He was a willow tree, tall and gaunt, with hidden branches that wrapped themselves around the untouchable sky, and had vines of secrets swaying beneath his temples. Impressively looming over the rest of the small, miniscule world, he stood - proud and devastatingly intimidating. His bark paled under the unforgiving sky, and it was now embellished with lines that spoke of a man who was older than he said, and of a life he had once lived. From his bark grew long branches: all thick and gangly and spread out across the earth of my mind, rooting themselves in whatever poor boy he could beguile. And from his branches, he grew leaves, dark as a deep swamp and dancing as the world spun. He was no pretty sight - all sharp angles and gloomy height. In addition, he bore no inextricably pretty flowers, except for perhaps the secrets of the wind that he whispered in the night. My willow tree, I would have called him once: my solemn, melancholic man.
As a child, I thought him the most beautiful boy in the world: because like the low hanging leaves of a willow tree, his acre of blond hair wandered lovingly across his back as the wind commanded; and in his eyes bloomed grey lily pads, across an inky mass of river; and from his words, a pool of warmth sprouted in my gut. I could only see kindness in his touch, could only taste love from his lips. Saccharine and cloying, he draped himself across me as though he were the strings of melichrous honey that trapped my form.
I will love him, even when he becomes a spectre of a man and has waned into a willow tree, nicked by sallow skin and thawny branches. I will love him, even when he coughs and croaks and collapse like a dying star, as his leaves fall and his eyes dull. I will love him, for all his immolations and aberrations, because I can no longer taste the antique joy of hollowed fruit as I have coalesced into a dreadful red pile without him. I will love him and water a sullen willow tree, for I have not forgotten how he germinated me from a seed.
I hadve loved him, from the moment we met. I have loved him, because there was no one like my lovely willow tree, no one like the once lovely enmity. He was as charming as could be, dusky mouth always in a tight lipped smile as he whisked me away into the dark night.
“What? You’re getting married?”
And I think about the oceans that encircle our islands, I think about the fields that encompass my house, I think about the stars that dot the night sky, and I think about the vast nothingness waiting for us in a void we cannot comprehend. When you get married, my greatest virgil, it will have meant nothing to the universe. When the memories we once possessed are thrown callously into the fireplace you and your wife will own in your grand new bungalow, they will have no impact on the world whatsoever. Your hands will have met mine on an immortal day, and we will have played the harp a final time. And even then, our woes will have left no lasting impact on our environment - our tune will go unheard and unguarded. We will cease to exist. And the memories you wrought me with will die with me; for you locked me in your eternal embrace. When you have danced with your sterling bride, we will cease to remain. We will have never happened. Nor in this world, or the rest. Only in mine, can I recall our paramount affair, and only in my world, will you have forgotten me for a final time.
“ Yes. The wedding will take place sometime in March. You’re invited to come, of course.”
“How will you introduce me?” I ask this; in a desperate, last-ditch attempt to make you reconcile with what you have done, to force you to recall , if only for a moment. Will you feel the same ripple of pain that jolts through me every time I close my eyes, and you are there?
“As an old acquaintance from Kensington. Why?”
I remember everything. So how can you not?
“No reason.” I laugh bitterly, but you do not notice. I know you used to be able to. ”How marvellous. Who else is invited?” You are getting married, and I am still haunted by your spectre.
“No one you would know,” you tell me brusquely, although I know you don’t mean it. Of course, I don’t know anyone from your circle, how could I? I was your evergreen secret, your most precious treasure. You had me hidden within your troves, like I was the last poem you would ever write. Now I drop my pen and the ink has spilled.
“I don’t suppose I would. By chance, how old is the lucky lass?”
Remember, please.
“Twenty-three. It’s Narcissa Black.”
I don’t care about her name. “Where did you meet her?”
“ It was an… arrangement.”
The ink has made a mess all over my desk, and I will have to clean it up. It has soaked my parchment with its insidious black pigment and stained my fingers. “Does she know?” I am practically begging you, at this point.
You could give me any reply, anything - a single word would do; the silence is breathtakingly agonising and I am absolutely torn now. Answer me, acknowledge me. Repent with a simple ‘sorry and I will be done. I will have exorcised your spirit, and lock those memories back into the hellscape from whence they came.
“ Know about what?”
I hang up on you.
Finger on the lip. Tongue on the eye. And you lie. You are devoid of meaning, as your teeth let a flick of tongue pass, and you tell me about the Ottoman Empire, Merlin, and how a spectre of magical theory might irrevocably change the rest of our lives. You say all kinds of romantic things—you play Salem tunes, and you translate music; you read me poetry, and you write your own. But you do not inform. You only recite. You are performed—you are a learned art. And you do not say, only in whispers and murmurs, do you speak. You are not afraid of dark lords, of war, of being eradicated by a meteorite. But you are afraid to speak. And so, you do not say.