Shame Of Maastricht by Marie N. Hallen (any book recommendations TXT) 📕

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Thoughts Of A Person That Doesn’t Exist      

A Cage Within A Cage      

You Were Warned     

Don’t Say A Word      

Share Your Disgrace      

Until The Air Runs Out      

You Will Shine      

Thoughts Of A Person That Doesn’t Exist

No mercy. No compassion. No catharsis. No remorse. No regrets. No way back. Nothing left. What’s actually left, was disgust. Total repulsion - first of all with herself. But no, it was actually a lie. Because if one could peer into this obscure meta-dimension of mind, that dark space she was sewn up in, he could also see the the broken soul, devastated and bleeding.

Why? What for? What have I done? Such a stupid, rhetorical question, though still so common around many people. This never-ending why, a question that outweighed all the other ones. She couldn’t help asking herself, knowing in advance she would never be able to find out the real reason why people betray those who loved them most. Even Jesus, although perfect, was betrayed by his best and smartest disciple. What about mortal people then? It often happens that excessive trust doesn’t lead you to a good end. Sooner or later you will be betrayed, even complete absence of flaws won’t help. She read somewhere that Jesus actually died from heart attack, not because of physical pain his torturers tried to inflict in him. Because he simply couldn’t handle the grievous pain of betrayal.

When Kate was a kid, her father left mom, just disappeared without saying a word. Her aunt never supported mom either. And now she is laying on the floor in despair and keeps questioning herself why she wasn’t enough for the one she loved more than her life. Not a single person has yet turned her soul inside out like he did. She moved to that place because of him, tried to adjust her job the the new reality, always supported him in all possible ways, doing everything a caring girl can do and doing it better than… Than the new one? Eventually this didn’t work. Luuk just turned away, stopped replying to calls and messages and a few weeks later she accidentally found out he had been dating another woman for a long time now. She disappeared too and stopped showing up online without any further comments. Does he know that she knows? Just another stupid question. He couldn’t care less.

Kate was trying to figure out the point at which things went wrong. Scrolling her memories for the past two years back and forth trying to find the answer which was still vague but obvious at the same time. Human cowardice. Of course this is cowardice, what else could this be? However not matter how bad his breakup method was, the end speaks for itself: they were not together and never been. This was an illusion of a relationship she built in her mind and he just supported it being afraid of ruining it and facing undesired consequences like another offended woman. Maybe sometimes it’s better to ask yourself why you believe in wrong things and wrong people. Kate’s friends couldn’t understand why she invested so much time and effort in a wrong person. But how do you determine a right one then? She just cares who to share her life with.

Lazara said the underlying reason was that she just couldn’t keep herself busy with something that would deliver her from all the sorrowful reflections. To keep herself busy? Did she mean with work or hobbies? Kate worked as a financial attaché at the embassy in The Hague. She was proud of her job. She either worked all her free time or spent hours reading, painting, jogging, working out, meditating or making music. She played in several bands. She loved to read and never skipped any new book she came across and then wrote complete reviews for each book in her blog. She even made extra money on selling her paintings, practiced yoga, held webinars on financial issues as one of her side projects and hardly had one free hour a week. Apart from this she always managed to find time for friends and family, sometimes attended major music and art events in Amsterdam and Rotterdam.

What kind of business was Lazara talking about? Kate just didn’t want to argue and therefore refrained from commenting on her friend’s point of view - after all it wouldn’t change anything. She didn’t like that sublimation idea according to which you should distract yourself somehow from something. No, it would be completely stupid to turn a blind eye on certain things. All these activities never could help her fight that feeling of total emptiness and non-existence, painful and harrowing. This emptiness seeped into her work, art, evening walks, constantly making itself felt, flashing with new outbursts of pain and despair and alienation, tearing apart her mind and her soul, sprouting black flowers in her heart, tearing it with their steel roots, crumbling off with gray ash from her cigarette, tapping with the white wheels of tablets, reflecting in every surface with bloody reflections of incinerating memories, poisoning her food, making every breath painful and every beat of her heart insufferable.

“I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe! I can’t!” she screamed into the darkness of her room, smashed the mirror and crouched on the floor in a convulsion-like state. Unbearable pain. Unendurable. Devastating. Demolishing. She really couldn’t breathe without him and even if she could, it no longer made sense. She hadn’t eaten for seven days already and only had water, because there was no more appetite. Surprisingly, but it didn’t affect her physical state and she never experienced neither hunger, nor anything else as if all her physical needs were frozen.

“Please stop this pain!” Kate screamed in despair and squeezed a shard of broken glass in her hand. There were no more tears in her drained eyes and she had already cried them all out. Then she blacked out on the floor and remained in the same position until the blinding morning light woke her up. Exciting weekend. She didn’t want to wake up. She would like to end up on a deserted island and stop thinking about everything that gnaws at her from the inside every minute.

But today is the day… She must go there. No more stupid calls and messages. Even if he's not alone. She must tell him… What did she want to say? Kate didn’t know yet. Trying to explain your feelings is like trying to take a picture of the moon with the phone camera. But she would like to look in the face of a person who… Did nothing, actually. Kate did realize this open gestalt should be closed and she has to look him in the face, where the words were unnecessary. Words are decay.

And she did it. Took a taxi, not feeling any greed for paying another thirty euros just to see the ruin of her illusion, the remains of something she believed was a home and shelter for her heart, no, it was a sanctuary, now defiled and burned to the ground. The driver wasn’t really talkative and neither was she.

She looked out of the window, staring at the endless dark fields at the edge of the road. The world around was blue and green with gray and yellow patches, but inside everything was blackened. It started raining and the view got blurry as the raindrops were polishing the glass, deforming the outer world, so there was no point in looking out. Or maybe there was…

First it was just a sound. The road was surprisingly empty, the noise of the wheels echoed with thousands sounds but her eye caught one big car. Normally this wouldn’t draw her attention, especially in her current state of mind, but there was something about this car that did catch her eye. Perhaps they were moving too close. The driver turned right and Kate saw the city ahead. Arriving soon.

Finally the strange car left behind and they proceeded to the gate where Kate paid and said goodbye to the driver. She was standing just in front of their house and there was no one else around. Luuk’s car and motorcycle were parked nearby so there was no doubt that everybody was home. Kate didn’t care about the probability of his new girlfriend coming out and driving her away. In this case she would say she had delivered something for Luuk. What was so special she could deliver? This is something she needs to think about. One step closer. Two steps closer. A few steps left... Yet she wasn’t brave enough to make this final step and knock on the door so she decided to sit down and take a break. “Why hurry then? You have all time in the world”, she thought. “Because you have already wasted all the time you had...”

It wasn’t raining any more but the sky was still clouded and it was probably going to rain somewhere at the other side of the river, so she was sitting at the porch and smoking the last cigarette. A wave of heat rushed in her face as well as the wave of rage. Why the hell should she remain silent and nice when her fate was being torn apart and her life was ruined - apparently by someone who didn’t care about Luuk’s future life as much as she did. She recalled what her mother preached about relationships - don’t get carried away, don’t get carried away. Let THEM chase you and not the other way.

“I’m not really chasing anyone,” she thought. Maybe coming home to her now ex boyfriend would seem to be a reckless idea. But at least it will be fun to see his girlfriend’s face as she sees Kate. “I will just tell him how mean it was of him. How many more women do you fool?” she was rehearsing the phrases she was going to throw in his face before he closes the door or says something which makes the further dialogue futile. Don’t ever ignore the worst-case scenarios.

She pressed her ear against the metal door, trying to hear at least one sign of his presence. Their presence. She could hear distant voices and steps somewhere in the deep of this former-office building now rented out as private property where Luuk rented a room. Just one large room with a shared kitchen and a bathroom. When they lived together, no one else lived there, so it was basically them two who had the whole building at their disposal while living just in one room. Kind of an abandoned dorm for adults. Just one room… Why did she choose such a poor guy? He was nothing special, already thirty and still living in a doghouse… or in a bear den... but she didn’t care about these material aspects. Always independent and able