A Moment of Stillness

   One of my classes was cancelled today, and fortunately, it was the class I share with sister #4. Listless, we wandered through hallways in circles, eventually settling on a bench.
   What began as an analysis of our current lives; her overall contentment with the stability she's found, though perhaps lamenting a shortage of excitement, my driving need to get out, shifted towards the inevitable when discussing things I need to escape from: Mr. Fantasy.
   "I just...don't think he's a good person," she concluded.
   I really struggled with that one. Torn between so many responses, I looked away to avoid saying any of them.
   "You don't have to respond," she said.
   "I, uhm... Well. Maybe you're like Mom and I'm like Dad because... well. You know how if someone is cool in a lot of ways but they're a racist I just don't like them?"
   "Yes."
   "Well, Mom's like that with womanizers. If a guy is cool in other areas, but treats women like shit, she hates him automatically. Whereas Dad and I... We have an easier time separating someone from that. Like... 'Yeah, he treats women like shit, but he's got all this other stuff going on...'"
   "Yeah," she responded, "but all that other stuff doesn't matter if you are the woman he's treating like shit. You don't want to be his friend. You don't want to hang out with him and... whatever. It doesn't matter if he's cool otherwise, because he's treating you like shit. And maybe I'm biased because you're my sister and seeing what he does to you hurts me, but... I just don't think a good person would do the things he does."
   That was hard to hear, and even harder to formulate a response to. Eventually, I just stuttered out some form of agreement.
   "And don't you feel like... this has been how many years?"
   "Four," I mumbled.
   "Don't you feel like you've just wasted all this time and energy and four years?!"
   "Yes," I admitted, "but there develops this...desperation. For something to hold on to, to say it was worth it. To... I need proof of the last four years of my life." What I find impossible to express is the depth of the desperation for the effort and the years to add up to something, to have meant something that can be translated into some truth, something other than disillusionment and distrust; some tangible thing I can walk away with, knowing or feeling or seeing, something that could compare to the endless things he takes from me.
   She paused for a moment, inhaling the magnitude of pathos I had laid bare on the floor. I don't open up very often. No one's ever sure how to react when I do.
   "Do you think it's just going to be like this until you get over him, or do you think he's going to change?"
   Ouch. I sat breathless for a minute, almost stunned by the question. Even though I ask myself that same goddamn question all the time. And I know the answer. And I hate the answer. I hate, hate, hate the answer. 
   Visions of our future inundate me, his promises deluge my mind. I'm filled with whining, smiling whispers and reassurances of good intentions, doused with sugar-sweet affection and hopefulness.
   Until: the cataclysm of consequences, moments of brutal realization, every single promise broken, every whisper silenced by deafening actions. I realize the past four years of my life do compose something, they do combine to form a truth and that is this:
   "He's never going to change," I confessed, slowly, feeling my heart contract, pull into itself so tight and small it might explode. "He's... he will never change."
   "That sucks," she sighed,
   "Yeah," I breathed. "Yeah, it does."


   So maybe the truth I can leave with, can carry with me, is this: People don't change unless they want to. And sometimes even then, they can't. Despite possible fluctuations in maturity and hormone levels, people are the same at 17 as they will be four years later, and even forty years beyond that.
   And if I haven't been incentive enough, I never will be.
   "I will never be enough for you," I remember confessing, teary-eyed and scared. 
   "You are. Of course you are. Stop," he pleaded. "It hurts me when you say things like that."
   Well lover, it hurts me every time you leave. And I'm awfully tired of watching you walk away.

  This time this time, this time, no, this time, wait, no this time, wait really guys THIS TIME! Or next time... How can I possibly expect him, or anyone else for that matter, to take me seriously when I can barely take myself seriously? I will be stronger. I will resist. I will leave us behind me.

   Right now I carry our burdensome weight on my back. But I'm headed into the sunshine, and I'm sure I'll shed it soon.