Chapter 24 #2
Out of habit, I opened my desk drawer, but of course, no bullets rolled back and forth...
Instead, my gaze lingered on something else.
Holding my breath, I reached for the little piece of paper on which we had both already left a message for each other.
Because someone out there will resonate with what you write. Deeply.
Just as much as I wanted to erase her words from my mind and destroy this piece of paper, I wanted just as urgently to never let go of these words again.
And so I was still holding the piece of paper in my hand as my hands clenched the steering wheel of Lara's car, still holding it as I drove into the driveway of our house, stormed inside, and left everything behind to disappear up to my study.
A short circuit in my head. That had to be what drove me to run like a madman into the storm inside me until I typed unrestrainedly on my keyboard, oblivious to the time.
Until the rain of words streamed over my skin, the wind of written emotions whipped my face, and the storm of euphoria finally swept me away.
I didn't even know what I was doing here, I just let all the ideas that I had relentlessly pushed away over the last few days and weeks burst out of me. They consumed me, intertwined, until a storyline emerged, linked by plot twists and dramatic climaxes.
At some point, candles and coffee mugs gathered around me, three of my old notebooks and a new one lost themselves among the pages that escaped my typewriter, while I put on my reading glasses and continued to study the old notes on Batteries of Ink.
All the quotes I had never looked at again, all the ideas. I added new ones and they literally tripled until twenty new pages of the new notebook were filled and three chronological chapters were typed, which I had thought about for nights on end.
Liberating. That's what all this was doing to me.
It lifted a weight off my chest, let me breathe, think clearly.
I was alive, even if it was only for one night.
Even if I would lock all this away in drawers again in the morning.
It would give me enough air to breathe for a few more months on reserve.
“Dad?”
I Never Asked You
Atli ?rvarsson
I flinched, jumped up from my desk chair, and took off my glasses, immediately overcome with guilt.
Lara leaned against the doorframe with her arms crossed, looked me up and down, then raised both eyebrows. She smiled, but when I didn't smile back, it disappeared.
What had I done?
I looked like someone who had no control over his life. My loosened tie, the top two buttons of my shirt undone... the whole damn study.
She stepped away from the doorframe, tension in her expression.
“I didn't mean to disturb you...”
“No...” I raised my hands reassuringly and put my glasses on the desk. “No, I...” I ran a hand over my face, closed my eyes in resignation, then opened them again and looked at the clock above my door.
Half past one.
“It won't happen again.”
“Dad,” Lara laughed, but with concern on her face. “Why do you apologize every time I find you writing, as if you'd done something illegal?” She raised an eyebrow. “Don't tell me it's still because of Joseph?”
I felt ridiculous. But Lara didn't know what writing could do to a person, that it could make one forget oneself and those around them. That it was a distraction from the things that really mattered.
I hastily gathered up the three and a half chapters, tempted to throw them into the fireplace, where the hungry flames were already flickering for two hours. They were waiting for my paper birds.
“I shouldn't have written. It was a one-time thing, and I'm in control.”
“Dad?”
Lara stepped into my office, looked around, and my gaze fell on the note I had received from Quill.
Immediately, my inner tension grew and I stepped back behind the desk before her gaze wandered over the mess on it and lingered on me.
“I may never have told you this, but I hope you didn’t give up writing because of me.”
Shit. She had never brought up this topic before.
My inner tension mixed with heaviness and further feelings of guilt, all of which I would bear with my head held high.
Sighing, I walked over to my daughter and placed my hands on her shoulders.
“Pumpkin, if I hadn't given up writing, we wouldn't have this life.” I smiled reassuringly at her. “Joseph has been a responsible father, and I'm glad I listened to his advice.”
Something in Lara's gaze shifted. It was as if a shadow had flitted across her face. She looked away, avoiding my gaze. And something told me that I had failed as a father.
“How about this? Let me quickly tidy up here, then I’ll make us some hot chocolate and you can tell me about your day?”
“Maybe another time.” Lara yawned and put her hand over her mouth before walking to the door. “I was in the parks with Quill looking at the stars and I’m really tired. Good night.”
I had really failed.
“Good night...”
The dog followed her down the hall to the bathroom as I slowly turned back to my desk.
What I would give to look at the stars with Quill and listen to her, just so I wouldn't feel alone in a world of words for a moment.
I forced that thought aside, making room for all the reproaches I deserved.
Lara was an adult, but that was no reason for me to stop being a good role model. I had probably confused her.
We had never talked about what had come over me four years ago, when, after so many years of keeping it all inside, a complete sea of letters had flowed out of me until I had published that damn book.
No one could have guessed that it would become a bestseller. No one could have seen that it would change me into a different person for a year.
I had spent less time with Lara, even though I had tried to find a balance.
Too often during that phase, I had longed to quit my job and continue writing on a leap of faith.
But you don't throw away something you've worked on for twenty years. That would be foolish. Mindless.
Angry at myself, I tidied up my office until my hands found Quill's note.
With my heart pounding violently, I unlocked the large cabinet containing the hundred signed copies that people would pay insane sums for and placed the note on one of the shelves, not even daring to look at the judgmental stares of the book spines, and closed the cabinet much too loudly.
Hastily, I stuffed today's writing into the bottom drawer of my desk.
No one will ever resonate with this, Feather, because I will never publish it.
At some point, my study looked quiet and desolate again.
My eyes fell on the dried-up white tulip petal, which must have somehow fallen out of my bag and onto the floor.
No matter how many cabinet doors I tried to hide her traces behind, she had been right. She was everywhere.
I was nothing more than a dried-up white tulip.
Quillon Veritas had put me in ink. You could take me out of the midnight blue liquid, dry me off, and put me in a vase with fresh water.
But no matter how hard you tried, it was too late.
The ink had already soaked into my fragile stem, ready to revive my wilting petals.
A single drop of ink.
That was all it took.
– Leaking Batteries Diary