She had these green eyes that looked at me like no one had ever looked at me before. It's intoxicating to be looked at like that. Everything else in the world disappeared when I was with her. I knew I was in trouble right from the start. All my friends told me she was too young. I knew that myself and I tried to run. I did. I ran across seven states. But the faster I ran, the more I fell behind because she was always there with me. Like a memory of what might have been. Like a hope for what used to be. She's the dream I can't wake up from.
Still, I knew better than to fight her on it. That's a lesson I learned the hard way. Because, while there is nothing so deep as the ocean and there is nothing so high as the sky, there is also nothing unwavering as a woman when she's already made up her mind. Once she's dug in … best to just leave her be.
I did that.
Then I didn't.
That was my first mistake. Or, maybe, my third.
So now she's sitting at one end of the kitchen table and she is staring without an expression. Those green eyes of hers … absolutely blank. Like I could reach right through her and not touch a thing. I can hear the TV on in the other room and the dog barking outside as the big yellow school bus bucks and rumbles its way down the road. I can feel everything else in the world except her.
Here, in the kitchen, she's not looking at me. She is looking at the space between us and she is talking to me without moving her eyes. She's just talking. She said something about going home. She said something about needing to spend some time alone. “It's not you, it's me.” “I just need to figure some things out.” Like it was only a temporary break we were taking. And she wondered out loud what it was she had to find, but she'd already made up her mind. She'd already left without leaving.
I feel dead inside. In my heart and soul. But my body still has some life left in it. When that finally goes, my friend, carry me down to the water's edge and then sail with me out to that ocean deep. Let me go easy down over the side and let the water wash me clean, wash me away.
And remember me to her.
Story based on “She's Already Made Up Her Mind” by Lyle Lovett. Photo credit: squilla.dave / Foter / CC BY-SA.
