There’s this idea of the phantom limb. A man who’s lost his arm still feels the arm and behaves as if the arm is intact. What I have, then, is a phantom love.
We lived together for four years. Two years in Sydney’s West Hollywood apartment and two years here, in our house in Los Feliz. He died one month ago and ever since, I’ve lived alone. But I don’t feel alone. Everywhere I turn are reminders, some three-dimensional, others invisible, all of them speaking and taking up space.
For instance, this chair I’m in now has plenty to say. We found it at the Rose Bowl. It’s a nineteenth-century antique, English, with lion’s-paw feet and a floral design. Syd had an eye for this type of stuff, could discern the prize from the junk.
I remember when we first brought it home. I can hear myself now, complaining about how uncomfortable the chair is. I hear Sydney laughing, explaining that it’s not supposed to be comfortable. It’s a visual piece, he’s telling me. Please, Mr. Winters, if you must sit, sit on the couch. And yet he himself would sit in the chair. He loved this chair.
But I can’t say I love it, not anymore. Not when the voice I hear isn’t even Sydney’s but some distant and muted approximation of the way he sounded.
I stand up and drag the heavy chair through the house, through the kitchen, and into the backyard. I lay the chair on its side, raise my boot over the top leg, and stomp down. The broken limb dangles from chewy fibers, the amputation not complete until I’ve twisted a dozen times and yanked the thing off. I detach the other three legs in the same fashion.
I uncover the fire pit and form a tepee with the legs. The rusted lighter near the grill still has juice, but its blue flame won’t stick to the antique logs. I could quit now. Or I could go get some kindling.
In the straw box under our bed, I find notes, photos, envelopes. We really were sentimental saps, the pair of us. We kept everything: the crude portraits we drew of each other while giddy on molly; my shoelace headband from our first hike in Griffith Park (my hair was long when we started dating); the paper airplane I made with Swissair on one wing, Take Me with You on the other; and, from one of our marathon dinners in the canyon, a matchbook.
While I’m here, I strip the bed. His scent lingers, real or phantom, I don’t know. I toss the linens on top of the memory box and carry the whole lot through the bends of our bungalow.
I dump it all in the pit and wave the lighter again. A crackle as the flame takes and spreads. I watch the mass heat up and grow, feeling a sense of accomplishment.
It takes many trips, but I rid the house of all reminders:
The rug where I found his body.
His phone.
Forest painting from nobody artist.
Linen curtains, chosen by Syd, hung by me.
Wireless speakers from one of his clients.
New Age guides to success and enlightenment.
Issues of Food & Wine, Forbes, Esquire that had been neatly stacked on Danish modern coffee table.
Danish modern coffee table.
Earbuds, mine, but we shared them once in the theater before previews began; we each took an ear and enjoyed half-stereo Passion Pit.
Pictures in frames, both laptops, clothes, favorite tea mug, ski poles, Ping-Pong balls, unused parenting books, mail, postcards, birthday cards, business cards, sympathy cards, it’s-the-holiday-look-at-our-children cards.
All these items lie scattered on the overgrown grass, waiting their turn in the fire. There won’t be room until the pile melts down. At the moment, nothing much is happening.
I grab Sydney’s tennis racket, jab at the heap. I poke and prod, breaking up the cluster, letting air squeeze into the gaps. Something sizzles, and the rubble finally ignites.
Even this, staring into the fire, is a memory. We were out here with our cocktails, resting our feet on the low brick wall. We had just bought the house and out of this new feeling of adulthood came a list of plans: more traveling, rings, even talk of a baby.
A spark leaps from the pit into the cuff of my pants. Syd bought them for me during one of our last shopping runs. I untie my boots, slide the chinos down, and sail them across the western sky. They land atop the summit like a fallen flag.
In the kitchen, I fix myself a cocktail. Gin, Campari, sweet red vermouth: a Negroni, Syd’s drink of the moment. The fridge is empty, so I do without the orange rind. Reaching into the freezer for ice, I notice the bracelet on my wrist. It’s an ugly thing made of cheap leather. We purchased two of them—one for each of us—while on vacation in Mexico. Only this one remains.
I reach for the metal clasp, start to undo the circle, but stop myself. Nose pressed to the leather, eyes shut, I inhale, and there it is, the past, awakened. A flash of us in Mexico, Sydney’s gringo tan. I don’t visualize it as much as experience it a second time, the sensation of it, just for a few seconds. But it’s long enough. I decide to spare the bracelet for now.
I rinse a dirty fork and plunge it into the cherry-red mixture. While I’m stirring, I see it through the back window, what I’ve done. It’s glorious and way out of hand. Illuminating the night, a zigzagging fury spitting orange danger everywhere.
I run outside, giggling. Maybe terror or elation or madness, all of the above, but I’m laughing. I raise my glass in front of the blaze.
“Good-bye,” I say.
“I love you,” I say.
And then: “I’m sorry.”
Around me, the night buzzes. Voices through the fence, a figure in a neighbor’s window. Hot wind blows against my neck. I turn back to the fire, now spilling from the pit and climbing the post that supports the porch awning. I step away, finish the last of my drink, and watch all our memories rise in smoke and vanish in the night.