Deux Semaines (Two Weeks) Page 10

never heard from her again. Can you believe what a fucking cruel joke life pulled on me. I never fucking knew! God I tried! I tried so hard not that God helped, that’s a joke. I prayed and I pleaded with that fantasy in the sky for any mercy on me, but the answer was no! Ask me why I don’t number among the happy faithful in this cursed world.”

  Jay calmed himself down a bit and asked, “How old are you Terry?”

  Terry replied, “I’m 32.”

  Jay nodded, “Alright then, you remember a world without cell phones, computers and social networks. Well that’s the world where I met Naeva. I had none of that shit back then to help me find her either! It wasn’t like now when you could pop in a Google search for Naeva Reese and get 100 hits. The weirdest thing was, I couldn’t even get anyone in her family by phone or mail. The letters were all marked return to sender. I couldn’t reach her Mother, her sister, no one! It made no sense to me.

  I even tried to call the local Police in St. John. Just try to imagine how far I got with that! Can you imagine calling a foreign country and asking them to give you information on some girl you met over the summer? It’s not like she was my family. Christ, I wasn’t even a Canadian citizen. All they would tell me is that there were no missing person reports filed on her and have a good day eh?”

  You also have to consider that by now, all my friends and family were looking at me like I was pathetic. I would hear things like, “Jay, maybe she just decided to move on and didn’t have the courage to tell you.” That would fucking infuriate me. I wasn’t rude to them because I knew they were trying to help, but I just couldn’t believe how she could ever do that. Not my Naeva. Never!”

  Terry said, “That sounds absolutely horrible. You must have felt completely isolated from everyone and everything.”

  Jay nodded, “That’s for sure. I felt alone, emotionally destroyed and the worst part was being helpless to do anything about it. I must have tried different things for almost two months and it was coming up on Christmas. Then one day, I did my desperate evening phone call to her number to find that it had been disconnected. That was it. That was a turning point.

  The only thing left for me to do was to travel to New Brunswick and try to find her. Actually go to her house. If it was that first month, I probably would have done it, but now I was starting to have doubts myself. I started to imagine how horrible it would be if I traveled to St. John, and showed up at her door. Then I'd have to endure the whole awkward moment of finding her, only to be told she really just changed her mind about me. How pathetic would that be?

  I kept hearing everyone around me say that I was just a victim, and she dumped you, give it up. They would say, “You only knew her for two weeks, are you serious? She‘s moved on Jay, time for you to do the same." Again and again I’d hear it like a mantra in my head. My friends didn’t even want to be with me the way I was acting, not that I blame them. I was a fucking mess.

  All I knew, was that I just couldn’t do it anymore. It was destroying me. So I stopped just like that.

  I gave up and I tried to get used to the fact that she’d just found someone else. You would think I would have hated her or something but I was really just numb. I found a way to just switch it off in my brain, and I stopped feeling anything when I thought of her. I got to be an expert at never thinking of her at all. She became like a short wonderful dream, and then a long horrible nightmare.

  Terry looked at Jay sincerely sad for what he’d gone through and said, “I wish I could have been there for you then. It sounds like you really needed some support, but unfortunately, all I can try to do is get you through what’s happening now. Did you did say that you found out she passed away just recently. When was that?”

  Jay replied, “About 6 months ago.”

  Terry nodded, “That is pretty recent. How did you find out?”

  Jay drank some water and ran his hands through his hair. He said, “It was of all things, a Friday night. My wife fell asleep early and I was on facebook just posting some bullshit. I’ve reconnected with many of my old of my old friends from years ago. Billy Bob and Angie are on the list. Apparently Holly is not a technology advocate like me and the rest of us so I couldn’t find her, although Angie sees her once and a while.

  That night I was kind of bored, and as I looked at the list of old friends, I started to wonder. Is there a chance she’s actually out there? I went to search and typed in Naeva Reese and I was surprised because I actually got some hits, but they were all really young and definitely not her.

  As I was looking through the list of names, I saw the name Tristan Reese in St John, New Brunswick. I remembered that her younger brother’s name was Tristan. It’s not a common name where I grew up, so I guess that’s why I remembered it.

  When I looked at his picture, he was about the right age so I thought ,why not? Just for the hell it I messaged him and asked if he was related to Naeva Reese and if not please disregard. Honestly Terry, I didn’t think there was a chance in hell it was him, or that he would even respond.

  Terry remarked with a serious expression, “I take it he did?”

  Jay nodded back, “Oh yah, did he ever. What really freaked me out was how fast it happened. He answered in under three minutes, saying that he was her younger brother and asked who I was. When I told him that she was my girlfriend for a little while, and in what year, I got an immediate friend acceptance and we were on chat together.

  I just came straight out with it and asked him what happened to her, and he gave me an answer just as directly. He said that she'd died that year in plane crash along with her sister and father.”

  Jay stopped talking and just sat silently trying to hold back the urge to become emotional. He stared at a single spot on the carpet in front of him and soon regained his ability to continue.

  Terry said, “My god Jay, that’s extremely tragic, it’s no wonder you’re being hurt so much by this. You don’t need to hold back emotions here.”

  Jay looked up at him. He took a deep breath and said, “I know I don’t have to, but I want to. I have more to say and I can’t do it if I’m sniveling.

  Anyway, as you can imagine, it felt like someone had unloaded a shotgun into my chest. I remember sitting there for a moment in shock rereading what he’d posted to see if I’d somehow misread it. Finally, I told him I had no idea that had happened and said how sorry I was. If he only knew how sorry.

  He replied with the usual gratitude and socially acceptable exchange of words, but then said something that just destroyed me. He told me that he remembered me. He said he remembered me because Naeva spent that whole summer on the phone with me until she left on the trip when she died. Apparently she hated talking on the phone, which I never knew about her, but he remembered how her mother would yell at her for talking to that American boy for so long that no one else could use the phone. He finished with the words, “She was completely love sick for you.” Jay up looked at Terry who appeared very sad and sat quietly shaking his head.

  Jay added, “Remember how the first bit of news felt like a shotgun to my chest? Well you guessed it. Reload, aim and fire. Boom! Tristan must have thought I dropped dead because I couldn’t even respond to him. I finally typed “Sorry gtg” and I was done."

  Terry was still sitting in silence not knowing what to say. Finally he said, “ I would like to tell you that I know what that must have been like, but I don’t think I could. I can’t even imagine it.”

  Jay said, “That’s a good thing not to be able to imagine, believe me. That night I just put on my coat and walked out the door of my house and into the dark. I walked to a big park nearby and when I got to the middle of a huge field, I dropped to my knees and completely fell apart. I didn’t even know what falling apart felt like before that moment. In case you’re wondering, it fucking sucked!”

  For hours I just wandered around outside. The fact it was February, limited how much time I could real
ly stay outside without freezing to death. I ended up going home and sat in a dark living room staring out the window until the sun came up. There was no way I could sleep.

  As you can imagine, I had a hard time trying to act like things were fine when I was around my family or at work. It’s not like I could share this with my wife and she obviously noticed I was miserable. If she brought it up, I would blame it on work or the cold dark winter days.

  Terry asked, “Do you think you’re dealing with it any better now then back then?

  Jay said, “Well, I don’t know if it’s better, but it’s different, I mean I hide it better. Back when I first found out about it, I was profoundly sad. Now I’m just pissed off. Really pissed off.”

  Terry asked, “Not that I blame you, and I could probably guess your answer, but I want to hear it from you. Why are you pissed off?”

  Jay replied, “I’m pissed because I never knew what happened Terry." Jay began to raise his voice and became more animated. “I’m pissed because I spent the last 20 years of my life dismissing my memory of her all because I