When You Say Nothing at All

His name was Paul. I guess it still is, somewhere out there in the cosmos. He was 6’2” with a slim, muscular build from riding his bicycle everywhere and hiking the backcountry when he wasn’t hitchhiking to someplace new. He had straight, dark blonde hair that hung loosely past his ears when it wasn’t tied back in a pony tail. An electrician by trade, a wanderer by heart. Thirty-two years old on the outside, but an old soul on the inside. He was a musician, a writer, a philosopher, a mathematician. He played the mandolin and guitar and made regular use of recreational drugs. Soft-spoken with a wide smile and dark eyes, he stole my heart.

We met at work. He came in as a prep cook, the roommate of my head chef from Anchorage. Biding his time until he could get his electrician business going in Homer, he spent his days chopping vegetables and making dressings and sauces. As tall as he was, he hardly ever showed anyone his eyes, keeping them downcast most of the time, hiding something, anything, everything.

Paul was playing for me in this picture.

We found each other at the same party at a mutual friend’s house, Lotus, one evening and spent the next several weeks inseparable. Stolen glances at work. Long walks on the beach in the Alaskan midnight sun. Dinner out and dinner in. Sharing favorite movies together and then talking until dawn. He sang to me, playing the mandolin or guitar. Shy, quiet Paul sang to me.

He was battling demons, as we all do. He felt like an outcast in this world, not necessarily fitting in anywhere. Then, one evening, he told me that he just wasn’t being fair to me because his heart belonged to someone else and he would never be able to give himself completely to me. The problem was that she had moved to Kodiak to live with her lesbian girlfriend. He was carrying a torch, unrequited love. But, the depth of his character and the strength of his loyalty would not let her go. So that was it.

It was a sad parting, but not in anger. At least not directed at him. I was angry at her. I hated her. I think it was just too hard for him to see me after that. So, he found another job. However, he and my head chef were sharing the cabin on the restaurant property meant for employees only and I had to ask him to move out.

Meanwhile, I met someone else at a bonfire at Lotus’ house a few days later. Paul was there, stoking the fire all night, alone, while me and this new man talked and laughed. Paul had a sadness he carried in his shoulders that night. But, what could I do?

A few days later, Paul had still not moved out of the cabin and I had to tell him, pressured by the owner/landlord who was now on site, to be out by the weekend. He moved out and into a tent in Lotus and Tristan’s backyard until he could get a cabin rented.

A couple of days after that, it was July 1^st and I was petsitting for Lotus and Tristan while they were visiting family. Paul had wanted to go along with them, but Lotus had insisted that it was family time. It was raining. My daughter, Sarah, had forgotten her key to the bakery and came to the house to pick one up from me. When I met her in the driveway, sheltering myself under a tree, she said that she had just seen Paul sitting on his backpack on the side of the road, in the rain. Weird, we both thought, as we shrugged our shoulders and went on. I briefly wondered why he wasn’t staying in the tent out back that night.

The next morning, at about 11am, I was at work when my landlord told me I needed to go see what was going on outside because there was a police officer talking to my head chef in the parking lot. As I walked up to them, I could see the broken look on Chef Jeff’s face. As the officer calmly explained to me, Paul’s body had been found earlier that morning near the trailhead at Paul Banks Elementary School. He had shot himself in the head. The officer had Paul’s belongings in the squad car. I lost my breath. My lungs caved into my spine. My heart fell onto the gravel parking lot. The tears wouldn’t stop… for days; they still come, on occasion. Jeff had been his best friend and I had been his girlfriend, up until just over a week before.

I have been in dark places in my life, more than once, and contemplated ending it all. But, I never knew, never truly understood the impact a split second action like that has on everyone around.

Jeff thought, “I should have known something was wrong. Paul was my best friend.”

Lotus thought, “I should have let him come along to dinner that night.”

Tristan thought, “I was working with him every day. How did I not know?”

Sarah thought, “If only I had stopped to see if he was okay that night.”

I thought… and thought.

In the end, no one was to blame except Paul. Gentle, sensitive, old soul Paul. Yes, sometimes this world does give someone more than they can handle.