Carmen had enough. She wanted to start a new life. The new life meant starting on without me. We made mad crazy passionate love and she was gone. No screams and shouts of protest, just gone. No words or promises just gone. I knew well enough why she went. I knew it was coming. I let her go. We lost so much, she lost so much. We where far from being human. It was time for a change. I got it. It hurt but I got it.

What did I do? How did I cope?

First I got clean. Getting clean is not easy. I went cold turkey. And the mere thought of food made me want to puke pink all over again. It was not day by day, it was hour to hour, the hours lasted a lifetime, my lifetime was ticking bomb that never reached the fuse, I so wanted to die….it helped me not to think about Carmen. One day the hurt was gone, one day the bright light didn’t hurt me, one day I went for a walk and wound up at the Santa Monica pier, one day, that day….life was nice to me. I looked around and liked what I saw.

 I got a job as a register girl at the supermarket down the street from my then apartment. I didn’t need the money. I had money. Just walking the isles putting back the items shoppers changed their mind on. In aisle 8, cereals and shit. I don’t remember really but it’s in that moment when and where I saw her, Trish. Hair in a ponytail, sweats, sandals….looking anything but glamorous yet so…she wanted to know if the Honey Nut Cheerios where still buy one get one. They where. She smiled that small serious smile of hers. She got me.

A feeling different from Carmen. Softer. Carmen had this effect on me. Like falling off a cliff. Trish, the feeling with her for her was like a deep…mature, passionate thing…..I felt it for both no question. Want and feel no question. Carmen was blunts in the stairwell, 40’s and driving around with the top down, it was sex against the wall, talking thru movies slamming back shots till we passed out in the middle of sex…..Maybe that was problem. Every feeling I ever had with Trish I had to compare it to Carm.