She had a sadness like an orgasm building in her for weeks.
She had felt her herself come to the brink of losing all control and inhibition at random times: coming back from a coffee break, looking at herself in the mirror before work, looking around on the subway, etc.
For all the almosts, for all the sting in her eyes, she hadn’t cried.
Sadness is the tether, mourning is the medium for expressing interaction attempts and failed intimacy with the whole of humanity.
Until sitting on her couch, at 9pm, the tears came, streaming down uncontrolled. Then they would stop, and the burning in her eyes would start again and with a blink, more tears would appear.
Like an orgasm, the more she thought about what brought them now, what caused their waves and their demand at her subservience to their passions, the more abstract the whole thing became.
She could tell herself, “look at the world, who wouldn’t cry”. But this week wasn’t The Week, it was a just a week. Tears were no more justified now than at any other time. And these tears had demanded, they had persisted, they were a lover that kept going, and going, and going until she found her release.
It was a weak climax. It brought neither catharsis nor relief. They imposed more questions, more exploration, and more obligation onto a poor girl who had enough on her plate for one evening.
After the tears her cheek-skin was taut. Her eyes sharp and tender. Her eyelashes slightly sicky to each other. And she felt worse than before she had cried. Because now the sadness was real, and she had no earthly idea as to the cause.