CLEAN SLATES

I really can't believe I spent several months writing things to you here in the hopes you would read them and come back.  

Wait.

That's not true.  

I really CAN believe I spent several months writing things to you here in the hopes you would read them and come back.

That's who I am.

Did you ever read any of it?

Are you dead?

Do you know I still check my email every single day, multiple times a day, to see if your name will appear in my inbox?

Gerard.

And the fake last name you gave me because the president of France died on that same day you sent me the first email so you took his last name as your own.

I didn't know that then.

It was only after you left that I figured it out.

Remember that one time you were sick with the flu (I wonder if it was actually Covid) and in the hospital and I didn't hear from you for several days?

Yeah.  I thought you were dead.

I called every hospital google told me was around you and gave them your name and your fake last name.  Only I didn't know at the time that your last name was fake so every time the person on the other end of the line said "No, we do not have a patient here by that name" I breathed a huge sigh of relief. 

And here is where the old me would say something like "God, I was such a dumbass."

But I'm not going to say that this time because I'm not such a dumbass.

Listen.

I don't hate you or anything and I'd forgive you in a millisecond if you came back around.  Actually, I don't have to forgive you because I already have.  I don't not forgive people for anything ever.  Unless you hurt Max, then I might have to kill you.  But you never hurt Max so your slate is clean with me.

A clean slate.

That's what I would give you because that's what I would give anyone.

Well, not Max's dad.  I ran out of clean slates to give him.  I was giving him one about every other day towards the end and probably from the beginning too.  He'd scribble all over it immediately and hand it back to me like some 6 year olds artwork hanging in the hallway of the school.  Except the hallway was in my heart and I hung all his slates there for far too long.

But you?  You deserve another one.  

Most people do.

So here.  Take it, ok?

And then you can get back to telling me about Una and Robinson Jeffers and if you ever finished that book about the silent film actresses you were writing.  I'd really like to know. 

 

But...

Maybe you’re dead? 

Well.

If you're not dead, you should come back around so I can make you a hot plate of fries and feed them to you while I straddle your lap in the kitchen.

And.

If you are dead, I hope there's some sort of afterlife and you're drinking Jameson while listening to punk music and reading poetry in bed with a sexy ghost.  Maybe you'll think of me from time to time.

 

Either way, I mostly just came here to say

You're rad.

Like super rad.

And I'm still out here.  

I really hope you're still out there too.