bedside tables

In the beginning it was perfection; ecstasy even. Idealism. Naïve notions of forever. Promises measured in years.
In the end, they were torn apart violently. She was to blame, undeniably, but in truth the ecstasy and idealism had begun to fade long ago. There was no need to demonize her by ignoring the subtle, yet telling harbingers of a cursed coexistence. In the end, it was their bedside tables that gave them away, foretelling their tragic downfall.

Hers,marked by an outspoken clutter of prescription bottles, half-empty diet coke cans, an occasional rolled twenty, and the small stack of half-read Kafka and Camus characterized by their broken spines and always falling apart. She never finished one before starting another, always in a restless state of anticipation
(or is it a symptom of my lack of what he called follow-through?)
Sometimes a TV remote surfaced among the disarray, when she could find it.
(it never has both batteries anyways, and the back cover is always missing)

His, marked by the ordered landscape of neatly separate items. A framed photograph; it used to be of her but now it could be of anything
(though I couldn’t guess with any certainty what)
A single book, most likely Lightman, shows no signs of use
(though I know it has been read thoroughly, cover to cover, countless times)
The spine has never been broken so the pages, annoyingly, never lay flat. A bottle of water, cap screwed on tightly.
(usually Fiji but never Evian; I remember he despises the French)
That was it other than various remotes to the TV, DVD, and the other electronics he was so fond of, all positioned neatly in a row.
(they always worked; they were never missing batteries)

Inside the drawer, beneath the organized surface, a wholly different world exists: one marked by disarray and chaos. Old letters from years ago, pages torn and out of order. The bottle of Ritalin, crucial to preserving the appearance of the visible exterior above
(my birth control pills, left over from when I lived there)
A small pouch, holding a small glass pipe and anywhere from an eighth to a quarter ounce of pot. Cigarettes; Marlboro Lights.
(the same as me)
He chain-smoked on the back porch at night, often in her company.
(though these days he has probably quit the habit, or just made it more covert)

The quintessential nature of each is revealed by the underlying juxtaposition:
Him; feigned yet compulsive precision guarding against any blatant exhibition of self. The tension only underscored the closeted anarchy behind the rigidity that dominated his life: this was the nature of the contradiction that damned them (me) from the very start. If only they had opened their eyes and clearly seen the omens, but Love truly is blind
(I finally grasp the acute meaning of the abstract adage)
They should have considered those words as far more than a simple, saccharine cliché; they are a warning they did not heed, an inevitability
(now I know)
They are the origins of the malignant promise of disillusionment.
(so different from our once benevolent one of  Utopia)
Now each, alone and wary, grieves the loss of their romantic illusions, lamenting the swift, unsettling surrender to solitude and cynicism