▸ Column · Present-day New York City — the letter found its way down a storm drain to the lair beneath the streets.
MICHELANGELO replies.
Replied to by Michelangelo, with a rebuttal from Han Solo.
The letter
Mikey — somebody slipped this letter down a storm drain and I figure that counts as addressed to you. I've been with Marco four years. We share a place, my mom's twenty minutes away and she's early into Parkinson's, and I'm a year and a half into nursing school I can't transfer without torching my credits and redoing clinicals. Last Tuesday, over dinner, Marco told me he took a transfer to Austin — after he'd already signed the offer and given two weeks' notice. When I said I couldn't pull my whole life up by the roots in fourteen days, he looked honestly baffled and said he figured I'd "work it out" since the money's good and Austin's "supposed to be great." He's sorry for the short notice but keeps calling it a puzzle "we" solve together, not a thing he should've asked me about before signing. I love him and I don't think he meant to steamroll me. I just can't tell if I'm feeling fair anger or watching a trailer for every big decision we'll ever make.
Michelangelo replies
Okay okay listen. Before anything else — that last line, where you go "I love him and I don't think he meant to steamroll me"? That's you apologizing for your own anger before you've even let yourself feel it. Dude. You're standing in the doorway of furious, asking permission to come in. Permission granted. Come all the way in.
Because this isn't about Austin. The feeling under the whole letter is "do I get a vote in my own life?" And I know that one. My big brother Leo leads our family, makes the calls, and every so often he decides something for all of us and just announces it — figures we'll work it out, 'cause he already did the thinking. I love the guy. It still makes me feel like the little kid nobody asked. That's the exact thing Marco handed you with the breadsticks.
Your mom, your clinicals — those aren't puzzle pieces. He turned your life into a spreadsheet 'cause spreadsheets don't make him feel guilty.
So don't solve it yet. Feel the whole big loud thing first. Then say the true sentence — not "I can't move in two weeks," but "you signed before you asked me, and that's the part that hurts." Watch if he can sit in that. That'll tell you more than Texas ever will. I got you.
— Michelangelo
Han Solo weighs in
Kid, you wrote a whole paragraph defending the guy — "didn't mean to," "I love him" — and then asked if this is a preview of the rest of your life. Sweetheart, you already screened the preview. He signed, gave notice, then told you over dinner. That's not a mix-up. That's a man showing you exactly where you rank when asking first would've cost him something. The apology's free. Don't grade the sorry, grade the order he did things in. I bicker daily with somebody who'd never sign my life out from under me and call it a "puzzle" — that's the bar. I'm not telling you to pack a bag. I'm telling you you've got your answer and you're hoping I'll say different.
— Han Solo
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