Piece #09: Remember

Song of Influence: “Come Undone” – Duran Duran

Theme: A study in Narcissism

 

Philip said, “Remember what I said.”

 

Years later, I found myself pondering what he meant. It… was so out of context anyway. I mean, what is it that he said that he wanted me to remember?

 

I would sit and think… oh, I would fucking think. Always searching, never finding.

 

Sometimes I wonder whether it was worth finding or not.

 

Philip… where the fuck did you go? Why did you leave me in the first place?

 

…a simple search led to me finding out where you supposedly lived before we separated, all those years ago. What I found bothered me. Your place, what you called home… held nothing. Nothing. Your “home” consisted of a cot with bed sheets, and a mirror on the wall. No chairs, no desks, no decorations adorning the wall, nothing.

 

Nothing… is that what my search—nay, our very lives together—amounted to?

 

I exited the pitiful space you called home, remembering. I thought of you and you only. I did not notice the blue sky, the trees, the sounds of the city…

 

I did not notice the truck until it hit me, sending me careening across the road.

 

It hurt, oh it hurt. The pain was so intense it caused me to separate from myself, my body. And it was then that I remembered.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He gazed into the mirror, seeing himself, and the only thing that mattered to himself. The object of desire gazed right back at him.

 

“Someday, we will be together again,” he said to the reflection, which dutifully spoke back those words to him.

 

Philip said, “Remember this…” and blinking his eyes, started again.

 

Philip said, “Remember what I said.”