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[TRANSCRIPT]

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I realize I said “on my way back” yesterday. That I’d hit New York on ‘my way back’. I—

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I don’t know why I said that. I would chalk it up to force of habit but…this is the first time I’ve left Pennsylvania in the whole time we lived there. 

It’s possible that it just hasn’t hit me yet, that I’m really…done. 

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I keep…

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..it’s not that I’m turning and expecting Harry to be there. The last few months before I left we were barely in the same room for more than fifteen minutes at a time. But, it’s like…

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My hair is starting to get past my shoulders. And the fact that it had already gotten past my chin by the time I got out of there—well, I like to keep it short and Harry would always cut it for me, but because we weren’t really on speaking terms…well.

I’m perfectly capable of cutting my own hair—hell, I could just shave all of it off. I barely look in the mirror anyway. But that was a habit I formed—Harry cuts my hair so I don’t have to think about it. Especially since she somehow always seemed to know when it was starting to bug me and would sit me down at the kitchen table, scissors in hand. I wouldn’t even have to say anything, she would just—

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It’s odd to think about. That I didn’t think twice about letting Harry stand behind me with a sharp implement.

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I guess our relationship was a bit like nuclear destruction in that sense—when everyone has an H-bomb, you can’t press the button without spelling your own destruction. When you’re with the only other person who is fighting to survive in a world that’s gone topsy-turvy, hurting them could resign you to a terrible fate. 

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Then again, I left. And I don’t—I don't feel like I’ve doomed us both to ruin. I guess that’s the difference between those first few chaotic, frightening years and where we are now, after spending half a decade figuring out how to muddle through. 

We’ve done it. We’ve muddled. And maybe I’ve doomed us both to a life lived without any meaningful contact with another person but, well, that actually, you know, assumes the contact between us was meaningful in the first place. 

Proximity does not equal closeness. 

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I hope the opposite is equally true. You and I may not have physical proximity—though for all I know, you’re just around the corner—but I hope we can have some kind of meaningful interaction. 

C’mon Birdie, talk to me. 

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