The Bar
Melancholy.
Had we not the same complex?
I was better than you, and you thought you were better than me.
Didn’t you? I’m sure of it. How else could we have bickered to our hearts delight, so many nights spent in contempt, deliberately prideful of our knowing? On iron benches by street-lamp light, in golden fields and glistening museums and palaces, and in the empty bar behind the park, desperately gripping and defending our thoughts from one another
like they were some lone treasured possession worth living and dying for.
Like they were all that we had.
I never said you weren’t strong, to my credit, but I might have crushed you, mentally or physically, at any time;
surely you knew I thought that. Of course, we never took to anything competitive in nature, save our squabbling.
And I was happy; a chess match might have ruined us.
Regardless, you made me tired and it was good for me.
We weren’t enemies, but we acted the part well. Had the Academy seen us, you might have won consecutive Oscars for best lead, save one particular instance some years ago. You cracked a curt but terrific smile, for seemingly no reason at all, and for that fraction of a moment, I swear I saw you delight in me!
Not in our joyously condescending conversation and witty below-belt punches, but me! Clear as day. I couldn’t forget it if I tried. But I’m not trying.
Naturally, I was also a good actor. But not to you, I’m sure of it. I must have cracked and showed you at least once!
Maybe tens, or even dozens of times! I showed you and you saw the love I had for you!
You did see, didn’t you?
I didn’t hate you then, or now, or ever; I couldn’t have. But you died and I wasn’t there, so maybe you thought I did.
I never did tell you.
The bar is higher now,
quite a leap.
I think no one will ever match me the way you once did. But I’m not looking.
The bar is higher now,
they raised it after the storm. So I teeter up the mossy steps, and past the humming copper lights and their mourning song.
I dodge the weathered bartender wondering where you are and where we’ve been, and stumble towards the place where we quarreled and viciously spewed our intelligent nonsense and shifted our weight anxiously at the thought of being bested by the other, hoping to now be somehow consoled by the faded spot of oak where your arms so frequently rested and stripped away the finish.
I really will miss you, I’m sure of it.
