...Bang Bang...21may14...

Her eyes leveled at me, uncommonly steady.  She had pulled on her collar moments before, as if readying herself of the drama I was about to unleash.  The grey wool jacket, with large black buttons.  They were overtly large.  They had to be ironic.  Weren't we done with that?  With irony?

"So?"

She had to beat me to the punch in an attempt to deflate.  Her blue eyes penetrated, easily - but it was a ploy.  Like most women she believed she had one over on me.  Little did she know that I had what many men don't: a backbone.

"So?  All you ever do is take.  You are a taker.  You use everyone like toilet paper.  You are ungrateful.  You are unwilling.  You belittle because it comes so easy to you.  Too easy.  It's like a chain smoker and their nonchalance of taking a drag.  You take drags on people's emotions.

I see it now.  You drain.  You pull apart and don't allow the moment to allow it to coalesce.  I didn't see it before, but I saw it the other night.  Where you ripped open Gustav's girl with a chuckle.  She was down, she was broken.  But you..."  At this point I knew I was making that face.  It started to hurt.  My eyes were burning as I was getting it all off of my chest.

"...you had to do that snarky little cunt laugh.  She was down, Charlie. She had just caught Gustav kissing that Peruvian exchange student in the bathroom of the flat they shared.  I saw how you pounced on her.  You prowled around the room and saw the best way to hurt her.  You waited for Demi and Crystal to look in your direction.  You had an audience.  You looked at her with that disgusting look and you laughed.  I can only imagine you would do the same if you slid a knife into a old woman's throat."

She grimaced, the little lines coming together slow, like the lines of two opposing trains coming to a stop at the same stop.  Her eyes searched the air.  She looked back at me with the eyes of a child that was found out.  She had nothing to say.

"So?  I'm saying fuck you, Charlie.  Piss off."

With that I turned away, knowing full well I had just flipped the script.  But I meant every word and I walked tall and I never saw her again.  My only regret was to use that face and a tall, taunt finger to her face.

Of course I say that then.

I received the Facebook IM that Charlie was asking for me.  Not about, but for.  It was from Lara.  What chilled was that Lara didn't say anything else.  Charlie's last update was six months ago and the cryptic "I guess this is what I sow."  I stared at that for literally ten minutes, my eyes reading beyond the the dots comprising the message on the screen.

I hated everything I said that day.  I hated that face now.  It was all just so unimportant.  She was asking for me.  The guy that broke up with her that cold Sunday morning at Owl's Head.  I left her stranded there on purpose, knowing she would have to figure out.

"Hey, Charlie.  How u doing?"  There is a reason for banality I say to myself at a phrase I've never said or written in my entire life.

It took three hours to get a reply.  I was at work at that point.

"Doctors therapist they said we need to tlk I'm sorry.  So sorry.  I guess we should talk."

Fuck.  I said a thousand times.  The rest of the day was a blur.  A blur of fucks.

"Yes, Charlie.  Of course.  I'm off at 4.  Wanna meet at 10th Pizza?"

"Cya then"

She's sorry?  I think about slicing a few necks while here at the hospital.  I never felt so low.  Everything that happened with her didn't matter.  She's Charlene Haynes, my ex-girlfriend, and she needs me right now.