lies

“What does a lie do?” she asks, leaning over the edge of the train station bench.

“It rips open your soul, and leaves a smooth edge, which can never be stitched back together,” she replies to herself.

I look over.

Is she speaking to me?

The lies that have come thundering through my life of late have left more than one tear, more than one tear that can never be healed. The edges never quite meet. The scar rips open before it is healed. The lies have ripped my eyes open to the complexity of the human soul. What is a truth is now a lie. What is a lie becomes the rocky foundation for a truth. The lies that were truths become demons in the middle of the night, rocking me awake.

Should I ask her why I am the perfect target for lies?

She seems wise, this woman wearing a pale blue cardigan, and a smooth strand of pearls. I look at her closely. Her eyes, grey green, reflect not the beautiful blue of her sweater but a sadness. I look closely. She looks hundreds of years old suddenly, as she looks up and smiles at me. Her head tipped back, the eyes radiate a flash of awareness, a certainty that the human race has so much further to go. She looks downward at her short fingernails, the cuticles worn and torn. They look familiar. Her hands stroke her pearl necklace, slowly worrying each pearl.

I look down at my hands.

My hands are hers. My eyes are hers. I am thousands of years old. And I still don’t understand these lies.