Let Go

St. Louis.  STL. So many memories, so much history.  The ghosts of the good mixed with the bad.  Mostly bad, heh.

I remember the slow nights, hanging out at Ted Drewes, trying to figure out how the frozen custard stays rock hard but melts as soon as you push your spoon into it.  Driving through downtown, the river on one side, the St. Louis Arch on the other.  The fights, the sharp spiteful words exchanged by both sides.  But in it all, the warmth, the intimacy forced by necessity, the sense of care that spawned from time and friendship.

The Summer of 2000.  I was about to turn 16.  I was pushing forward in my youth.  In a sense, I was stretching my arms and legs, having moved away from the harshness of the ghetto I grew up in until 2 years before.  Perhaps it was a way of shedding the burdens that I carried with me indirectly since childhood.  But as with many things, the past continues to chase us like a jealous child until we acknowledge its twisted sense of self-worth.

She was a childhood friend.  We grew up on the same dusty street in Los Angeles littered with spent needles.  I remember my anger rising as I purchased the plane ticket.  How dare he.  How dare he.  Her tearful whispers resonated on the phone still.  He had taken her trust, in a way that I could not express even through my initial shock.  The next day, I read the news.  He had gunned down her mother’s two lovers, before shooting himself in the chest on the way home.  This man, he was supposed to be her father.

In a very real sense, I still was quite innocent.  Understanding the larger forces in the world was still beyond me.  I felt invincible, that I could take anything into my hands and create something good from it with impunity.

Mafia.  Sicilians.  I still cringe to this day whenever I think in retrospect.

The next few months of the summer I spent taking care of her brother and spending time with her.  Those quiet nights with just us three, while her mother drowned herself in alcohol and spent our money on gambling.  I remember those tired nights, having to blink twice at the shadow leaning against the column leading up to the front door, where he used to smoke.  The happy nights of laughter were punctuated by heavy choices I wouldn’t want anyone to go through, teenager or not.  The constant police contact, wanting to ask this question, that question, how much I knew about her father, how little I knew about her father.  Sicilians.  They were connected to, it was a whole big family.

The blissfulness of teaching her how to drive too, when she turned 16 a few months behind me.  The fireworks booming and crashing over our heads on the 4th of July.  Her little brother’s laughter piercing the air when I bought him a second-hand bike and polished it up really good.  The slow rolling evenings on the balcony above the basement with candles and wine.  Our quiet lovemaking when we decided we were obviously soulmates.  The friendship, the trust.

How figuratively cruel it was when one of our trusted friends, a cop, twisted us apart to serve his own sense of loss over losing his own daughter and son because of his bi-polar outbursts.  We hadn’t talked for a few years after that, until we turned 18, and even after then, only sparingly.

And now, 10 years later, I find myself again in this familiar yet strange town.  We hardly talk anymore, after I cut her out last year for disrespecting me by proxy because her current boyfriend had decided that he could not stand our history together.  But here I am.  Her brother had got into an accident, and tracing my fingers along the ground by the river, twisting the blades of grass in my fingertips, it comes roaring back.  It’s hard to escape the past, especially when you have got emotional investment into something.  My decisions continue to shape my sense of being and the future; my decision to come as soon as possible when I received word about her brother, even though we hadn’t spoken for the last year.

She’s different now.  Gone was that shy girl who dreamed big things.  Harsh, pessimistic, too “out there.”  It’s as if the light had left her eyes long ago.  Life has shaped her too.

What I ask myself, is if I should keep the good memories, excising the bad like a cancer, or just let go.  But with many things, even through remission, the cancer can rebound even with a single surviving damaged cell.

I let go.

Ingrained

I remember growing up.

It’s still a surreal memory for me.  The people, the environment, the culture.

I wouldn’t say that I grew up in the ghetto, but now that I think about it, it sure was a disadvantaged community.  The drugs, sex, crime, youngsters standing on the corner waiting for some trouble, the constant roar of the police sirens, the soft popping of gunshots going off in the night.

And in this, I learned my first lessons on women, relationships, people.

***

I remember you, who I called my sister.  One of my greatest wishes as a child was to have sisters, as it was just my brother and I most of the time.  I remember begging my parents for a little sister, and half-wishing that I hadn’t been the oldest child.  I wanted an older sister to take care of me, and to be able to take care of a younger sister.  So here, you came in.

You lived in the duplex next to mine, and was a year older, but in everything, we were as close as blood siblings could be.  In you, my needs for and older sister was fulfilled.  I remember your kind heart, the way you knew how to make every situation better.

***

I remember that cold day in June so clearly.  The strobe of the squad cars’ lightbars, the detective trying to ask me questions, my tears streaming down my cheeks, diluting the blood stains on my hands.  It still feels like a lucid dream, something unreal.  You were only 14 then, and I 13.

***

You had just gotten together with him for a few months.  I remember respecting him so much, as an older brother, a friend, my protector.  Through him, I had found my place.  But he was a player, even at his early age of 19.  That was how all us boys grew up, caught up in crime, reveling in our bedroom exploits, chattering about it excitedly as the sparrows do over a bit of seed.  I didn’t respect women then, but I respected you.

On that day, I rushed excitedly home from school to tell you something that now slips my mind.  I rambled up the flight of stairs, and pushed the door to your duplex open.  The kitchen was swept clean, dinner set out neatly in the way that you always do.  I can see now why your mother and little sister always valued you.

I called out your name, but there was no reply over the shower, so I waited patiently at the little dining table that you always tried to make homey.  After some time, I sensed something wrong, and went into the bedroom.  Softly knocking on the bathroom door, I didn’t hear any reply.  I opened the door, and there was no one there.  I turned off the shower, and noticed the wet footprints on the vinyl floor.

Only then did I have that sinking feeling inside.  I made my way quickly out, and saw the ruffled blankets, with a tuff of raven hair on the side.  I remember now, pushing those blankets over to the side, only to see you still wrapped in the towel.  The gleam of steel caught the corner of my eye, and my heart started to panic as I saw the gun resting awkwardly on your chest.

***

The call of the ambulance sirens, the buzzing background drowned out the spinning in my head.  I read your note again and again, how you explained that you couldn’t take it anymore that your man had used you, left you.  I remember how I cried out against God, against the world, against everybody for taking my friend away.  How he denied all culpability in destroying you, and left to Texas to live out his life.

***

Years later, I received a phone call from his cousin.  Her muffled crying came out so clearly.  He had been shot based on a grudge.  Only then through his death did he let go of his pride.  I heard how he had admitted to his cousin that he felt truly sorry for what happened in our youth, but never had the ability to look over his pride and denials.  He had lived the rest of his short life in shame and regret.  Pride makes men do strange things, and above all, takes away our ability to reason out the truth.

***

This was my first lesson, and I remember it well, every time I bring you new flowers at your resting place.