They are beautiful drawings. One sketched of a woman with her face buried in her hands, her long hair falling forward, dramatically draped across her bosom. There is one of a girl looking out through a wet, rain-stained window where the only splat of color comes from the maroon butterfly resting on the glass. Beautiful. A pair of feet walking down a wet asphalted road. A pier and a lighthouse almost buried in water and snow, winter and cold. Dreams. A collaboration of at least seven different posters from the WWII era, a burning bus on the street. They are terrible images, drawn to extract emotion. She has succeeded. David can feel a tear in the corner of his left eye as his gaze returns to his favorite. It is the one of a small African child seated in the back of a car and as the car drives its windows reflects what must be a revolution on the outside. The child looks dangerously solemn and scared. But there are happy ones too. A man and woman kissing, a family surrounding a tree. The image of a sole child laughing was breathtaking and leaves him staring, longing to hear the laughter. A captivating one, is of the woman sitting on a shore with the huge San Francisco Bridge in the background, all buildings removed. He looks up from all the pictures and surveyes the room again. Lola must have drawn this. Does she have more? As if compelled by an outer force – usually called curiosity – he moves, searching. He opens her closet but finds only clothes. He opens the drawers of her desk without regard for her privacy but finds only hundreds of pens and brushes. The bottom drawer contains what appears to be water-colors but he is fairly sure they are not. Crayons of various kinds shows up in the most peculiar places, under the pillow, in her vase filled with dried flowers, in her underwear drawer. On her desk, of course, but also one under her carpet, one on the chair, one carefully balanced with as much as possible outside of the shelf in a light bookcase. Then, in a final act of desperation he goes down on one knee and takes a look beneath her bed, Lola’s bed. And, sure enough, as predictable as the fact that a molecule of water needed two hydrogen atoms and one of oxygen, he finds something. They are paintings, actual paintings. No discovery has ever made him quite so happy. With a ridiculous smile he pulls them out and takes a look. He has no idea of what colors had been used or why, no idea what it was produced upon or by what. Does it matter?
They are creations of beauty. The bottom one he remains with, stays with, not willing to let it lose from his sight, not even for the duration of minutes. It is impossible to tear himself away. He wants to get closer, let it crawl beneath his skin but how can he? You cannot eat a painting. A painting can never return a hug or caress your skin. He watches it and its simplicity. It sticks with him. Only when he hears noises from the hallway does he tear himself away. He should not be here. It is a fact he had overlooked. He should not be here. He has known that all along. He should not be here. He is.
tjugoförsta augusti tvåtusentio
Why, he asks and she cannot understand. Does it matter? Already she feels this fickle human emotion, love they call it, and now they ask her to define it? Where she comes from emotions are far from definable and as far as she has gathered, so are theirs. Yet humans, this curious species, seem to have this intense need for labelling everything they come across. It is supposed to be short, dark, funny, intense, red or anything or everything and she still cannot see the need for it. Is there a need for it, or is it the mind of these humans, calling for attention and order in a world so far from it? They do not know much of this people, not yet, and that is why she is here, why she has travelled so far away and so far from home and it is why she even could fall in love with the impossible man in the first place. She suspects he is just like any other human man but to her he is exotic and different, far, far away from her greenish scales and her eyes in the colour that humans have no name for yet. She has not told him her people do not have a name for it either because he wouldn’t understand, wouldn’t get why they don’t. Just as she doesn’t get what he wants know. She loves him, and so she told him and then he smiled that brilliant smile which rapidly result in her species equivalent of a grin the way it always does. What she cannot understand is this constant need for why, this desperate chase for reasons and answers and twirling underlying thoughts considering the purpose of life. But she loves him and so in the end she makes up for a reason because she knows how thrilled he will be and how happy and content he will look when he returns the favour. She sure loves him.
fjortonde augusti tvåtusentio
När livet slår mot henne som allra hårdast, det är då hon ler som mest. Hon försöker i alla fall. Det är svårt, det är jävligt svårt, så otroligt jävla svårt, men vad mer finns det att göra? Hon tänker inte falla ned i en grop. Hon tänker inte drunkna i de känslor som slåss om utrymme i hennes tankar, hon tänker inte falla för trycket och tillåta sig själv att känna. Med styrka som bara kan liknas med en hjältes slår hon för sitt liv, för sina tankar, för sitt jag, men aldrig erkänns hon för världen. Man är ingen hjälte om man bara slåss för sig själv, även om striden är nobel, tragisk och för världens bästa. Man måste vara mer publik för det och det är inte hon. Aldrig skulle hon visa det offentligt för det skulle innebära att erkänna att känslorna finns eller kanske vill finnas och det vore en förlust i sig själv.
Men så faller hon. Inte långt, inte djupt, kanske mer utav ett snubbel än ett fall. Vad gör det? Hon förlorar och hon dör lite, dör lite grann inuti, dör en aning och hennes leende skälver för att försvinna, om så bara för ett ögonblick. Hon gråter inte fast hon vill gråta för det vore ytterligare ett nederlag och hon klarar inte av nederlag. Hon tror att hon skulle dö då, dö på riktigt, dö som bara en ännu icke nämnd hjälte dör, i ensamhet och nederlag. Hon ska inte dö. Hon vägrar.
Hon reser sig och ler igen och det gör ont bara att le. Hur kan det göra ont att le? Kanske slog hon sig mer än hon vet om; kanske är hon svagare än hon vet, fegare än hon tror. Kanske inte. Det vore hemskt så hon tänker inte så, hon tänker att hon är bäst och starkast och vackrast och bäst och oövervinnelig trots att det i sig själv är ett förnekande av allt hon någonsin varit och kommer att vara. Hon gör så ändå för det gör inte riktigt lika ont som att förlora.
Sen så gråter hon och hon hatar att hon snubblat, eller kanske stapplat till och vrickat sin fot, igen. Hon vill inte. Så hon rätar på ryggen och låtsas som om hon inte haltar och döljer det väl genom stödförband och osynliga kryckor som hon inte ens vet existerar. Inte ens kryckorna vet att de finns och hur skulle hon veta då, trots att det är hon som tvingat fram deras existens? Aldrig skulle hon erkänna deras varande. Hon ler. Hon har blivit bra på att ljuga till och med i sin egen värld.
Hon tänker: Fan. Det är ingen lögn för man får svära för det är inget nederlag, det är ingen förlust och inget farligt med det. Det gör inte ont så hon gör det igen. Helvete. Sedan gråter hon igen, hon snubblar, stapplar och faller. Faktiskt faller. Och sedan ligger hon där, i leran på marken, i ensamheten för ingen vet vart hon har gått och hur ska de då veta att hon ligger där, att det är där de ska leta, att hon borde ligga där? Ingen vet, allra minst hon, för fortfarande erkänner hon aldrig att hon kanske faktiskt fallit. När hon ligger där så tänker hon plötsligt: so what om det dör ont? So what? Sedan känner hon. Hon känner, känner allt allt allt. Allt.
Hon orkar inte resa på sig.
åttonde augusti tvåtusentio
She calls him Willie and laughs knowingly. It is their inside joke and while a handful of people get it later on, the rest of the world do not, but that is okay because they do not have to get it; never is the joke for the world, always for them, her and her Willie darling. The joke is theirs and on their account and never does it belong to anyone else. Always someone feels inclined to ask if his name wasn’t Jonah and the two of them laugh with their eyes caught in each other’s. He always replies, the seriousness evident in his voice, with the same answer. “Of course Jonah is my name. Why would you think not?”
Then she proceeds to call him Willie again and confusion is everywhere.
She lives on confusion, thrives on confusion and sincerely believes later that that is why it only took seconds for her to know him to be her Willie when they first met. She saw it, right then and there, that they would be forever friends. And so they are, the best of friends, the kind of pair you envy for their absolute trust in the other and their ease in which they meet; they have the kind of friendship where nothing is faked or pretended and they simply enjoy the other’s companionship. They are companions. The first time they meet he is watching other kids swinging and she asks why he does not do so too. He says he does not want to and she calls him a sissy and challenges him on a competition of who can swing the highest. He wins, but that does not matter, the point is that after the first time, more friendly and competitive contests ensues. They are kind of special in that way, neither ever hesitating to fight the other or shove their own excellence in the other’s eyes. Not that it prevents their relationship from blooming like daffodils come spring. They are awesome together. Great apart, sure, but awesome together. It comes so naturally to both of them, the trust, the friendship, the love. Not love love, but friendship love. Nothing ever matters but them. So they go to the university together and she calls him Willie and all was well. And they laugh together and they use each other as boxing bags and they have the time of their lives. They play soccer. Climb trees. Get drunk. Fail tests and occasionally pass them. Find jobs. Create a life. Live life. They are best friends. He is her Willie and nothing ever comes between them. He is her Willie.
Then he is hurt and he lies still in a hospital bed. He is 34 and he is young and the world should be beautiful. She stays with him through the night and when he moans in pain she is there and when he smiles in his sleep she knows he is dreaming of her. They are friends, but never just friends, always friends, and when he opens his eyes her and nobody else is there. In the end they know their best mate better than themselves. And they are so secure in each other, because he is her Willie, so sure of the other one’s existence and love and friendship and the simplicity of always being there. Sometimes he cries and she knows that it is okay, that the best is to let him cry until he runs out of tears. When her mother dies and she does not cry, he knows it is okay, because he knows her well enough to know her grief is too deep for tears. At the time she meets a somewhat serious girlfriend of his, she is not nervous or worried that the girl might be a bitch because she knows, deep in the very core of what is her, that she is the one thing permanent and the girlfriend isn’t. And they have other friends of course and they are close and lovely and great but it isn’t ever like that between them. What they have – Char and Willie-love– is so very special.
When they, the world, talk of love; it is the one thing neither of them ever quite gets. Those are the books and the poems that they never quite do understand, the emotion they will never feel. Their love for the other is so great and profound that no one can ever comprehend but never do they feel that desire so greatly connected with love. Never the wish to divulge, devour and explore, kiss, caress and never ever let go. It does not work in that way and so when they sleep they sleep with others and when they kiss they kiss others and jealousy is never involved. But she loves him. Oh, she loves him. He loves her. Never should anyone doubt it. After all, he is her Willie.
Then someone asks and right then they are there again. Are they sure they are not dating, lovers, soul-mates of some kind, loved ones? And because they never feel what others do, Char and Willie-love, can neither fully understand to which extent all of it is asked and questioned. All they can see is doubt followed by annoyance and sometimes even anger at their supposed ignorance. These are the times she lashes out, furious at their self-proclaimed pretense for concern and with fire streaming from her eyes she shouts and roars and wonder what the hell is wrong with them – or perhaps, in her more lucid bursts of wrath – what is wrong with herself. Those are times when their special bond shines like the beacon that it is in a world of ice and hatred and narrow-mindedness and he holds her hand and sometimes giver her hugs and then he whispers and smiles slowly. She looks at him and then she can see, really see, again.
Then they fight, the way they always do because he will forever call her on her crap, her darling Willie. He shouts and pants and throw his fists up in the air in anger, a perfect, fragile mirror of her image, neither backing down, both refusing to consider letting the matter go. And when they reemerge minutes later to the public in laughter, that is when they approach her and say how devoted he seems to her and what a gem he is and is she quite sure she is not in love with him? Forever they approach her, as if she could confess this pretended and by them conjured love while he cannot. Is her friendship displayed differently than his? Always, they seem more inclined to speak their words to her.
She never knows why.
When she eventually dies he doesn’t say anything because it won’t matter. It won’t make a difference. Instead, in a full and true reflection of all the two of them ever was or would be, he leaves home, he attends her funeral and he dies. It is not suicide, he would not end his own life, but it might as well be. It does not matter though. He dies. And just like that their lives are over. A moment in history, in universe, in time, monumentally forgotten.
Willie. It seemed so random but it wasn’t. Never. Not at all. See, he called her Princess.
sjunde augusti tvåtusentio
Buddha