“No, Alan. If we try to talk this out now, that’s when we will end up over. You are just too angry to see it.”

~~~

By the time I reach Berkeley, I am something beyond numb. I don’t even have the sensation of having driven here. The scenery passed in a blur, unreal, as disjointed moments of my life rose in my memory, now connected, unkind and too real.

All through the drive, my senses were only claimed by the flashing images of all the mistakes I’ve made. The mistakes I’ve made in how I love Alan. The mistakes I’ve made with everyone in my life.

I pull into the carport, grab my bag, and somehow manage to get into the elevator. I look at myself in the mirrored squares, and it’s a strange thing that I should look normal, exactly as I always do, and yet there is nothing comfortable or familiar left inside me.

I hurt the man I love. I hurt my best friend, and yes, Neil is my best friend. I didn’t realize it when we broke up, but it is painfully present inside me today.

Inside the condo, I drop my bag, and without turning on the lights I go to my bedroom. I rummage through my drawer for my mobile phone, flip it open, stare and start to shake.

It fully sinks in at this moment. It didn’t completely have the feel of realness before now, though it probably should have and I don’t know why it didn’t.

My legs are no longer able to hold me, and I sink on the bed and stare at the phone. Ten hours and not one message from Alan. Nothing. Not a single call. This time, I should have stayed and fought for him. Even if it bloodied us. Even if it hurt too much. And even if it ended this way.

Chrissie’s Journal

There are times I truly hate the phone. There are times I truly hate Alan. And there are times I truly hate myself. I’m sick of staring at the phone. I’m sick of waiting for Alan to call me. And I’m sick of feeling pathetic for repeatedly calling him.

I knew it in January when I walked out on Alan; I’d made a catastrophic mistake, the kind you don’t repair with a guy. It shouldn’t surprise me that Alan ignores my phone messages. It shouldn’t surprise me to see him splattered across the tabloids with a new girl every week. It shouldn’t surprise me that he’s self-destructing in print and ignoring me.

I’ve lived this horrible moment before. I seem to live the horrible moments of my life over and over again. It is all exactly like it was after I left Alan in New York in 1989. Only this time, I wish I could undo it, take back my mistakes, because this time I really could use Alan being here with me.

There is nothing about the past three months I don’t get…or blame Alan for…or forgive myself for. I am the one who fucked us up big time. I just really wish Alan would call, so I could tell him what’s going on with me because I don’t know what to do. What I’m supposed to do. What he would want me to do.

Crap, Chrissie, stop lying to your journal. You know exactly what Alan would want you to do. You just want him to say it so it won’t be something you do, something you own totally on your own.

Shit, how can someone’s life get so fucked up in three short months? January was awful and it keeps going downhill from there. One minute my life is OK, survivable, and then everything changes too quickly and my life is anything but OK.

Three little words and the world has changed. Time has lost the feel of realness. I have lost the feel of realness. I don’t know what to do, and I hate that I’m in this mess alone trying to figure out my life by myself.

Fuck, Alan, just call me. We’re over. Message received. You don’t need to continue behaving like an asshole so the message is sent to me every day via the tabloids. Your silence says it all. So now, can you please answer a single phone message?

Accept the fact, Chrissie, he’s not going to call. I need to stop calling him. Maybe it’s time to let go of him the way he has definitely let go of me. Only a stupid girl runs to a guy, who doesn’t want her, with her problems. This is my problem and I need to fix it on my own.

Maybe this is what being an adult is. This awful aloneness with life-altering decisions you are too terrified to make.

Still, when I left Malibu I didn’t really believe Alan would end us. I thought he’d be pissed off for a few days and then break down and call me. He called and sent me letters for a year after I left him in New York, but after Malibu, nothing. I really didn’t expect this.

Maybe there are some hurts love can’t fix. Maybe there are some things people are not supposed to be able to forgive. Maybe it is better to walk away from someone rather than to try to mend your heart after having someone rip it out.

That’s what Alan said to me. I ripped out his heart. Oh God, the memory of the way he looked at me still makes me grow shaky and cold inside. Maybe it’s all better this way, with him walling me out in a way that makes it abundantly clear that I fucked up and we are over forever.

Maybe this is love. Protecting the part of yourself most important to you and knowing when to let go so that you can keep a small piece of that person alive and real in your heart. Maybe this is the only way Alan can keep from hating me.

And really, that’s not such a bad thing. As awful as this is, as much as I need him now, it would be worse knowing that Alan hates me. Maybe the best two people can do when they’ve loved each other badly, is to walk away before hating each other.

Maybe someday we’ll get past this and be friends. That would be nice. But I don’t think that’s ever going to happen.

It’s probably better this way.

CHAPTER ONE

April 1993

I sit at the kitchen table, hunched over the typewriter, staring at a blank page. Damn, I’ve been at this four hours and I still haven’t written a single word. There is something so intimidating about a blank page. Some people think only black represents nothingness, but white does as well. The absence of everything, just in a gentler, less-frightening-looking way.

I feel my eyes mist up and I focus on staring at my fingers ready on the typewriter keys. The absence of everything. That’s how my life has felt since I walked out on Alan. I don’t even know how I’ve made it through the last three months of school. I feel blank inside like this stark, white typing paper, and numb, as if the world in all its bright spring color in Berkeley exists in total absence of everything.

But it doesn’t. Life, and the world, is marching into the future around me, same as always. Time goes on whether my heart is broken or not, or I’m panicking inside because I’ve got decisions I have to make being forced upon me whether I want to make them or not.

I push away my thoughts and type my name in the upper right hand corner of the blank page. There. That’s something on the page, at least. It’s better that I don’t think about my problems today. I need to focus on the paper I have to write. I definitely have got to finish it; no paper, no grade, and no graduation in May.

A sound causes me to turn and I see Rene racing into the kitchen. She pauses to stare over my shoulder. “Shit, Chrissie, you need to get this paper done. You’ve been at it all day. I still have one to write tonight as well. If you aren’t going to work on it, can I at least have the typewriter until you’re ready to try and finish your homework?”

I avoid looking at her by rummaging through my notes on the table. “I’ll be done in an hour. But if you keep bugging me I won’t ever finish.”

Rene drops heavily into the chair across from me and I can feel her stare dissecting my posture and expression. “Chrissie, what is wrong? You’ve been like this for weeks. Nervous and edgy and preoccupied. You’re barely passing your classes. Jeez, we’ve been here for four years. Now is not the time to fuck up and not graduate. What’s wrong?”