Before You Knew My Name

by Jacqueline Bublitz

Maybe the people who appear brave are merely doing the thing they have to do. It’s not a matter of courage, then, to pack up and leave a life. Just a lack of any other option, and the sudden realisation you probably don’t have anything left to lose.

(Are we ever the same person with someone else? And if we’re not, what happens when one of you leaves, where does that version of you go? This is something I have thought about a lot since my mother left me.)

When a star dies, the dust and gases left over can form a nebula. Which is truly one of the most beautiful things you’ll ever see. But nebulae get even more interesting, because they also signify regions where bright, new stars are formed. Stellar nurseries, they call them. Stardust, then, is both the end and the beginning of things. A galactic reminder that birth and death are not so very different.’

When a man punishes us for our resistance, we scramble to make it right.

There is no name to be spoken, but I am recognised by each of the women present, clasped around their lifted hands, heavy on their hearts. I am their fears, and their lucky escapes, their anger, and their wariness. I am their caution and their yesterdays, the shadow version of themselves all those nights they have spent looking over shoulders, or twining keys between fingers.

How easy is it, Ruby will think later, back in her studio, to assume you are the cause of another person’s discomfort or disdain, when the reality is, we all show up with our night befores, our midnight hours and too-early mornings.

For the first time, I understand it’s not only the dead who have lives they don’t get to live out. The people left behind have as many versions of themselves unexplored, as many possible paths that close off.

No one lives just one life. We start and finish our worlds many times over. And no matter how long or short a time we are here, I’m beginning to realise we all want more than we get.

How many times does politeness keep us rooted to the spot? We stand on the brink, making a choice whether to tip over into trust or disgust, and we remember all our training, the lifetime of it. The doctrine of nice, the fear of hurting someone’s feelings.

Safety comes from moving with the current until you are free of it, and then, only then, can you turn and swim like hell for the shore.