Unconfessed

Trying to guide our future through a
one-size-fits-all world isn't easy.

We were a foursome: Jeremy and Jennifer, along with Jun and I, Jolene. We were the "Four J's". Jeremy worked for the Treasury Department chasing counterfeiters. Jennifer was a rising administrative assistant at a downtown skyscraper. Jun was a freelance artist with a carefree spirit (and for that I loved him madly). And I am still a high school counselor, the most infuriating, rewarding job you can ask for. Of the four of us, I am the only one still alive.

Jeremy was uptight but a "good" drunk. He got more sociable, more open and sometimes actually funny (but he thought every time he was funny). As for Jennifer, I don't care how good she was at her job, it was her her style I wanted! A burlap sack would look good on her. My Jun was an exotic breath of fresh air. I never did get to the bottom of it. Would I have loved him as much without his fascinating Chinese ancestry? And everyone agreed I had the job most unwanted by the other three - which was their way of paying me a compliment.

This is hard to write. I cry when I think back to that night at our old watering hole.

Jeremy was bragging on busting a counterfeiter ring which naturally forced Jun to pop his bubble any way he could. Jun had no use for "the so-called real world."

"What do you mean you caught some goofball counterfeiters - "

"They weren't goofballs! It was a sophisticated operation in over seven states!" Jeremy never learned not to take Jun's bait.

"Anyone jacking off with slips of paper is a goofball! Money doesn't exist. It's an illusion, all in your freaking bonehead!"

"For an illusion you sure do seem to want your share of it!" Jun had touched a sore point and that tickled him to no end. He could not match Jeremy's worldly success - nor could Jeremy match Jun's spiritual success. Jennifer and I looked at each other with sly smiles. Jun had his fish on the hook and no way was he going to let go.

"Weren't you the one bitchin' that my Chinese money doesn't even look real?"

Mao say dung!

"It doesn't! It's all hieroglyphics and scribbling and no-good Commies on there. Real money shouldn't look like that."

"You only say that because you're brainwashed. What about you with your crazy pyramid with an eye on it??" Jun was having a glorious time. He craved these sort of conversations that most people - especially "straights" as he called them - would never let him have. The idea of even questioning the concept of money is too disconcerting or too ridiculous or, frankly, too embarrassing for just about anyone else to consider. Jun admired Jeremy for even allowing the argument. I'm not sure Jeremy ever got that.

"I'm not brainwashed. People's lives are at stake. How would you like to be paid in fake money?"

"Fine by me. I'd sell them a fake painting!"

"Oh, he already does that!" I had to interject. That seemed to break a tension I was beginning to feel.

Jun stopped a passing waiter asking for a sheet of paper from his notepad. He was on a roll. "Here, let me show you. I write on here 1,000,000,000, draw a picture of my handsome Commie profile, then I'll do a castle instead of a pyramid and boom! I'm a billionaire."

"That's just stupid," sighed Jeremy.

"Stupid, huh? Well, I'm going to frame this tomorrow in my gallery and I bet I get some of your so-called real money for my money!" We all thought that was a wickedly funny thought - but Jeremy erupted.

"You better not, dammit!" It was like a gavel hit the table silencing us. As Jennifer tried to calm him down I remembered a conversation she and I had I never could shake. She called Jeremy a "runaway".

Most people bemoan not telling their parents - or whomever - that they love them before passing away. Jeremy's situation was the opposite. He'd pretended to love his father all his life only to have his father die before telling him he hated him. Jeremy despised the man as a fraud and a phony. "Everything he did was a lie," he confessed to Jennifer one night. She wondered how deep a price he'd pay for that unconfessed part of his life.

As a counselor I know it can be fatal. I said nothing. I don't want to bring my psychological aspects into the daily lives of my friends. I see now I should have expressed my reservations, pointing out Jeremy could be sitting on a time bomb. Jun had a point. Jeremy sought the artificial world as sanctuary. By not confessing his feelings he lived a lie just as his father before him. One never knows how deeply that can fester. I knew in a heartbeat that Jeremy's snapping at Jun's taunting that night meant he really did feel like he was a failure, the spitting image of his father. I decided to break my rule and have a talk with Jeremy to root this out.

I never got that chance.

I left early with end of quarter paperwork hounding me back to the house. But that feeling I had walking out I'll never forget! I felt I was being ripped in two, voices screaming at me for no logical reason. The ride home was surreal, nearly starting to cry seeing a bad accident on the other side of the highway divide. The one thing I hate more than any other is to be accused of over-reacting or sensationalizing my emotions. It stings me and burns me, ultimately scarring me. Yet here I was feeling that burn by not sensationalizing my feelings, remaining "logical" and doing the "so-called" practical thing.

At 6:33 AM on a cloudless Sunday morn I got the news from a loft neighbor of Jun's. All three had gone off the Calatrava bridge in a one car accident. All I said was "Thank you," and hung up. I was dispossessed of my body. I didn't ask why or cry out. My eyes were glued wide open. I could see the entire universe with its flowing colors and vibrant joy. Had I retreated into sorrow I'd have never made it out of that hole. Why in that moment the universe did not want me to die I do not know. I know I sure wanted to (and sometimes still do).

Each came to me in a dream. First Jun. The first two times I cried out in pain at the cruelty of believing he was alive while I was asleep only to have him die on me all over again in the morning. By the third time I understood. He wants me to know he still exists somewhere! Oh, thank everything in the universe for that! My tears are not in vain. We are together though apart.

It was after that I allowed his art to be sold. Hanging on to his art was not the same as hanging on to what we had. The world should know what I know of him. He smiles with every smile his creations bring.

Jennifer came to bring me an understanding hug. I didn't know I needed it until she gave it to me. Yes, I realized, I had been secretly recriminating myself. For leaving, for not saying more, for living. Sisters of a different mother we'd always said of ourselves. I was afraid I'd lost that too.

Was a long time before Jeremy came. I thought perhaps even in the afterlife he might still choose to run away. I didn't judge him but I didn't respect him. Then I found out why he waited. It wasn't just that he had been drunk driving, killing two of the most important people in his life. It was what happened after they hit the water. The cold sobered him up and in a mad panic tried to save Jennifer and Jun. In that he made honest efforts but it was too late. Then he was faced with a choice.

Something inside of him snapped. He gave up. Jeremy could have made it to the surface but reversed course to drown. He'd have to face the law. He'd have to face two families he wrecked. He'd have to face me. And he'd have to face up to living a lie and being no better than his father. This was his "out." A runaway.

*****

It has taken me over two years to write about this. Strange, but in all this time I had not realized I'd never spoken about the wreck out loud. Sure seemed to me like I had but when everyone started congratulating me for coming to terms with this "at last" I was a bit shocked but soon realized what it must have seemed from their perspective. A season for all things.

What prompted this writing, though, was late night TV. Bored and unable to sleep I saw the opening credits to "Leave It To Beaver". That caused a flashback that made me laugh. All through high school Jeremy had called Jun "June Cleaver". It was funny, at first.

Addendum: Samurai Sorrow

Nobu stood perplexed at the precipice of life in the early morning fog. Which road leads to life and which to death? He'd found heaven under the sun - but was the sun his to claim?

*****

At long last Nobu had freedom from the suffocating samurai structure which had imprisoned him since birth. His creative impulses, his vision, his ever active imagination acted as tormenting demons in his daily life, struggling against a corrupt authoritarian regime he couldn't help but taunt as he himself felt. It was a case of damned if he did and damned if he didn't.

"Why me?" Nobu wondered in the middle of night. What annoyed him most - when he let go in his most private moments - was the irrepressible feeling of optimism that would bubble up. An exciting truth lingered just below the surface, that if it ever got free would change the world. I am instrument of Destiny!

"Baka!" he'd reprimand his dreaming soul in self-mutilation. Samurai were servants, their fate determined at birth to be no less or more than objects in a feudal society. Anything outside of that had no place in their strict code of conduct. The simple wallowed in this like muddy pigs, thugs relished it in bullying delight, and those of rare intelligence either became ambitious or torn apart like Nobu. Now, he lived on the other side of that fence - the price to live on the run.

Life on the run after his famously - and infamously - done gesture of rebuke of the samurai way breathed even more life into his impossibly secret dream. More excited than ever, it waited for the inevitable moments when his guard dropped, Nobu losing his human will. But this ambiguous nebulous cloud of hope never quite came into focus. Stop getting so excited for no damn reason! It was like grasping to touch a rainbow.

Emiko changed all that.

It wasn't until he met her did Nobu realize he'd been praying to meet her his entire life. Like finding a long lost childhood friend he knew her life story the minute he saw her smile and explored her deep, gathering eyes. They were two of a kind walking upright in a world that crawled on all fours. Or, at least, with her Nobu walked upright.

It's true the specter of doom dogged his every step but his world reversed with her, as the dream seemed more true than an illusion of hunted reality. This is something real. I feel I've given birth to a flower of light at last! Never before faced with this sort of spotlight of self-illumination, the samurai who'd been forced to live his life in his head shivered with a fear no mere sword could ever arouse. Yet there was no denying he craved this with a lifelong thirst.

Emiko had also found her missing piece. She fancied poetry and the arts like a Heian princess of the ancient court which prized wit and culture above all, contributing to a poetry chain as important as military prowess. Her husband had recently died of sudden disease and she walked in the dark shadows of grief seeing neither the moon nor stars nor sun. As so often happens in times of crisis, the swell of emotion overflowed into art. Her haiku were so painful she could not bear to read them afterwards.

Had he stayed in his samurai rut Nobu would never have met a soul like Emiko. In the never ceasing questioning of himself if he made the right decision to go on the run, surely this was irrefutable evidence of vindication! Side by side they made love with calligraphy, feeling a deeper intimacy than either had known before. This unspoken jubilation struck each soul as having proven their previous paths in life had not been what they'd pretended to be.

Most touching of all for Nobu was for his Thoughts He Could Not Defend. The role of science was squelched in Japan in the 18th century (which made for a volcanic scientific blossoming when the samurai era ended) but Nobu was gifted with the imagination of an inventor, foreseeing a world of splendor. His crucifixion to the Japanese gulag of misplaced vanity of a perfectly ordered society buried him under a mountain of frustration. He was bitter not only for himself but also for his beloved Japans cheating herself with this willful ignorance. "It's not just me who pays!" he cried to the wilderness of the deaf.

Emiko, however, had ears. She was a life-saving oasis in a desert of monotonous weeds. She could understand his visions which cannot be explained. In this, a thousand poking demons died in the night replaced by a chorus of angels. Maybe the Maker of all was not such a cruel beast. Nobu had never experienced such a feeling - never suspecting it was even possible! This starburst of joy humbled him and confounded him. Like Moses before the burning bush he knelt in awe of this gift that surely only the most pure deserve.

Her latest poem shattered him further:

"The falling leaf
does not hate
the wind."

He nearly cried at the sentiment, she expressing no self-pity at the sudden taking of her beloved husband. Her calligraphic style was clean and exquisite, for how one wrote was as important as what one wrote. Nobu realized what a selfish and self-centered existence he'd led - even if the insulated world of the samurai encouraged that. Emiko showed that was no excuse not to rise above. Her beautiful surrendering to Nature made him feel as lacking as a child in an adult's world.

What the self-doubting Nobu failed to face was that his presence to her was as much a part of her realizing that sentiment as any efforts of her own.

Nobu still had one demon to overcome, his strongest and most feared: the Guilt Monster. For every ounce of joy he received with Emiko an equal amount of brutalization was wrought by the monster. He'd yet to tell her of his checkered past. He'd yet to tell her he was on the run, a notorious fugitive of the Shogunate. He'd yet to tell her that her life was in danger if she were deemed by authorities to have helped him. How can you do this, you sorry dog! She gives you life and you repay her like this? If she saw the real you she'd disown you!

Tears streamed down his face in the hot, sticky air of the dusty hut. This Sorrow For The Ages was the final betrayal by the universe. Helpless to be with her as he was to take his next breath his only choice was to drive her away. He pretended scorn of her writing, crushing her to the core as his previously doubtless belief in her had rekindled her waning creative spirit she was finally beginning to fully nurture. Too painful to go on, not believing her horrified eyes, giving him chance after chance, she left never to return. She wrote no more.

The Guilt Monster congratulated Nobu on his suicidal sacrifice, for having crawled back into his samurai saga of pity's martyrdom. Did you think someone as wonderful as she deserves to die because of you? She's better off now!

"I know. I know. But I shouldn't have lied to her. I'm blind! I'm blind! I can't see what to do!"

You were deceiving her all along. It was never real.

"I'm going to die without her, this I know."

See? That proves your love! You gave your life for her!

"But I can't help to believe I should have come clean no matter what. If I did the right thing why am I in this living hell?"

What were you going to do? Ask her to die for you? What an asshole, you selfish prick! She has a right to a happy life.

"But our love is dead. The flower of light taken away. The darkness is twice as black as before."

Stop kidding yourself, she can get that from anyone. What did you ever have to offer? You must hold onto your integrity and answer yourself this question: What would she have answered if you'd asked her to give her life to stay in your company? Who are you anyway? Do you even dare to know? Tell me what her answer would have been!

*****

Nobu's life on the run went into permanent decline. The ice melting under his feet, his betrayal of love hounded him night and day as he was seized by savage sweat-inducing nightmares of his life falling into the cold hands of revenging samurai; a life rent by the thorns of the world with his having forsaken heaven in the clouds. Later, in the afterlife, he finally posed the question to Emiko if she would have given her life to be with him.

"There was no life without you. Separation was the real danger."

It was true there was no way out once he went on the run but Nobu could have died with love instead of without. For all eternity, he howled in pain at what he'd lost.

Let Me Lend You A Hand

"I can see you're hurting, something is bothering you."

"My life is a living hell!"

"You need to talk about it. Open up!"

"It won't make any difference."

"There you go being negative! When you share things you feel better."

"No, it only makes things worse."

"Put your trust in the universe. It is conspiring to help you!"

"Well, bully for it. But that's no help either."

"You can't just shut yourself off."

"It's the way of the world."

"Not true! Give love and you will get love in return."

"Love doesn't help."

"Of course love helps. God is love. Remember: God doesn't give us any more than we can handle."

"That's a vile and vicious thing to say."

"How can you possibly say that?"

"That's just another way of turning your back on people needing help."

"But you must believe in the power of prayer!"

"Can I pray you'll leave me alone?"

"God can do anything. I'm here to remind you of that."

"God is the one bringing my killing stress."

"You should do something wonderful today. Treat yourself! Go for a fine walk in the park."

"Jesus fucking Christ. You don't understand a damn thing, do you, if you think that's some sort of fucking solution to anything?"

"Make me understand!"

"Make yourself understand."

"I can't if you don't tell me."

"It's really not any of your business."

"We're all in this together! One person's problem is every person's problem! Don't put yourself on an island. United we stand, divided we fall."

"Nobody believes that. It's every man for himself."

"Brother, I'm here today to prove you wrong. I bring you the Word of salvation and the cup of human kindness. The world is what we make of it. You need to stop doing this to yourself!"

"You're just not going to stop being a busybody, are you?"

"Never! I'm with you all the way, down the line and to the end. The fires of hell can't stop me. I am devotion itself."

"Sheesh...OK, do you really want to know?"

"Yes!"

"I mean, do you REALLY want to know? You want to know this to your dying fucking day never to escape?"

"Wild horses couldn't drag me away. Speak! Speak and set yourself free!"

"I can't pay my rent."

"Oh!...well...hmmmm...uh, well...I gotta go. See ya! I'm sure you'll be fine."

Why is it every time I speak of the universe people speak of paying the rent, and when I speak of paying the rent people speak of the universe?

Hit Man Blues

[The lights are glitzy and glowing on a downtown Dallas night as a sharp dressed man steps out of a black BMW on an obscure side street. As those on Main street revel and roar he strides purposefully to an unknown destination. He's out of sync with the nightlife with his razor sharp focus. Perhaps no one else alive at that moment has such a clear sense of direction in his life. Then it snaps.]

"You're an idiot! They're using you!"

"Shut the fuck up!"

"They're just using you. They put the blood on your hands and you take the risks."

"I don't have time for this. Not fucking now!"

"You're a fool! Wasting your time for theirs."

"Jesus! Be quiet! I can't be having this now!"

"Why even do this?"

"Why the fuck not? Get out of my head!"

Opportunity in life never comes when it's convenient. In fact, it's just the opposite: when it hits you, it hits you. Like it did me walking on the city sidewalk on the way to a contract. The whole of my existence struck me as absurd. Clear as day I saw myself. I wasn't being clever. I hadn't been clever. I was a chump to do someone else's dirty work, soiling my soul. How humiliating. A $12,000 suit can't cover that. No amount of paper can.

"Turn around, walk away! It's not worth it."

"Of course it's fucking worth it. What the hell else am I going to do?"

"No idea but this is what this is: total and utter bullshit."

"Don't give me that. People kill for money every day. No one thinks twice about someone dying from a lack of funds. I'm just being more direct."

"They're fools too! Want to join them? You always say you're smarter than they."

"I am, dammit! I am!"

But was I? I'd suddenly lost the ability to lie to myself right at the worst fucking time. Every life reaches that point. How you react to it determines which side wins out: smart or stupid. My precious vanity of believing I was Smarter was in mortal danger. I really was just another working stiff after all: paid more because I was used more. They're using you, man, just like the coal miner getting black lung. You're no fucking different.

I had to hide, step into a side alley away from prying eyes. Of all the fucking times to come to this realization! I'm on the hook for this. This is a BIG contract. Run away from this and they will find you. They'll send hit men after me for leaving them so critically vulnerable. Goddam. Why couldn't this have hit me between contracts instead of at my most crucial one yet?

Think you're not a killer? Think again.

I crouched behind a dumpster. I had no desire to move. Ever. I was tugged equally in two different directions. It's about what You want, man. But I want my fine clothes and Maserati and uptown townhouse. Most of all I want out of the fucking rat race. You want to be one of them Blue Bell fuckers? Letting assholes determine your life?

The same old rage came over me when I read about workers who'd spent their entire working lives at Blue Bell ice cream only to have the rug ripped out from under them when listeria was found and they had to shut down all three plants. They'd done nothing wrong. Been honest workers. And what do they get? THE SHAFT! Happens all time where people are thrown out in the street regardless of their own efforts. Fucking animals.

"That's not going to be me. I'm going to shoot this guy and walk away as I see fit. I'm stuck in this jungle and if I'm going to die I'm going to die on my own fucking terms. There's no fucking reason not to."

"Because you don't want to."

"That's it? That's all you got? Since when does what I fucking want mean a FUCKING GODDAM THING in this world? You want me to do what I want then fucking fund me. What do you say to that?"

Silence.

"That's what I fucking thought."

Still, much to my annoyance, I could not escape my hidden crouch. A thousand arguments to execute the contract and only one to walk away: what I wanted.

"What the fuck else am I going to do? This isn't some freaking movie. I'm supposed to become a cab driver or something? That's no life. Don't I deserve to live too? What's in it for me? Homelessness?"

More silence.

"Jesus, give me a freaking answer! I can't see! I can't see!"

There was no getting around it: I didn't want to do this hit  - or any hits - ever again. Just the thought of freedom infected me like a wildfire, feeding my desire to live. But must I sacrifice my life to the thorns of the world? What to do? What to do?

I already got the only answer I was going to get.

"This is insanity! This is nuts! I'm crouching down here behind a dumpster on a warm spring night listening to people on the streets laugh, leggy woman flashing their wares, parties going on. What's happening to me? Why am I even considering not doing this job? Those party assholes are corrupted up the ass just like I am."

OK, well, not everyone. Not...

Shit, man. I can't be like she. That's asking way too much. I so much want to be a part of that world, I do. It seems so far away. Untouchable. Like her. Shit. I make this hit and I'm fucking myself out of where I want to be. Goddam it, this sucks.

Just fucking do it and leave all this existential crap for the morning, OK?

Remember all the other times where you didn't do what you wanted? Remember how that could have changed your life, given you a way out? You got yourself into this mess.

Refused

"No! It's not me!"

Suit yourself. Keep on going where you're going and see where it gets you.

"Couldn't be any worse than where I already am: total fucking shit. I'm going to shoot this fucker and then maybe I'll consider this bullshit conversation. Sure, I need to change. But not fucking now! You want me dead?"

No answer.

"Well, fuck you, then. I sure as hell hope God likes dead bodies because that fucker's going to get a whole planet full of them! We're all stuck and fucked and all the lectures in the world won't pay my damn bills. Since I don't know what to do I'll just keep on doing what I've been doing and goddam God can sort it out later."

I got up, smoothing out the wrinkles. Back in the real world, smelling the restaurant flavors, giving myself to the moist evening air filling my lungs, hearing an unexpected song in my heart. Shit, why am I so high? Looking around at the sidewalk cafes, I could be anybody. Damn, what a thought! Can I just ride this feeling and get away with it? Can it possibly be life is that good?

I walked passed the building I was supposed to enter. I started to smile. Hey, I do feel smart! Motherfucker! I'll be damned.

"Turn around. These feelings aren't real! You're just kidding yourself. You know you're no better than a selfish dog. Best to be honest with yourself than be a fool before all the world!"

I'd heard that before. It's what kept me from doing what I'd wanted. It's what got me into this mess to begin with, isn't it? Only question now: is it too late?

I kept walking but I'd be lying if the tug to go back and execute the hit wasn't pulling at me hard, out of habit if nothing else. I was breaking off a part of myself I know. How smart was that, really? It was strange, though. Whatever path I was on, the other road that seemed the smarter. I was a fool to walk away from the hit. I was a fool to do it. Blind faith, I hate you.

Hard as it was, I knew I had to go all the way, forcing myself to play it down the line one hundred percent. "Don't waver! That's the bit that will trip you up." I left my car, everything. Got a bus ticket out of the city. My first time on a bus. Something told me not to follow my normal routines. A clean break. I have to admit, though, sitting on that foul beast it was hard to make the argument I was smart.

A million thoughts raged through my mind on that bus seat. I was permanently altering my life and for what? My imagination? It was shitty scenes like this that got me into the business. Dear God, I can't live the rest of my life riding buses. Frankly, I should be way more upset than what I am. Surely I will come to see this as a horribly stupid decision later when I sober up.

I felt smart anyway.

*****

The morning sunshine at the diner the next morning was glorious, like when I was a child. Good to spend some time in a rural place as a change of pace. Maybe doors I thought were shut weren't so shut after all. Can't believe I'm having these thoughts! Not that I didn't have many nagging woes bringing me down. Don't confuse hope of getting out with actually being out. Life is really, really fucking hard.

Bored, I asked if I could read the communal paper left on the counter. It was from Dallas which I thought was funny. Times here in Podunk are to slow to write about. But the headline was the real shocker.

"Dumb fucking luck!"

Turns out the job had been double booked. Also turns out it had been a set up all along! "Hit Man Arrested In Police Sting". I shuddered and nearly broke down. I've been walking deeper into a mine field all this time!

I staggered out. If they knew about the other guy they most likely knew about me. Personal integrity. This was the one fucking time in my life I showed any - and it saved my life by the skin of my teeth. Now I had proof. Now I had answers. But unless I keep acting this way, I'll never make it out of this mine field alive. Jesus!