for?” she asks.
“Stressing you out so much that you need to regulate with the floor.”
“You’re not stressing me out.”
“Please,” I say.
“You are not stressing me out,” she repeats, getting up. “You’re the most peaceful I have ever felt with,” she says as she walks past me and brushes briefly with her fingers over my shoulder. “I’ll make us something to eat.”
I lean back against the bathtub and sit there with her cat. It’s the first time I realize the room I sit in.
It’s very tidy, nothing that isn’t necessary, but it’s also warm and inviting. A pot palm sits in the corner, and photos of her cat hang meticulously placed on the wall.
Jane returns with two bowls of cereal and two spoons. She sits cross-legged in front of me.
“Here, eat,” she says, hands me a bowl, and after I take it, she proceeds to eat her cereal.
I am not hungry.
But I take a spoonful anyway.
Because it’s nice, sitting here on the bathroom floor, eating cereal with her and a cat on my lap.