Hope Idiotic | Part 44

David HimmelFiction
Written By David Himmel

By David Himmel

Hope Idiotic is a serialized novel. This is the final installment.

SOMEONE WAS KNOCKING ON THE FRONT DOOR. It woke Lou up. It took him a moment to realize where he was and what was happening. The knocking sounded furious. Lou pulled himself up off the floor and moved to the master bathroom where he splashed some water on his face and took a moment to look at himself in the mirror.

“Jesus Christ, Louis,” he said to the reflection. “Feel better?”

The furious knocking came again. He ran down the stairs yelling at it, “Hang on!” and winced at how sore his throat was. He flung the door open to see Michelle standing there.

“Hi,” she said.

“What the hell?...”

“I was, um, driving by and saw the car—is it a rental?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I heard you were in town, and so I thought that maybe that car was yours and that I would stop by to say hello and see how you were.”

“You were driving by? Just happened to be driving by?”

“Well, okay, I took a detour from the mall on the off chance you would be here.”

“Why?”

“To say hello and see…”

“Come on, Michelle. See how I was doing? Really? We don’t speak for over a year while living in the same city, and now you want to reach out to me? Why are you here?”

“I guess I don’t know. You don’t think it’s strange that we haven’t talked?”

“No.”

“After everything?”

“That’s why I don’t think it’s strange. After everything, I was perfectly happy to never talk to you again and to certainly never see you again.”

“Wow. That’s pretty harsh, Lou.”

He could see she was hurt. He didn’t want to hurt her. He didn’t want to do anything to her. He was completely indifferent. But he couldn’t help being honest to her. He took a deep breath and invited her in.

“So, are you selling it?”

“Just getting it ready to have a management company rent it out.”

“You look good.”

“Thanks.” Honesty prevented him from returning the compliment. She didn’t look bad, but she looked like a lesser version of the Michelle he had known.

“Anyway,” she said.

“Anyway. I’d invite you to sit, but as you can see, there’s no furniture.”

“That’s okay, I can’t stay long. My parents and I are going to Cut for dinner tonight.”

“Of course.”

“Did you hear Bella’s closed?”

“Yeah. A while ago.”

“Yeah. So, I heard you got a job. Copywriting or something?”

“Where are you hearing all of this? Because I haven’t heard one word about you.”

“Well, you know, Scott’s parents talk to my parents, so.”

“Of course. Yeah, I’m a copywriter at an creative agency. Doing a lot of freelancing, too. Business is good. Mark and I are playing around with a few ideas for TV pilots. We’ll see.”

“That’s really great.”

“You still at the firm?”

“Yeah. I don’t know how much longer though. I really keep thinking about moving to L.A.”

“I figured you would have done that by now. You always wanted to.”

“Are you seeing anyone?”

“Do you want the answer to that?”

“I guess not. I wish things had been different with us.”

“Me, too. But I think it worked out in the end.” 

Hope won’t get anyone a goddamn thing. It never has, and it never will.

Lou surprised himself when he realized the words that had just come out of his mouth. Only an hour ago, he was having a complete meltdown over the relationship and the life that had been—and even the life that had come to be. He didn’t say that to hurt her. He said it because he meant it. He had realized that his life was better without her and that it would have only gotten worse if they hadn’t broken up. He couldn’t have managed his grief through alcohol with her. He couldn’t have worked through the weekends writing with her. What he was seeing for the first time was that he was going to be just fine. Because looking back on the last year of hiding out in booze and women and feeling angry and sad and going through all of the shit that brought him to the need to do that, had given him perspective. Lou’s puzzle may have been shy a few pieces, but that’s okay, because that’s what life is. Sometimes it’s terrible. And sometimes it’s wonderful. And sometimes it’s easy. And sometimes it’s hard. And sometimes it’s boring. And sometimes it’s exciting. And since he’d gone through all of those things with such intensity in such a short period of time, Lou understood that he could stand to keep living. He never wanted to kill himself, but there were times during those years when he would have been okay to just not wake up. You have to go through the shit so that you know how to handle it when it comes around for you again, he thought.

“I’m sorry, I take that back. It’s just that I couldn’t have done any of this with you. I was unhappy and that made you unhappy and that made me even more unhappy because all I tried to do was live up to your idea of living a life where everything is perfect and falls into place. But that’s crazy because it’s impossible. And I think I realized that a long time ago, I just ignored it. And it took my best friend dying and a complete emotional breakdown to accept it.”

“Are you sick? Your voice sounds a little hoarse.”

“Part of the emotional breakdown requires getting into a screaming match with yourself.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Forget it. You don’t have to.”

“Lou, this is going to sound like it’s coming out of nowhere, but I have to say it. I spent most of this year missing you and wondering if I made a mistake by letting things end.”

“Michelle…”

“Let me finish. I don’t sit up all night wondering about you anymore. The thoughts of you with another woman don’t make me sick anymore—maybe a little uncomfortable, but not sick to the point where I have to throw up.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I always knew you had potential, and I see now that you can make things happen. And I’m happy for you. Are you happy?”

“At the moment, yes.”

“Good. It’s just strange, Lou, because even though I know there’s a good chance we’ll never be together again, and I am pretty sure that I don’t even want to be with you right now anyhow, but there’s this part of me that still has hope. I don’t know if it’s hope for us to be married and sit on a park bench when we’re old together, or if it’s hope that we’ll be friends again someday. I just know that now, when I think of you, I feel hope.”

“And there’s the biggest difference between us, Michelle. There’s the difference that should have kept us from maybe ever even becoming friends to begin with. Hope doesn’t mean anything. Hope is what people have or do when they can’t have or do anything else. Hope is inaction. It’s sitting back and just waiting for what you want to come. It’s hoping for everything to work out. It’s what we have when we feel we have nothing else. I don’t ever want to hope. I want to have. I want to try. And I’m okay if I fail. Hope won’t get anyone a goddamn thing. It never has, and it never will.”

“Wow.”

“I don’t mean to be mean.”

She sighed and looked down. “You’re not. You’re being honest. And I appreciate that. I should go.”

“Okay.”

She stepped toward him and opened her arms. An old instinct kicked in and he stepped toward her and they hugged. She kissed him with her check against his like she had always done when she didn’t want to mess up her lipstick. He laughed.

“Bye, Michelle.”

“Take care of yourself, Lou. I’m so happy for you.”

She opened the door and walked out. Lou walked into the garage and said, “Hey, Chuck, can you fucking believe that?” Then he stood there for a few more minutes and tried to cry. When the tears wouldn’t come, he walked outside to check the backyard for anything that might need fixing or readying before he put the house up for rent. Everything outside looked perfect.

✶

LOU HAS DREAMS OF CHUCK. In all of them, he’s a ghost, and they both know it.

They began shortly after Chuck died. In one, Lou is standing in the dining room of the Las Vegas house. I’m in the kitchen cutting up Subway sandwiches. Chuck walks in from the garage.

“I just flew here all the way from Cayuga,” he says.

“Are you done with this shit?” Lou says. “Are you done fucking up? Can you just get down to business and keep on the right path and figure it out already? Can you do that, please?”

Chuck starts to cry. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

In another dream, Lou is driving Chuck’s BMW along the winding road that led to Bella’s. Chuck is riding shotgun. They are laughing and chatting away like they had always done.

And then Lou says, “You know, if this is the only way I get to spend time with you now, I’m okay with that.”

Chuck pulls a bottle of beer out from between his feet and takes a long gulp, then looks at Lou, smiles and says “I guess you got it all figured out then, eh?”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

Chuck smiles crookedly. “Fuck it. Just drive.”

THE END

David Himmel
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