Black Chalk

And I mean this as well, absolutely I do. But my feelings of joy at seeing that my visitor had left me a note were soon transformed into a sense of breathless panic. Because, you see, I don’t remember the pool table or being thrown out. I don’t remember my drunken declarations of love. And therefore I have no idea whose name I called out. And if I reveal this to my visitor now, if I admit to forgetting her a second time . . .

Yet neither name seems any more likely than the other.

Emilia, Dee.

Dee, Emilia.

I loved them both. If things had only turned out differently . . .

And so now there is something important I must do with my story, something I need to tell you about. Henceforth, when I type in italics, these passages will be strictly for your eyes only. For you and only you, my reader. Which means there now exist two versions of my story. Not that I will be writing an entirely different account. Both versions will be the same file copied and recopied to keep them identical. The only difference will be the italicised passages, these italicised passages, which my visitor simply must not read.

This italicised version will lay hidden, buried like pirate gold, nestling inside a folder inside a folder inside a folder . . . the last in a series of Russian dolls, folders with names like Utilities, Dialogues, Cookies, Mnemonics and Preferences. I have created blind alleys and false leads like the wrong turns in a maze. At certain dead ends I have thrown in older versions of this story, or articles I worked on years ago for the paper. There is no way that my visitor can find the hidden treasure of this second version.

Because I want to be honest with you, my intended reader. I want to be honest with the world. But my visitor will expect me to start using her name, hence my panic. And I don’t want to lose her again. I don’t want to lose her for good.

*

I pace around my apartment in a state of high anxiety. Emilia or Dee? Dee or Emilia? I lie on my bed, sit at my table, stand by my window. Nothing comes to me. I pull on my sneakers.

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