NEON

by Mandy Forlenza

I look at the world map on my wall daily.  One night, we poured over it together.   Your country tucked away, so small its name was printed in blue water.  The United States was in the center of the map, with New York printed larger than your whole country.  

And you returned home.  All I have is the laminated page of the world to track you and the orange card where you scratched down your name and address.  That last night as we ate sushi and it rained; I wrote my address on the other half of the orange card for you. Handing you the card, I thought that we’d be part of something together.  I was grasping at straws. I wouldn’t allow myself more than weary hopes of keeping in touch.  I hadn’t completely fooled myself.  

I know your address by heart.  I stare at it next to the map while I type on my computer at night.  Your scrambled handwriting on the bright orange card glows like neon.  Sometimes I ponder its position.  I should probably take it down, put it with the papers and trinkets at the foot of my desk.  What started as an envelope filled with our memories has grown to a pile in your absence.  I have slowly begun to dismantle the thoughts of you in my home.  

I told myself when you left that I had permission to chip away at you, little by little.  I didn’t have to rush you into a box.  I didn’t need to push hard at moving you into a drawer.  I would delicately move your pieces together to a corner at my own pace.  I would gracefully gather you up and set you free when I was ready.

There are other fragments of you lingering.  I bump into them often.  Other times I walk by as if they were a clean windowpane.  It’s when I am alone at night, smothered in my down comforter and engrossed in television that my eye wanders to the lone hanger left by you.  It has been there for six weeks announcing, “we love our customers”.  Sometimes I mentally attempt its removal.  Other times I pretend not to notice.  Does it love me though?  Does it linger with thoughts of me?

Of course, these are questions I’d like to ask you.  Instead, I am left with a laminated map and a wire dry-cleaning hanger to keep me company.  

You have gone without my heart’s permission.  Left with a blessing, just the same. It was crazy to have loved you with your impermanence.  Still, I just looked into your eyes and melted.