I’m Thinking of Ending Things

by Iain Reid

I’m thinking of ending things.

Once this thought arrives, it stays. It sticks. It lingers. It dominates.

Is an unspoken idea unoriginal?

“Sometimes a thought is closer to truth, to reality, than an action. You can say anything, you can do anything, but you can’t fake a thought.”

like most men, he would probably like to tell me about it. He would like it better than if he thought I already knew the words and had an equally varied vocabulary.

The wave changed everything. It had an effect of malice, as if he were suggesting I could never be completely on my own, that he would be around, that he would be back.

the calls had come from my own number.

There’s only one question to resolve. I’m scared. I feel a little crazy. I’m not lucid. The assumptions are right. I can feel my fear growing. Now is the time for the answer. Just one question. One question to answer.

If you have nothing, there’s nothing to lose. —Yeah. Nothing to lose.

But it’s the reading just for the sake of it that I find irritating.

What I’m questioning involves both of us, affects both of us, yet I can only decide alone. What does that say about relationships?

Mostly, I just think I’d be better off without Jake, that it makes more sense than going on. I’m not certain, though. How can I be certain? I’ve never broken up with a boyfriend before.

“That we don’t know all the answers, that we can’t explain it all, like space. Maybe we’re not supposed to know all the answers. Questions are good. They’re better than answers. If you want to know more about life, how we work, how we progress, it’s questions that are important. That’s what pushes and stretches our intellect. I think questions make us feel less lonely and more connected. It’s not always about knowing. I appreciate not knowing. Not knowing is human. That’s how it should be, like space. It’s unsolvable, and it’s dark,” I say, “but not entirely.”

“There’s only one question we need to resolve.” —There’s only one question we need to resolve? —Yup. That’s what he wrote. —What’s the one question? —I have no idea.

looked down at the metal key chain in my hands, which was just a large letter J.”

‘The meaning of my existence is that life has addressed a question to me. Or, conversely, I myself am a question which is addressed to the world, and I must communicate my answer, for otherwise I am dependent upon the world’s answer.’”

To really know ourselves we have to question ourselves.

‘There are certain things in life, not very many, that are real, confirmed cures for rainy days, for loneliness. Puzzles are like that. We each have to solve our own.’

The fact that she was the best kisser in the world made her the center of the universe, in her words. “He was looking for me to reply, or to say something. I didn’t know what to say. So I told him what came to mind, that kissing involves two people. You can’t be a singular person and be the best kisser. It’s an action that requires two. ‘So really,’ I said, ‘you would only be the best if the other person was also the best, which is impossible.’

But what if there wasn’t someone else?

“A memory is its own thing each time it’s recalled. It’s not absolute. Stories based on actual events often share more with fiction than fact. Both fictions and memories are recalled and retold. They’re both forms of stories. Stories are the way we learn. Stories are how we understand each other. But reality happens only once.”

Part of everything will always be forgettable. No matter how good or remarkable it is. It literally has to be. To be.”

“That’s the whole point. You just assume it to be too far-fetched to be real. You can’t perceive that someone you know, some regular dude sitting beside you in a car, is the smartest person. But why not?”

“The most attractive thing in the world is the combination of confidence and self-consciousness.

There’s so much we don’t know about what really happened in there. —And the only one who could tell us is gone.

want to understand myself and recognize how others see me. I want to be comfortable being myself.

Are small, critical actions enough? Small gestures make us feel good—about ourselves, about others. Small things connect us. They feel like everything. A lot depends on them. It’s not unlike religion and God.

The idea that we are better off with one person for the rest of our lives is not an innate truth of existence. It’s a belief we want to be true.

Is intelligence always good? I wonder. What if intelligence is wasted? What if intelligence leads to more loneliness rather than to fulfillment? What if instead of productivity and clarity, it generates pain, isolation, and regret?

I could say I’ve been thinking about a relationship in the context of only myself and what everything means to me. Or I could ask if this is irrelevant because a relationship can’t be understood sliced in two. Or I could be completely honest and say, “I’m thinking of ending things.” But I don’t. I don’t say any of that.

Everything is impossibly fragile.”

“Just how it feels. You and me,” he says. “The singular velocity of flow.”

Just flat, listless. So much has felt accidental, unnecessary, arbitrary. It’s been lacking a dimension. Something seems to be missing.

How much of you can fall off before something important is lost?

“Depression is a serious illness. It’s physically painful, debilitating. And you can’t just decide to get over it in the same way you can’t just decide to get over cancer. Sadness is a normal human condition, no different from happiness. You wouldn’t think of happiness as an illness. Sadness and happiness need each other. To exist, each relies on the other, is what I mean.”

“It seems to me that in the context of life and existing and people and relationships and work, being sad is one correct answer. It’s truthful. Both are right answers.

“Aren’t you aware of me when we’re sleeping?” “I mean, I don’t know. I’m asleep.” “I’m aware of you,” I say.

To rely on someone else, have him rely on you. That’s not a biological connection like the one between parents and children.

Most people want to get married. Is there anything else that people do in such huge numbers, with such a terrible success rate?

He doesn’t just mean he looks different but that every cell captured in the image has died, been shed and replaced by new cells. In the present, he is literally a different person.

Our physical structures, like a relationship, change and repeat, tire and wilt, age and deplete. We get sick and better, or sick and worse. We don’t know when, or how, or why. We just carry on.

“And you also know things are real when they can be lost.”

No, he wasn’t married. No wife. No kids. No one. It’s rare these days to see someone living like that, entirely alone.

It seems to me, maybe for the first time, that there are varying degrees of dead. Like there are varying degrees of everything: of being alive, of being in love, of being committed, of being sure.

Both pigs were literally being eaten alive. From the inside out. And you’d never really know if you just looked at them from afar. From a distance, they seemed content, relaxed. Up close, it was a different story. I told you: life isn’t always pleasant.”

What if suffering doesn’t end with death? How can we know? What if it doesn’t get better? What if death isn’t an escape? What if the maggots continue to feed and feed and feed and continue to be felt? This possibility scares me.

It doesn’t look like Jake. Not at all. It looks like a little girl. More precise: it looks like me.

It’s striking. Seeing someone with their parents is a tangible reminder that we’re all composites.

“She knows him. Inside and out.”

If it can’t fly anymore, there’s no way it’s getting out. It can’t climb out. It’s stuck in there. Does it understand? Of course not. I use my thumb and crush it against the side of the bowl. I’m not sure why. Not something I normally do. I guess I’m helping it.