TheBanyanTree: Magda - Fiction

[NancyIee at aol.com]

The  person who needs compassion the most, often drives it away.  What a  
thought-provoking and sad write. I think that's what "hopelessness" must feel 
 like.
 
 

Magda
>
>
> I hear the crickets outside, scads of  them from the sounds of it. The 
cats
> used to care, always wanting out  so they could catch them, but now they
> just
> sleep right  through it, as if they can’t hear them at all. Just two weeks
> ago  there weren’t any crickets at all, at least not that I could hear, 
but
>  time isn’t standing still, even when it feels like it is, and before  
long
> the crickets will fade away too, like everything does, and I’ll  still be
> here, with the cats, listening.
>
>
> Or  maybe it’s frogs I hear. Frogs, crickets, things that make noises in  
the
> night when the rest of the world is asleep. I used to think it was  
peaceful
> out here, miles from the nearest town, but now I just think  it’s dead out
> here, with nothing alive for miles in any direction,  nothing but me and 
the
> cats and the crickets and the frogs. During the  day it’s even quieter, 
not
> so much as an airplane overhead or the mail  truck passing by on the road.
> There used to be all kinds of traffic on  this road, everyone in a hurry 
to
> get from one place to another, and  it bothered me, all the noise, and I
> wished for  peace.
>
>
> Now I have it and I don’t like it, not one bit.  I’m not sure when the
> traffic stopped. Maybe it was when the bypass  was built, a better 
smoother
> road that takes the people away from this  area, as if we’ve ceased to
> exist.
> Maybe we have. I can’t  really tell anymore.
>
>
> I used to keep in touch with  people out there, people out in the world, 
but
> that was when the  telephone was still working. Somewhere along the line,
> perhaps a  couple of years ago, the phone stopped working. Maybe I stopped
> paying  the bill, I’m not really sure. I picked it up one day, after 
months
> of  not picking it up at all, and there wasn’t so much as a dial tone on  
it.
> Nothing at all. I would have called to find out, but I had no  phone.
> Inertia
> took over from there.
>
> I stopped  driving after I had the accident, the one that banged me up
>  pretty
> bad last year. It was so bad for awhile there I didn’t want to  keep going
> on, especially when they had me in the rehab place. But  eventually they
> sent
> me back home with my crutches, had a taxi  drop me off right at my house,
> and
> I just stayed here after  that. I had nowhere to go, after all, and no one
> to
>  see.
>
>
> It wasn’t always like this, just me and the cats.  Used to be we had
> ourselves a regular life, but that was when Alan was  still here, before 
he
> run off on me. He said he was tired of me just  moping around, never 
trying
> to get better, but I did try, I know I  did.
>
>
> Just seemed like no matter what I did things  wouldn’t get better, and I
> never could get myself back into a  rhythm.
>
>
> He left on a Tuesday morning in the middle of  April. Things were starting
> to
> bloom, spring was coming, and  usually that helped, usually I could rouse
> myself into caring just a  little bit, but before that could happen Alan
> said
> he’d had  enough, that no one should have to live like this forever. I
>  didn’t
> understand what he meant, though I knew I hadn’t been myself  for quite
> awhile.
>
>
> “You have to get over it,”  he’d tell me, and I’d wonder how he could 
expect
> that. How could I get  over it as if I didn’t even care? Are men that
> different that they can  just move on so quickly?
>
>
> And then, “I can’t live like  this, Magda, I just can’t.” I didn’t even 
try
> to stop him. I didn’t  say anything. What was there to say? If he really
> loved me he’d stay,  he’d understand, he’d make me better, but I guess he
> just didn’t love  me enough.
>
>
> I’m not sure anyone has ever loved me  enough, not for me anyway. Not even
> the cats. They only care for me  because I feed them, and I feed them
> because
> I love them. But  they don’t love me back, not like I want them to.
>
>
> It’s  lonely out here, that’s the truth, but what am I to do? I don’t 
know
>  anyone out there in the world anymore. All that ignoring people and  
hiding
> out got me the exact result I thought I wanted, and now no one  knows of 
me
> at all. Knowing of me is the most basic of knowing, and  what I really 
want
> is for someone to know me. But no one knows of me  anymore, much less 
knows
> me.
>
>
> I was never the  most sociable of women anyway, always waiting for others 
to
> come to  me. But I made myself agreeable. I laughed at their jokes, I
> listened  to their stories, I put on a face that I thought said to them,
> “please  be my friend.” And it worked, for a while, or at least it seemed
>  to.
>
>
>
> Until I turned them all away when they  came out, all so concerned and
> sympathetic. I hated the sympathy, I  hated the way they looked at me as 
if
> they pitied me. And so I hid,  and I sent them away, and they went away 
and
> forgot all about me. Just  like I wanted. And then there was only Alan, 
and
> now there’s no Alan  either.
>
>
> There’s nothing but me and the cats, and the  frogs and the crickets. I
> can’t
> even remember how long ago it  was that Alan left, how long I’ve been here
> alone. I’ve got my garden,  but over the winter I finished off all the
> canned
> goods. Not  sure how long I can go on like this, but I can’t go back out 
to
> the  world now. I don’t know how anymore. I lost my way.
>
>
> I  sleep a lot now. It’s something to do, and when I sleep I dream of the
>  beach, and the boardwalk where Alan and I used to go in the summer,
>  sometimes in the winter too, when no one else was there and the sky  was
> dark
> and the wind would put a chill right through us. We  didn’t care, we loved
> it
> when we were together. I don’t even  know if the beach is still there, if
> the
> boardwalk is right  where we left it, but in my dreams it’s all the same, 
so
> I’ll keep  that. I wouldn’t like to go there and find out it was gone, or
> that it  had changed. I want it just like it was, and so I’ll keep it in 
my
>  dreams where it won’t ever change.
>
>
> That’s why I like  the past. It doesn’t change, it just is. There’s 
nothing
> scary there,  for I’ve already been there. I’d live there all the time, 
if I
> could,  but sometimes I have to wake up and feed the cats, feed myself, 
take
>  care of what little life I have left.
>
>
> It’s not so bad,  I tell myself. At least the worst has already happened,
> and
>  nothing can ever be that bad again.
>
>
> It helps me sleep,  that little bit of knowing that nothing else can ever
> hurt like that  again. If it weren’t for that, I think I might go  insane.
>




mom