Dear Mother - Part One

A Story by cobebear

Letters to mother.

Dear mother,

I feel so separated and trapped inside myself. Like an old prison wall that refuses to split apart after punching it repeatedly with my ensanguined knuckles. I sense the slow beat of my heart, the blood trailing through my brain, continually running in circles, and it’s driving me insane. I feel lost, and abandoned. But for one to be abandoned, one must be with one. One must exist with another. Then one must be torn apart from the other. It doesn’t matter if it was your fault or not, or if you left or they did, it all hurts the same. The pain is neutral. I separated myself from reasoning and rationality. It left me in the same place where I first met it. Down by the old church where you used to bring me. With a veil covering your identity. It was there I started to separate truth from fiction. Wondering why one lies in a bed with flowers and the priest crying out as flaming tears ran down everyones faces but yours. While your hands shook as you held my tiny hands, and the pulse in your thumb ran faster and faster. That is when I first felt emotional pain. It was at the same church, twenty years later, where it left me.

Dear mother,

Today, I met a very admirable lady. We didn’t speak much, we just sat on the edge of the fountain in the plaza, feeding pigeons bread crumbs and seeds. Her name was Victoria. She glanced over at me, and her eyes, oh her eyes. Deep brown, latte like eyes. Shielded by her glasses so the charm of her eyes wouldn’t slip and escape into my soul, to shatter it into a million pieces of stained glass. She smiled and I smiled back. She told me she doesn’t get out often and that she was glad she went out with me today. She wrote her number on a receipt from Brogues Delique which is an amazingly expensive and expressive restaurant. She got up and left, taking her bag of seeds with her. All the pigeons left me and went after her for the seeds.

Dear mother,

It’s been two weeks since spring time has passed and everyone seems to be into jogging. As I sit on a bench with the jacket and scarf you made me, I see people run up and down the path. With friends, with dogs, with relatives and by themselves with headphones in their ears. I examined each jogger carefully, looking for details that could tell me something about them. Sometimes the smallest details can reveal the larger picture. Sometimes it would be as simple as a wedding ring. So when I saw a couple run by, they both had marriage rings on, so I assumed they were married. Sometimes it was as complex as just paying attention to their eyes, or their breath. The eyes can tell a story that not even Mark Twain could write. The eyes are the windows to the soul, but some people like to keep their windows shut and cover them with blinds, so birds and insects don’t fly in.

Dear mother,

Green tea with honey is an amazing cure for a sore throat. Thank you for being the best home nurse possible.

Dear mother,

Yesterday was my birthday, however I don’t feel any older or any more responsible. I have the memory and responsibility of a little child. My mind is a fragile glass vase, ready to break at any given moment. What could break it? That’s just the thing. I really have no clue. It could be as simple and as small as a gust of wind, or a little push… And when it does break, I can just replace it with another vase, fixing the flowers, and refilling the water with smooth water. My mind is a vase of flowers. If the flowers die, what will happen to me? The cells of creativity withering. I need water, I need it. My owner will not refill me, nobody will. I’m just another flower in the hot sun, waiting to die from the steamy rays of a blazing fire star.