[Abigail Forbes]

& the good news is I’m better for the time we spent together

& the bad news is you’re gone

I don’t even know where to begin with this. I used to do this all the time. Before the explosion, my grandfather had entire corner of his study stuffed with my journals. I haven’t written a word in a journal since then. I wish there were a different reason for me needing to write but I’ve tried everything else. I’m suffocating on the acrylic paint fumes in my flat. If I do anymore yoga, I will be permanently stuck in some sort of pretzel position. I can’t walk because my legs hurt from so much yoga. My flat is in pieces because I tore everything down and threw whatever I could get my hands on as hard and as far as I could. And I can’t cry anymore, at least not for the time being. I didn’t sleep last night, I barely made it passed my front door before I curled up on the floor and didn’t stop crying until sometime this morning. Nothing has helped.

Michael is dead.

Amazing how difficult three words are to write. He was hit by a car yesterday. Mr. Lynwood took his own life not too long after he heard the news, I suppose. And maybe that’s why nothing has helped, because nothing I do can change those two facts. Not how many hours I spent on my floor crying, not the fact that I kept calling Michael’s voicemail just to hear his voice until my phone died, not the fact that for some reason the sun still rose today. It all changes nothing. Michael is still gone. As if I needed another reason to despise the driving in London.

All I can think about is that last day Kaffeine when I had just come back from Paris. No one has made me blush as much as Mr. Lynwood has and watching him and Michael interact made me miss Albert so much. I couldn’t stop smiling. Most people would just brush that off because “Gee, Abby, you’re always smiling” but it was always different with Michael. I didn’t have to back track all of my conversations with him and break down my sentences with pop culture references for him to follow. I could talk to him about art, literature, theatre, classes and he just understood. I miss him. I miss him so much.

I wish I would have told him everything. Not just about my mom but about everything… About how Charles dumped me with my grandparents and how lucky he is that his father stuck around. That Charles and I barely have a business relationship, let alone the banter he and his father have. That I liked him as more than just a friend, that I had for a while and just didn’t know what to do or how to say it. I had so many chances: Kaffeine, our trip to Scotland, hell I could have passed him a note in lecture. But I was so afraid of what he would say.

I’ll never forgive myself for that.

Abby

October 1, 2011

coded by onegai KAREN !! of ATF

[Abigail Forbes]

praying to God, begging

that's when he's more than a memory

Why does everyone have to ask me if I’m okay? I made it through an entire day, through an entire eight hours without crying. And then one of my regulars had to say that I seemed a little down and wondered if I was alright. I know their heart was in the right place but I wish people would just leave me be. I barely choked out the words “I’m just having a bad day” before tearing off for the back room. For the first time in three years, my boss sent me home; I had 30 minutes to spare. The walk home was certainly interesting; I have never cried and walked in London before.

I think it did more harm than good, sending me away. At least at work I can slip into autopilot. At work there are things to keep me busy; a reason to hold back the tears and put on a smile. There’s a purpose to my carrying on and pretending everything is normal. I can’t say that I forget Michael is gone, that thought constantly hovers over me, but I can put it on the back burner and deal with it on my own. But then someone asks, someone wonders and I have to focus on it. I am forced to confront Michael’s absence in my life head on again. It’s like the first time every time.

I can’t watch the news, turn on the television, unlock my phone, or log onto my computer without being reminded that Michael was here just yesterday and now he’s just gone. The only thing I can do is curl up on my floor, wrapped in a comforter, and wait. Wait to see if time can in fact ease the pain that’s radiating from my heart; wait to see if this is all some terrible, psychotic dream and at any moment Michael is going call me wondering why I keep phoning him but won’t leave a message. I keep waiting, I keep hoping against the weight on my chest that this all just some big mistake.

Abby

October 2, 2011

coded by onegai KAREN !! of ATF

[Abigail Forbes]

tell me i was dreaming

that you didn't leave me here to cry

“Today was hard” feels like the understatement of the year. But it’s a beginning, I suppose. Maybe I’ll get better at feigning being okay after a while. I spent most of the day in lecture or the library but it didn’t even feel like I was there. It’s as if I’m wrapped in some invisible field; I don’t feel, everything sounds like it’s underwater, everyone seems far away.

I barely heard the lectures, didn’t notice if students collided with me in the hall. My professors seemed concerned; lectures are rather quiet without me making snide comments and laughing on the rare occasions Michael would join in.

Do I have a right to miss Michael this much?

I mean, we were friends, of course and I know mourning that loss is completely within my right. But do I have a right to miss him as anything more than that? Do I have the right to miss what could have been, what could have been said, what might have occurred? Is it right to miss him in a way he probably didn’t feel for me? Am I being ridiculous, making this into something it’s not? I’m not even sure most days how Michael put up with me… Am I missing something that wasn’t even there? Is my imagination twisting innocent things into something they weren’t just to ease my mind?

Is this all just in my head?

I didn’t even get to say goodbye. I don’t even know how to say goodbye to him, where to begin. I don't know where to go from here, how to pick up the pieces of what's left of me and go on. I feel so...so shell-shocked but I know there's pain under there. It comes in waves. One minute, I'm numb and able to maneuver through the day. The next, the pain hits and all I can do is sit and cry and keep crying until I can't anymore. And then I'm left with anger. Complete and total fury at the bastard who wasn't paying attention to where they were going - to the fact that Michael was right there. Upset with myself for not making him drop whatever he was doing so I could have somehow intervened in this. I'm even angry with Michael for being anywhere near a moving vehicle.

Bought a stack of canvasses and paints today. Am considering painting out my feelings.

Abby

October 3, 2011

coded by onegai KAREN !! of ATF

[Abigail Forbes]

it was just my imagination

telling lies

Just when I thought this month couldn't get any worse, Charles and his family came to visit. This was really the last thing I needed. I can tolerate Charles on a business level but God help me if I have to deal with Deborah and her pathetic-excuse-for-human-beings-children, I may commit mass murder. My ability has been shaky enough without their presence.

I mean, really. I do not need their rehearsed condolences. I don't need to hear what the tabloids are saying. I certainly don't need to hear their opinions on two men they have never met. And I really have no interest in their opinions on the state of my flat. I did not ask them to come here from France, I did not ask them to be here, their thoughts on anything right now are of little consequence to me.

I feel like God must be taking a piss on my life right about now.

Abby

October 3, 2011 (later)

coded by onegai KAREN !! of ATF