He loved her because she could never be satisfied. She loved me because I could never be
satisfied. You could call it a love
triangle except I no longer loved her but I loathed with a passion that could
only be from love inverted on itself. It
was just another day with all of these clear truths being unspoken. It is two weeks before the official suicide
of Emmanuel. They, self-excluded,
believed Emmanuel had been murdered by his ex-wife’s father.
My relationship with Emmanuel was naturally strained because
he was now dating my ex, maybe two weeks before his demise, six of us, gathered
around a table on the patio with a half gallon of Jack Daniels. Though spirits seemed high, we were grieving
something to come, as fixed as the electron’s twisted decent down the line.
I liked Emmanuel superficially. I was told he was Sarah’s brother. Sarah was Miguel’s girlfriend. Emmanuel was a rotund Hispanic fellow with a
good head of hair on his head and all over his face, slightly shorter than me
being 6 foot tall but in battle his large bulk would have made him quite a
contender. He was a young man, maybe 22,
and of few words but a pleasant look on his face as though hearing in his
mind’s eye a relaxing classical orchestra.
As a mental health professional, a psychotherapist, I knew that look,
that silence. It was the look of someone
who has decided to commit suicide and was resigned to his fate. In two weeks his large bulk would be
discovered stinking in a bathtub in Miguel’s house, soaking in blood, the gun
landing in some place that could tell the whole tale but not important enough
for the police to investigate. A right
suicide for all the authorities cared.
Miguel was there. As
usual, tales of violence and mayhem sprang constantly from his mouth, telling
of those he’d beaten for small offenses, sometimes just because he was
drunk. He was tall and thick and with a
kind of complete bravery that made him useful even despite the mental health
warning in his eyes. I had him pegged as
a classical sociopath which meant many of his stories were lies and some of the
worst ones were true. He was good
friends with Emmanuel, who was staying at his home after being divorced from
the woman he still loved with a deep sad passion. He had lost the house he’d worked so hard to
get. She did not give him an easy time
and it was painful to him, but he would be the last to mention it. He said very little. He was mildly affectionate to Katie.
Katie was in love with me with the pure affect of a
Borderline Personality, love, hate, jealousy, brutal violence, tears, and
sometimes manic bursts of joy. William
loved Katie but he was a short, fat, black guy with very little sexual
appeal. Katie had promised to marry him
if neither of them got married by the age of 25. They were both now 25 and it was clear they
weren’t going to get married. This
possibly added to William’s constant depression.
I didn’t really belong in this group. I had once loved Katie and it had nearly
destroyed me but brought forth a beautiful daughter, now age 4 and there was
nothing on this earth more precious to me.
I had fed her late at night with a bottle when Katie refused to
breastfeed. I could change her diaper,
bathe her, clothe her, warm the bottle test it on my arm all with my left hand
while holding her in my right when she was little. I was Mr. Mom. Katie was good with her but none too fond of
the drudge work of keeping a baby happy.
I would hold her and walk her through the house for hours at night to
calm her temperament so she could sleep.
So she was a daddy’s girl, her first words were ‘Dada’. And she kept repeating it, “Dada, Dada, Dada,
Dada,” until Katie was jealous and sick of it.
I was as proud as if she had just graduated high school. When first she crawled to a chair, hoisted
herself up, legs wobbling, and let go standing on her own, she put both of her
arms up and howled with the purest look of narcissistic elation I had ever
witnessed. There was no doubt she was
part of me, my narcissism sometimes getting the better of me. She of course, fell down as a result of her
self celebration just as I have many times.
There was a racial mix.
Miguel, Emmanuel, and Sarah were Hispanic. Me and William were black, and Katie was
white. Tonite, we were gonna get fucked
up. Having had my problems with alcohol
and having taken several antidepressants and a few Klonopin, I resolved to
drink only about four drinks, carefully measured and retire to bed.
Miguel poured for me the smooth draught into a measuring
cup, exactly 6 ounces. The next thing I
knew, the whole half gallon was empty and me and Miguel were tossing the empty
bottle over the fence in the back yard.
I had fucked up obviously.
I had drank too much at some point and blacked out. Blurry recollections of what had transpired
came back to me. Miguel had some tree
climbing tools and had demonstrated it for me and I had tried to climb the tree
in the backyard and fell on my ass laughing.
I had become friends with Miguel’s pit bull. I had hit on Miguel’s girlfriend. No excuses here, I had been bad and had a lot
of fun doing it. Most notably, Miguel
and I had become friends being the only two who could nearly down that half
gallon by ourselves. We were drinking
with the big dogs and acting like complete hooligans. I had testified to the neighbors that Katie
was a fat, dirty, whore. I was out of
control.
I recalled distinctly an episode where Miguel had offered me
a special drink he had concocted, mixing the Jack Daniels with special flavors
and a kick of strong coffee that was sure to energize me and dispel the threat
of hangover. William, Katie, and Sarah
watched anxiously if I would take it, I felt there was something strange
amidst. But there was alcohol in it so I
drank. It tasted horrible and I almost
expelled it immediately but the alcohol hit and made it drinkable. I downed it.
15 minutes later was I was having severe stomach pains and had to run to
the restroom and evacuate my system. It
did not occur to me at the time that the drink had been poisoned, me and Miguel
being such good friends that night. I
later learned that it was full of laxatives, and that William had possibly
added some amount of detergent, likely hoping it would kill me. Emmanuel it seemed, would have none of
this. He was not present. He was still outside on the patio, listening
to the smooth tunes of death playing in his head.
Finally, I retired to sleep.
I had to be at work at 5am at
the methadone clinic to counsel addicts on the dangers of drug abuse. The irony no longer thrilled me. I was a pill popper and an alcoholic who went
to work everyday, sometimes still drunk from the previous night, to counsel
others on how to be drug free. You be
the judge. It is not for me to judge
myself, that’s a game I don’t play anymore.
Tell me what I am, a fake, a hypocrite, a worm. I want to know. I want to change.
Two weeks later Miguel called Katie saying Emmanuel might be
in some danger and they should go check on him.
It was around 7 am . Miguel left work to meet Katie and lead her
to his place, where Emmanuel had been sitting or pacing, sending text messages
to Katie that had no hint of sorrow or distress, and plans of what he would do
that day. When they walked in they were
met by the stench of death, and found Emmanuel naked, in the bathtub, a hole in
his head, blood splatter in a direction that could have told the tale. The gun having landed where the secret
lies. The position he was in, was it
that of someone who had committed suicide or someone who had been murdered? Unfortunately, the police did not care. It was simply ruled a suicide.
I later learned that Emmanuel was not Sarah’s brother. They were not related at all. He was just a friend who was staying at
Miguels home with Miguel’s girlfriend Sarah while Miguel was away at work, day after
day, week after week. Had I known that
at the time, I would have seriously questioned Miguel. Being the sociopath that he was, it seemed
likely to me that anyone man staying at his house with his girlfriend while he
was away at work might end up dead. Had
Sarah and Emmanuel begun an affair that he discovered? Had he gotten away with murder?
This is a blog, not a book or a short story so I might as
well tell you that just about all of this story is true in the superficial non-deconstructed sense of the term. The names have been changed to protect the
innocent and the guilty. It’s just one
of those things that happen, out of hundreds, thousands, accumulating right now
in some nook or cranny, here in the quiet corners, broken by the single shot,
in the putrid city, Columbus , Georgia
By Daryl Seldon
