Mary calling promptly after 10:00pm, the hour she signed off from her internet pornographic shows, exclaimed how she detested the internet customers. remarking matter of factly, “I had to stop and run out to 7-11 to buy batteries for my vibrators.” We would talk for hours and hours Often the sun would be rising when we would say good-byes. The topics always so diverse, ranging from aliens to God to food to our children. Mary enjoyed my army stories and she really revelled in the hazing stories. Saying, “Tell the story when they beat you with bars of soap in socks. Oh oh, tell me the story when they tied you up, locked you in the locker and threw it down a flight of stairs.” Mary would laugh with an over exuberant glee. I did not understand why until much much later in our relationship exactly why she enjoyed these stories so much.What I did know, during our first in-depth conversation, our relationship was a supernatural event. Divine spiritual manifestation.We discussed Jesus Christ. How else could this be explained? The art piece with her images, the fact I knew she was not who she portrayed herself to be. That her public image was a fraud. That she so readily confided in me. C
coincidence? not a chance
I can’t say I had never meet her, (as I had that brief encounter 15 years ago) but I certainly did not know her. Not at all. Yet I knew I loved her from our first conversation. She is so sad, so alone, so hurt. .
Just as I am.
Saying, “I love you.” I was risking alienating her. I knew she had heard this from fans, perverts, abusers, manipulators and God knows who else. But I had to say this. It bubbled out of my mouth, like spring water. Clear, honest and true. Filtered through the granite bedrock-wreckage of my life . I didn’t want anything from her but to heal her, to bring her joy ,peace and love. The things I pined for also. The very ingredients missing from my soul. I could empathize with her agony, humiliation, shame, and loneliness. The loneliness. The unbearable void in the very center of the human heart. Mary’s voice was faint, a virtual whisper and I could hear her shallow breathing. I knew she had been drinking and she had ingested Valium. I was panicked. ”I…love…you…too,” she finally said beginning to cry. I in turn began to sob uncontrollably. Glancing at my wrist watch I noticed it was 6:30am.
