Going to Paris

Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York

I'm burned out on this tomb of a town full of the soulless walking dead. You have to be numb to survive here. I've had enough. I can't go through the motions anymore. I drag myself out of bed. I eat. I drag myself to work through the stone faced crowds. I daydream through work detaching myself from the crushing banality of it all. I drag my tired self back home through the wretched cold and the half dead masses, hunger gnawing at my stomach. She has food for me. I am safe and warm and crawl back into bed to do it all over again. Again. And again. And again. I feel a helpless rage building in me. When will it change? Something has to change. But what? The book has to sell. I stay up at nights working on it. There is something there... a light, a fire at the end of the tunnel... I feed the flame nightly... One day it will burn brightly... She cries when she comes home from work... The hours, the stress, the constant worry of money. I make grand pronouncements and declarations about the future. I see her face fill with hope. I worry. I secretly worry. I feel less than able. I feel less than a man. The old Fears and insecurities haunt me. I put on a face. I go to work. I hold it all in, until finally, one day it gets the better of me. It all comes pouring out sitting in bed on a day off drinking coffee and reading the paper. It spills out on her. The Fears. The Insecurities. I am not enough. She will cheat. She will tire of me. I will fail her just like I did the other women. She can't stand the constant need for reassurance. She dismisses me. I am a child. I am boy. I lash out at her in rage. I say terrible things. I leave and walk the streets through the snow and the freezing wind, smoking, my fingers numb. I am coming undone. I have no where else to go. I have no one else. My face is frozen in shame. The shame tears at me. I can't forgive myself for not being able to provide, for not being secure with myself, with her, with us. I call her. She's quick to pick up the phone, "where are you? Are you okay?" I tell her that I'm sorry. I'll be home in a little while. I just need a moment.

The apartment is sad and uneasy when I get there out of the cold.
We are tense together.
Unsure.
Silence.
And in the silence we make love.
We reassure each other.
But things must change.
We decide that we must leave for a while.
We are going to Paris.

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