Dearest Maximillian,

I used to have the best memory.
You could have asked me anything and I could have answered you.

What did you wear as you walked down Tova Street that last night?
What color was the sky in Leningrad on July 17th, 1978?
What coffee shop was it again?
What was his name?

Over many years, my eyes and senses had faithfully engraved every detail of my life into the surface of my brain. It was like a bank vault or an oak chest.
All my memories, so pristine.
All together. So neat and safe.
My autobiography.

But then a flood came.
(You could call it the first stage of Alzheimers.)
It picked up my chest of memories.
And it swept them away.
So effortlessly.

Carried it in its watery embrace out to sea.
The Black Sea, of course.

I looked for so long.
But I couldn't find it.
Things washed up on shore.
Little wisps of seaweed and jellyfish echoes of my memories.
Multicolored ocean glass.
I loved that wreckage.
Those salvaged pieces.
My new life.

So forgive me, Max.
The red has vanished from my hair.
My eyes have been dulled.
My skin is abundant with wrinkles.
I've just grown older.

But I'd still like to tell you my story.
What's left of it.
Of him.

te amo.

His name was Jaymes Villareal.


By day, he would grace women with a small smile, sometimes a kiss on the hand. He went about the town with his head held high and stole the hearts of all the people around him. He was known as the ciudad amante, town lover. He was married to a beautiful woman, but she lived thirty-two miles east of the lake to take care of her family. So Jaymes was alone, free to do what he pleased. And believe me, he did.


By night, his nickname took action. He'd visit his catch of the month, throwing small pebbles at her window to get her attention. When she came down to him, he'd take her to the bay of the lake. With the moon high in the sky, he would make love to her. While the small lake waves padded against their bodies. He would never stay with one girl for too long, for Jaymes bored easily. He was always looking for something new, perhaps something he knew he was missing in himself.


Her name was Natalie Garcia.


By day, she roamed free. Sometimes running endlessly through daisy fields. Or sleeping as long as she pleased. Loneliness was no stranger to her, for she had lost her parents at the age of nine and had never married. She had thick, wavy, brown locks that she always wore down. Tan skin and lips the color of roses. She was beautiful, but strange. Most of the town completely ignored her quirkiness, for they seemed to have better things to do. One day, as Natalie walked down the bay, she saw him....




Their eyes met and it's as if the whole world had stopped for her. His messy black hair, his soft brown eyes, and his burly build. She wanted to run to him, but Natalie didn't even know his name. As Jaymes saw her, he felt as though he was in a dream. This beautiful angel walking towards him could not be real. He wanted to grab her, and kiss her with everything that he had, but he thought against it, for nothing that beautiful could be a good thing. Natalie approached him slowly and Jaymes stood. When they were within eight feet of each other, they just stood, staring. Not an awkward stare nor awkward silence, it was comfortable; as if this had happened between them all the time. Jaymes was the first one to speak, "I'm ashamed to ask this, but I don't think I know you..." Natalie looked down shyly, "do not be ashamed, for I seem to not recall who you are as well..." Jaymes moved closer, "I'm Jaymes Villareal" and he put his hand out. "Natalie Garcia." she put his hand in his. 


It went from there, this is their story.


On the first day of their encounter, they stayed together all day. Just talking, telling stories about one another's lives. Natalie told him about the boy who broke her heart and since then love never seemed worth it. Jaymes told her about his art and his messed up family life. By the time they finally parted, the sun was waking up. That night, Natalie heard tapping on her window. She opened it slowly and there stood Jaymes, "come down to me..." Natalie smiled, closed her window and crawled back into bed. He was confused by this and continued throwing pebbles at her window. When there was no response, he walked off. This had never happened to him. "What have I down wrong?" He thought, and thought, and thought. Nothing had crossed his mind.  Jaymes could not sleep that night, for no girl had ever left him waiting. He would go back there tomorrow night, and try again; he decided before finally drifting to sleep. 


The next day; Natalie slept till twelve that afternoon. She awoke, put on her favorite white dress, plucked a pale pink carnation from her garden and made her way to town. Searching the sea of people, she searched for Jaymes' face. Finally, she found him. She made her way over to him, he noticed this and put down the board and hammer he held. "Good morning" she smiled, "good afternoon" he replied.  Jaymes pulled her away from the crowd, "why did you not come to me last night...?" Natalie looked disgusted, "because I'm the type of women who deserves to be seen out during the day, not hidden away in the night." And with that, she left him, standing there; mouth agape.  "Natalie!" Jaymes called, she did not turn around. He ran to her and grabbed her arm, "come with me, please?" he pleaded. She looked deep into his eyes and finally she replied "okay..."


He led her through the Willow Forest, past the daisy fields, and even further than the lake's bay. Finally after about an hour and a half of walking, there they stood; on a cliff that overlooked the entire town. Natalie stepped forward, the wind whipping her hair back. "It's breathtaking." She said looking back at Jaymes. "My father brought me here when I was a young boy, he told me that when I had finally found love, to bring that girl here..." Natalie turned around slowly, "love?" Jaymes stepped forward, "you're unlike any girl I've ever met Natalie Garcia, you're so free; you don't care what people think about you. You do what you want when it pleases you and you stand up for what you believe in. Your charisma is noble." Natalie's cheeks burned, "just because I'm not the first girl to come to you at night, does not mean you love me, Jaymes."  Jaymes smirked, "I know, but it's more than that. You're beautiful and inspiring." And with that, he grabbed her and kissed her more passionately than he had ever kissed another woman. Hours passed and they were still on that cliff together.  Tears of happiness slid off of Natalie's cheeks. "This will never work, you are married..." Jaymes kissed her forehead, "I'd cut off ties with everyone in my life if it meant I get to spend forever with you."  Natalie sat up placing her hand on Jaymes' chest, "you're a silly man Jaymes Villareal, I'm not going to let you shame your name like this and break the heart of an innocent woman just because you want to be with me right now...you need to think hard and long about what you really want in life. If it's me, then your heart will know where to find me. If it's not, then thank you; because of you, I now know that my heart is no longer afraid to love...."  


She walked away, tears falling down her face. Jaymes didn't know what to do, he too had tears slipping from his eyes. He laid there for hours, contemplating everything. Finally, he knew what he had to do. Jaymes walked to Natalie's home, but when he arrived; all that was before him was a daisy field. It looked as though the foundations of a home had never graced the land. Confused, he walked down to the village. The first person he saw was Momma Gio,  he called to her. "Momma Gio, where is Natalie Garcia?" Her face pained when he asked this, "Jaymes...you know she took her life last spring after her husband left her...you shouldn't ask such questions." And she left him there, cold and alone and confused. Did he dream this? No, everything that had happened had been to real to be a dream. That night, he wrote a letter to his wife....




"Dear Alexandria,

How have you been? It has been ages since we've last talked...and because of that I have not been the husband you deserve. Love, I've been missing something inside me for a long long time now. But I've been scared to confront it, in fear you might not see me as the man you've always been so sure of. I've been unfaithful and I know that's wrong; but I had to admit that to you. I care about you supremely, but I do not love you. You do not deserve someone like me. With someone as incredible as you, you deserve a man who can put the stars in the sky and rearrange them so beautifully, Heaven is envious. You may be wondering why I have had this sudden revelation, well I met someone...or at least I think I did. She put things into perspective for me and made me realize how I've been living is wrong. I'm going to travel the world and leave this small town...and I just couldn't do that knowing I have been dragging your heart around on a string. Thank you for blessing me with five years of happiness, but you deserve a life time. Lexie, please do not hate me...but if you do I would understand. Just know that we were young when we married and I never really had the time needed to grow up. I will always think of you whenever i see sapphire blue fabric or lily's. You are always in my heart...


yours forever, Jaymes Villareal."

The Dream of Living Forever With You

They dreamed everyday.

The boy would say, "You start." 

The girl would say, "Okay, we're in Boston and it's beautiful" because that’s how she always started her dreams. 

Then the boy would say, "Our duplex overlooks the ocean and it always smells like incense and you've got a room for writing with big bay windows and I've got a studio and it's just like you imagined your first everything to be.”

"We stay up late on our rooftop and look out at the skyline. It’s how perfect would feel like if it existed,” the girl would say.

"You're putting on your makeup because we're going to see one of our favorite Indie bands tonight, Glass Houses, in some small pub. And we'll go dancing and be so alive and so careless."

"We're catching a train to Canada at midnight" she smiled, "to the cabin in the woods." 

Sometimes he would wake her up, "We're sailing on the bluest water, in a small wooden boat. It's nighttime. We talk about stars-are they made of fire or of something more beautiful?" 

She said, "This reminds me of us." (You and I, we're not tied to the ground, not falling but rising like rolling around, eyes closed above the rooftops, eyes closed, we're gonna spin through the stars, our arms wide as the sky, we're gonna ride the blue all the way to the end of the world, to the end of the world).

Where are we tonight, the girl would whisper.

Iceland.

Amsterdam.

Brazil.

New Zealand.

He would tell her.

Where are we going, the girl would ask.

Anywhere.

Everywhere.

Let’s never stop dreaming. Promise me.

I promise you.

Say it.

Say what?

We’ll never stop.

We’ll never stop.

He would tell the girl:

We’re in our cabin and it’s Christmas. You’ve decorated it so beautifully. I take you outside, with my hands over your eyes. I tell you, open your eyes and I lift my hands off them at the same moment. When you open them all you can see is all the trees in our yard, the ones that have lost their leaves, wrapped up in lights. I remember you told me that they looked lonely, I tell you. You say, things like this make me believe in God all over again. You say, let’s not talk anymore. So I don’t. You walk out beneath the trees, touching the places where the bark is exposed and if someone saw you at that moment they’d call you beautiful. The truth is, it’s nice to just be places where you are.

She would tell the boy:

We walk to the ski lodge later and I ask one of the lift operators to turn a lift on. He picks, Cambria Pass, the one that runs up through the mountains at night.  It’s so easy to sit there with you, on some three-passenger chair lift, of course it is. You say, I can see our house from here. I recite a passage from my favorite book to you. I say, “Love me because love doesn’t exist and I have tried everything that does.” I’m wearing that sweater we bought in Ireland. You’ve got on some kind of hat with fur. Our life these days seems like a blank notebook, the kind with cream-colored paper, or like the flimsy opaqueness that accompanies every Antarctic night, right before the Aurora Borealis.

While sailing along the Mediterranean Coast he told her:

If someone asked me about this moment, I would say, it was the greatest.

Somewhere in Romania she told him:

Nothing will ever be as great as you can imagine it to be.

In Cairo, he whispered, while tossing pebbles into the Nile:

Except for this.

During intermission at the Paris Opera, she confided:

You make my feet lighter.

Before diving off a waterfall in Australia he assured her:

I’ll come back up and do it again with you.

And so they dreamed, as most people dream yet they lived, as most people never get a chance to live.

One day, while walking down an imaginary street together, the boy looked at the girl. He wondered why she always swung her hands so quickly.

She was looking for a bookstore.

He asked her:

Would you like some coffee? How many sugars?  Cream?

She asked him:

Would you like a book? Genre? Length?

They took the same street and went different directions. It was like this: the being together and then suddenly having the need to be alone.  The balance that was so hard to achieve. The complete unity that could form and mold itself into any shape but somehow evaded them both.

Somewhere in Alaska the girl told the boy:

I’m tired of travel. No matter where I go, myself always follows me.

On a pier in Japan as she threw the remains of a letter into the Pacific:

There are three classifications of people in my life: friends, lovers or nothing.

Rewind to another imaginary adventure in Israel. They strolled the narrow streets and shade from the olive trees splashed on their faces. The boy prayed and told jokes the girl wrote in that journal she was always scribbling in. They lay with the sand hot on their backs.

Fast forward to their pilgrimage to India. She bought kabobs from a street vendor. They ate them in front of the beautiful Hindu temple. He whistled some Beatles song and she sang, “Little darling it’s been a long, cold, lonely winter. Little darling it’s been years since you’ve been here.” She was wearing an electric purple sari. He sang back, “Here comes the sun, do do do, here comes the sun. And I say it’s alright.”

Pause their sabbatical in Madagascar. He dared her to eat it. She said, let’s both take a bite. The truth is, it wasn’t that bad and the locals laughed. He announced that he was going swimming. She said she would be back in a little while, because she would be looking for seashells. Later, they built a fire and simultaneously wondered why it seemed that there were always more stars in exotic places than in the city. Oscar Wilde came to her mind and she said, “We are all in the gutter but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Play their journey in Italy. They danced in the piazza and then he pushed her into the fountain. She laughed as she said; you’ve ruined my dress. Smiling as she pulled him in along with her, but not as bad I just ruined your shirt. She put her arm in the crook of his as the walked through St. Peter’s Basilica. They strained their necks together from looking at Michelangelo’s ceilings for so long. They had the best meal and stumbled upon a tango street festival. Dimly lit with tea lights the ancient cobble stoned street had sparkled with the scent of Chanel, the girl would later insist. They watched, entranced, as what had formerly been only gondoliers and waitresses flounced and twirled, dipped and touched in a manner that the boy would later describe as, ephemeral and earnest.

While eating at a seaside café in Madrid the girl confessed:

I just want to be one of those interesting old people when I grow up. You know, someone that people want to sit next to at parties. Someone who makes a lasting impression. I want to leave a party with the knowledge that someone will be going home and telling anyone who will listen that they just met the most captivating person in the world.

In front of Buckingham Palace the boy told one of the guards:

You’re awfully serious.

In the Hall of Mirrors she mused:

I’m just as lonely as Marie Antoinette.

In the midst of the Kalahari Desert he quoted:

“Have I found you flightless bird, American mouth?”

Somewhere in Montana the boy told the girl:

You’re free. He reminded her to breathe, breathe, shh, shh, just breathe. Just go, the boy whispered. Run. Make your great escape. Hurry and be quick now. Yes, here are your train tickets. No, I don’t know where you’re going but you’re going, that’s enough for now. I can’t go with you. Please, no tears. No arguments. Just leave. You’re free; I’m setting you free. Yes, I put you in first class. Here’s your luggage. Yes, I packed your jewels and your Hermes scarves. No, you look wonderful. Here let me fix it. Let me carry your things for you. I’m not all that good at this, sorry.

At the final destination after years of the in between, staring at the painting after months of preliminary sketches and mixing colors, staying awake until the break of dawn after years of never being able to. That was what saying goodbye was for them. Intangible.

He told her, here’s your coat.

He told her, your plane leaves in forty-two minutes.

He told her, you’re like some great book that I keep misplacing. 

She said, thank you for everything.

She said, I don’t think I’ll remember much.

She said, please read e.e cummings before you die.

Rewind to their last night in Denmark as she handed him a red tulip:

“Here is the deepest secret no one knows. Here is the root of the root. Here is the bud of the bud, in the sky of a tree called life. I carry your heart. I carry it in my heart.”

Fast forward to a crowded bazaar in some foreign place:

A not so young girl collides with a not so young boy.

She spills the papers she was carrying.

He drops his coffee and his newspaper.

She looks up. She crinkles her forehead.

He pushes his glasses back up his nose.

The not so young girl smiles and it is the best smile.

Then she says, the truth about forever is…

She stops midsentence; she’s crying.

Her knees were scraped.

The laces of her Oxford’s were untied.

Her hair hung in loose wisps around her face.

The not so young boy says, oh, it’s you.

His white shirt is stained with coffee.

He hasn’t shaved in a while.

He thinks, of course it’s her.

Then he says for her, the truth about forever is that it isn’t forever.

Pause.