Holes in the Ceiling

Dealing with a dream that haunted me for a long time

It was that stereotypical dark night, just like what everyone else talks about so I guess I’ll be just like the rest. But this night you called me. It’s been months of wall bending silence and moving on. Or being left behind. Guess which one I fell under. You called me to hear my voice, to hear something familiar. You called me to tremble your lower lip and echo through telephone lines. You felt close to me again like we were holding hands and talking through two solo cups and string. At the same time you were miles away from me, just like it always was. You told me you weren’t pure anymore, like you lost your wings, flew to close to the sun and fell back down to the soil and dirt.

            I never forgot what you said, “The holes in the ceiling, Joe, the holes in the ceiling just keep getting bigger. They’re going to swallow me”. To this day I don’t know what you meant. I’ve spent more days dazed out trying to figure out what you meant. I guess you’ve always had that effect on me. You’re a Merry-Go-Round of broken down horses with no attendant.

            The only thing I know is that it broke you, whatever you did. You fell apart just like that night your dad died, to you at least. Except those three pills won’t fix this. That night you were motionless on my floor drooling on my carpet letting your saliva seep into my life ever further. I wanted to call the police to save you but then I would be dead to you too. We both would never have been able to deal with that loss.

When you regained yourself you kept me up for hours talking about how you will become everything he would not believe you would become; how you will cause him as much heartbreak and depression as he inflicted upon you.

            You told me, immobilized on the floor, that I would never know what you were going through, that I would never experience hardship like you. But on the phone you asked me to go back before we lost touch. Before I told you never to speak to me again. Before I sat outside that diner waiting hours for you reciting the words that were going to save us. Before you left me there sitting for six hours. Before you slept with Jeff. Before my ego brought me to your step. You begged for a fresh start, or for us to never have met. But you begged for something new, something better than any of the debacles either of us had since the night you couldn’t look me in the eye. Since the night I apologized for your behavior. You promised over and over that things have changed. That you have changed.  You can regrow your wings and your purity. I didn’t want to tell you no, to drive you further into the hole above you, letting the bright of night consume you. Part of me is still attached to you, that horcrux of my still pumping heart. I drift back to your eclectic perfection.

            You taught me one thing Nicole: Perfection can be destructive. It can rip through anyone that it preaches to. It opens its door to the weak and hopeless. Me. It ripped my veins apart, chewed through my arteries and let me spill on the floor. You did this. After all of it, you wanted my forgiveness. We hung up the phone never achieving it, never drawing closure.

            There, our Pandora’s box stayed open in the open for everyone to see. I still remember the last thing you said: I’ll live without your forgiveness.

            A year later your dad called. He asked me if I knew where you were.

            The dead don’t know anything sir.