Drawing Down a Burning Sky

Jonathan

This is the message you interrupted. Unedited between then and now. It's softly spoken, for what that's worth. 

If these words cause you any pain, then I've sent them to the wrong person.

-

This is sincere, but it's based entirely on my limited perspective and the incredibly narrow scope of transparency you've offered me. I could be wrong. I wish to be wrong. And if I'm wrong, I hope you'll tell me and accept my apology and have the grace to understand why I wrote these words and why they would seem so true to me within the only context I have access to. But I also understand that my mind is damaged, and that limits my ability to parse out perfectly sound Socratic or dialectical understandings of reality. So if I'm wrong, I hope you'll help me understand exactly how wrong I am. But I don't think I am. And I think even though these words would have hurt you once upon a time, I'm almost certain you'll find them relieving today. So, congratulations. You win. This letter is my surrender.

I'm happy to continue going to counseling as long as you're willing, but I understand your enthusiasm is for getting a resolution and not for participating in healing.

So I want you to know that every memory you have from the past two years of me telling you the various ways that I would preserve our love for the rest of my life - those memories don't belong to you. I wasn't talking about you. I don't know you, I don't recognize you. Those memories belong to the woman whose stolen face you wear. A woman I loved, who loved me. A woman I called my wife and dreamed of marrying properly as soon as I could carry us across the threshold of our hard times. A woman who was very deeply my best friend. My sun and sky. She would have hated you. 

I'm sure that makes you happy, because you've always been clear about how pathetic you found those words, how much you didn't want them to begin with. So you get what you want, yet again.

I can't stand how cruel you are, how uncaring, how unsympathetic, how unaccountable, how unbelievably selfish. Part of me hopes that you're just the result of covid-inflicted brain damage. Either way, there's nothing left of the Marysue I knew. There's nothing left to fight for. I can't pretend my faith isn't just delusion anymore 

You killed us both. A woman with a beautiful soul full of love and gentleness, and a loyal man with unmatched determination and endurance. And you did it for such shallow, fleeting pleasures. You unapologetically destroyed rare and precious things because you didn't want to put any effort into keeping them, because you wanted more, because you're insatiable. Because you're empty. 

If I ever have the daughter I dreamed of raising with my Marysue, I'm going to name her Camille. And I'll teach her how to nurture all the gentle things I learned from my time spent with that woman, and how to steel herself against all the brutal things I learned from my time spent with you.

So, yeah. Schedule time to call me, and let's work out the details of finalizing a permanent end to this nightmare mockery of what's left of us.

Marysue

I’m still willing to do the counseling and don’t see why we can’t participate in both finding a resolution and also healing. 

Jonathan

I appreciate your response. I understand that's the most you can give, and it is significant and meaningful that you are willing to give it. Thank you. 

I will put my best intentions and good faith forward to work with you toward that path.

I've been writing and deleting and repeating for over an hour now so I'm erasing all of it and just sending you this.

We still need to talk. I don't actually want to. But I'll invest in it. Find an hour to commit to a call. Or commit to several shorter calls spaced out. But the current dynamic isn't safe for me, so I need you to show up to the gym to put in work with me to change it together - in between meeting with our personal trainer - or else I need you to show up at the table to settle our final affairs to end it permanently.

🤏M

Jonathan

Is that... are you telling me to wait a moment? Or... calling me small? Or are you holding your hand up to your eye and squishing me with your fingers what does that even mean WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS 

Marysue

Bruh It’s like the wait a moment sign, I couldn’t find anything else to convey that. 

I’m on adderall and I need to completely lock in on work cause I’m bombing this new role and reading that messaging this morning threw me for a loop so I can’t focus on anything else rn or think about what I’m going to respond cause it will stress me out. I’m not trying to be like woe is me I’m just being honest. Maybe it’s not really needed so I should just delete that but yeah it means give me a couple hours 

Jonathan

Okay! Thank you for letting me know, I really appreciate that.

All good go go go lock in. Talk later

🫀M

Marysue

Hi! I’m sorry, I just realized it’s super late over there. I can probably take a call at some point while I’m here. Short ones ideally. 

Jonathan

Figure out a time. 

Jonathan

I'm leaving the park now, heading to New Braunfels. So I'll be up to read a reply if you're going to send one. 

I'm tired of this. And you aren't sorry.

Jonathan

I'm gonna hire a hexwitch to hit you with Greater Curse of UTI

Marysue

Your tone changes are giving me whiplash 

Marysue

I’m with my family so I can’t talk on the phone rn 

Jonathan

Your tonal changes put me in a hospital and dragged me through the worst two years of my life. You'll live.

Make time tomorrow.

😠M

Jonathan

Hmmm

Marysue

Is this a picture of Lala? 

Jonathan

Yeah, it's supposed to be catastrophic for the big island. Are you on Maui or Oahu?

Marysue

Oahu. That’s super unfortunate :( 

Jonathan

Yeah. You'll probably just get tropical storm effects on your island unless it shifts by like forty miles from current projections. 

Have you seen the news about El Niño?

Also I know you usually turned off your ears when I talked about climate science but one thing I used to bring up a lot as a coal-mine canary was warming temperatures causing the collapse of critical cyclical oceanographic phenomena. One of those finally happened last year, a seasonal upwelling in the Gulf of Panama failed for the first time in recorded history. 

2024 was the first year to pass 1.5°C above pre-industrial conditions, so we're no longer going to be able to meet the Paris Agreements target mitigation. Something like 75% of climate models put us at crossing 2°C by 2040-2050 if every government in the world acts together to enact strict mitigation, which, obviously won't happen.

I got tired of going back and forth between my bookmarks to check the numbers so I asked Chagi to sort through them and make a little table of the main points lol I'll paste that below.

But yeah man it's actually enlightening. It makes me so happy for you, helps me see your vision. The world is on fire and life is short. There was no shot that we could have had an incredible, fun, exciting, satisfying life together in the comfort and power of a mutually safe and trusting relationship. Not even as friends. You made the right call, and damn if you didn't play it perfectly too. I remember what he was like with other men's women. And I remember what you were like when you were excited about me. When the choice is between the sweat and the thrill of effortless pleasure or investing in a broke played-out loser? No shot, 100% audience vote. Smoke em while you got em. 

I mean it. Unironically. I mean, I never did that to you, I never would have done that to you, for anything, or anyone. But life is short and nothing actually matters. Hopefully I can learn to be more like you, maybe I'll be able to scrape up something of what's left of me to enjoy a little bit of life for myself before the end. Probably not, being what I am. But at least - because I got to witness how much incredibly better your life became once you disposed of me, and not just because you got a job and your own place, but specifically because you killed me like a cancer that was holding you back - I'll get to live out my years knowing that everyone is better off without the infliction of me darkening their lives. I'm glad that I've become this pathetic wretch. The man I had become right at the end before all of this came crashing down on me - he was a delusion. Thank you for showing me the truth of what I'm worth. Thank you for helping me understand why I'm exactly the wrong person to be or to be with in this world. 

I know none of this touches you. That's, honestly, why I wrote it. If you had ever actually engaged me with the same vulnerability, it would have changed the way I thought, the way I felt. It would have made words like these untrue, and unwriteable. But this is just another speech into an empty room. Ramblings of an inconsequential stranger. Words you probably stopped reading as soon as you saw they weren't any fun. Normally I delete these after writing them. I'm at a point where I no longer care, because you just delete them for me. This is what the past two years have made of me. How fucking disgusting. 

Don't reply.

Jonathan

Marysue.

I know I've been ugly and getting worse recently. Yes, it is as expected and outlined previously, and yes, I believe it's still my fault for choosing to stretch myself thin enough to risk falling apart like this.

I want to push the clock back by two weeks. Not by pretending to erase anything either of us has said or done, but by compartmentalizing my despair and returning it to a place offstage for me to keep alone for a while.

I want to do that for the sake of what's coming next.

I need your help to do it. Yes, I understand the irony. Better than you could imagine.

My inability to handle your dismissive or unresponsive emails hasn't changed. If you're going to talk to me, I need it to be by voice. But I want my voice to come from where it would have come from a few weeks ago, not from where it would come from today. That's going to be difficult for me and it might not make sense to you. But if you can see how it would help both of us, then please consider doing this thing I'm asking.

I need a lot of things that I can't and won't get. I have a bottomless heart full of things to say and questions to ask to a version of you that doesn't exist. You haven't been able or willing to help me the way I've needed help from you for a very long time. But you say that you're doing everything you can. And I'm choosing to believe you again despite what my experience has been telling me. I know this is me stretching myself thin one last time. So I'm asking you to help me in a way that you will actually be willing and able to help me. I'm asking you to meet me in the middle. I'm hoping that you will humor me.

My ask is that you call me now and then. Or schedule time to talk. It can be strictly timed so there's no risk of you calling when you only have a few minutes to spare and me dragging you for more. It can be on whatever terms you want.

But I need your help to override the state of my mind, of my brain. So instead of calling me to hear whatever I have to say, which will do neither of us any good, please call me to tell me about you. Pour something out. Anything. Let me know what's going on in your head. Or, if you're determined to stay in your shell, ask me questions. Things that matter to you. 

If there's really nothing you have to say, nothing you want to say, nothing you want to know, then help me understand why we're doing this, what outcomes you think are actually possible. And if it's not something you're willing to do, then just call me to tell me about that. Please.

I hope all of that makes sense. It's been more and more difficult to think through the fractures in me.

And to address that specifically, yes, I am spiraling. No, I am not a self harm (or anyone harm) risk. My engines are failing and my wings are shot but I'm aware of my surroundings and I'm choosing where to crash. If I get worse, if the situation gets worse, there's no version of these events that ends with me taking my life. The worst version of the ending of these events is the crash site I pointed to recently - scheduling a final call to agree on permanent terms. If you don't believe me, I have plenty of information available for you to consider to change your mind. But you've told me before, plenty of times, that you can't and won't accept any change of mind that comes from considering anything I've said. That's a pretty brutal Catch-22, so instead of urging you to consider the logic and evidence, I'll just accept your choice as another mine in this field you've left for me.

I can take a reply to this message if you want to send one within the next six hours. That's about as long as I can hold my breath anymore. Please don't reply after that window.

Thank you for your time

- what's left of Jonathan

Marysue

Like you want me to call to just talk about anything or you want to talk about us? 

Jonathan

Neither. I don't want to talk. I want to listen to you. I want to hear from you. Those are two separate wants for two separate reasons. Ideally, I want you to ask questions. 

I want you to speak your words even if they're painful for you or me or both of us. Especially if they're painful for you or for both of us, because I've actually heard my fill of your words that are only painful for me. But I'll still accept more of those if that's all you can muster.

This is about the cost I told you about last night. And it's about what I meant when I told you how harmful it's been for me to hear you tell me things that don't line up with your actions. It's about how much it takes from me to continue to invest vulnerability in trust into someone who has, to put it bluntly, consistently taken those investments and spent them exclusively for self-gain.

These actions I want from you are what show me that you mean the things you've been saying. It's how I can see where your intentions connect with your actions, your decisions, your claims.

Marysue

Okay. I think I can do that but so I understand, this is to what aim? And what exactly do you mean by now and then? I just want to make sure I am aware of expectations since that has been a place of misunderstanding in the past 

Jonathan

Can you clarify what you mean about expectations being a thing of misunderstanding in the past? 

Now and then is vague intentionally to give freedom for you to decide how much you're capable of. Because this is driven by what you can gather to care to say or ask, it's not something I can demand. The outcome will depend on the input. If you decide that now and then means twice a year, then that tells me something. If you decide it means a quick impromptu call one day, a scheduled call another day, a scattering of several throughout the week, that also tells me something. 

Our next counseling session will likely change this situation and nullify this request. So in the short term, I would appreciate, if you're going to do it, to have one longer call or a couple short calls before Tuesday. I know your time is spent at a premium, but despite how it may seem, so is mine, so I'm not asking for a lot of it. And I'm not asking you to prioritize this as highly as I have. But I'm asking you to prioritize this at least above scrolling or piddling. 

👍M

Marysue

I just wanted to know more about what now and then meant for you but you answered it. 

That works for me! 

🙏J

Marysue

Heads up, in case you try to reach me and can’t. A bunch of T-Mobile lines and power lines are down so we have been without electricity or signal since last night. We drove into the city and I got a little signal but I’ll likely have none for a while. We are okay though! 

Jonathan

I won't. 

Thanks.

I'm glad you're okay.

Marysue

Hellooo, I’m assuming you are recovering. Let me know when you are free for a quick call. No pressure. 

Jonathan

Hi, yes. Am available.

Jonathan

Nobody is infallible just because they're a professional. You don't have to follow anyone's advice. You've certainly tried everyone's but mine for several years now. This doesn't have to be the end of the world I promised to follow you to.

But if you don't care enough, if you aren't brave enough to handle the pain—which will certainly be worse now than it would have been at any point in the past two years—then I don't have the power to heal us on my own. And I don't have the strength to endure the wounds which you hold open because it hurts you to look at them. 

So, unless you have words of power to speak, to hold off our infinite universes of possibility from collapsing into this one permanent singularity, then I guess this is it.

Drop the card.

Jonathan

Please, say something. Tell me that there is something I can do to help you feel comfortable enough to just fucking talk to me. Tell me anything you need from me to make me worth investing any intention into. Ask me anything you're afraid of knowing the answer to. Say something so that your final answer to all of this isn't just silence. 

Say something from your heart without the dozens of layers of protective ablation you've kept yourself and your decisions so thoroughly wrapped in, collected from everyone else who has had a say in our relationship without ever having been involved in the investment or the experience or the consequences of it.

Marysue, please.

Marysue

I’m not just going to give you silence. That was super rough and I’m processing it. I’m disappointed that she came to that conclusion and I’m wondering if it would be worth to try to find a different therapist for us. I wondering if they have some sort of chain of therapists and the other therapist would just talk to this therapist and tell us the same thing. I also don’t think the flower bit you wrote in your intake form helped 🙄

I don’t have any questions for you that you haven’t already volunteered the information for or that I haven’t already asked. I know you’re not doing well. I know that shit sucks. I know that you wish I would ask you to go into detail but I don’t want you to. You already have for the most part. 

This all sounds kinda mean and blunt but I don’t mean it that way I’m not mad. I do care. But I also realize I should stop trying to coddle your feelings or be afraid that you’re going to take things in a negative way like I just did right now. You don’t feel like what I’m doing is coddling anyways and we end up going in circles. 

I do feel like the therapist had some valid points. It’s a shame she doesn’t want to talk to us anymore cause I think we both could have gotten a lot of value from her. 

My head is pounding from all the crying so I’m going to shower and try to have an early night. 

Good night 

Jonathan

Your account is overdue. Late penalties are in effect, original payment plan offer of "several shorter unscheduled calls" is no longer valid. Please schedule one longer call with interest at your earliest availability to avoid additional delinquency fees.

thank u

- next

Jonathan

Final Notice 

This overdue account is scheduled to be closed on Monday, August 31, 2026. Any balances and associated fees outstanding as of date of closure will be charged off and sent to collections.

Jonathan

Actually, jokes aside, I've already very extremely over-extended myself for your sake, so I'm accelerating this.

Please respond with a time or two this week, a minimum of one focused hour in which you aren't distracted or driving or getting ready to go out, that will work for you, by 8pm tomorrow, Thursday, August 27.

Marysue

Hello! I don’t think I’ll have time for a longer, focused call this week BUT I might be able to Sunday, i will send an update confirming yes or no by Saturday. 

Next week though, I am free Monday from 4:30-6pm, Tuesday any time after 4:30pm, Wednesday any time after 7pm, Thursday free any time, Friday free any time. Saturday and Sunday I will be in the valley so would rather not take a call during that time. 

Happy to chat whenever works best for you! 

Jonathan

Oh, hi! Um... Thanks for responding. My availability on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday of next week lines up with yours. My Friday availability is uncertain. I am mostly unavailable that Saturday and Sunday. But if this Sunday ends up working for you, and you let me know on Saturday, then I can work with that and I'd rather do this sooner than later.

Thank you for your response. 

On a completely unrelated note, I need to ask you something that has nothing to do with us but you are literally the only person on this entire planet who I know has the information I need. It's nothing to do with anything I've ever asked you or talked to you about before. It should take less than five minutes, if you're willing to help out please give me a very quick call anytime after 3pm today strictly to tackle that and nothing else. It's very time sensitive so if I can't get your help I have to trust luck, and we both know how well that's gone for me the rest of my life so pls consider.

Marysue

I think I can tomorrow! 

Jonathan

Okay, thanks for letting me know. I've been unwell, so try to give me as much notice as possible for me to try to collect myself please.

Chat soon

Marysue

Ye ye will do. Likely late! 

Marysue

Hi again, I’m sorry I can’t nail down a time for tonight, I think I overextended myself I have to do something for work still. How about Tuesday? Also down to do a quick call Monday in prep for Tuesday. Thoughts? 

Ps: why are you unwell? Healing pains? 

Marysue

I know I told you today so if you reorganized your schedule for this I can make it work but I was thinking maybe a pre call would help 

Jonathan

Thank you for the update

 

Jonathan

Which of these looks better to you?

Marysue

Okay so at first glance the one on top instantly looked the best to me and then I put my phone down to reply to an email and now I’m not sure 

Jonathan

Fuck that's exactly what happened to me

Marysue

Ugh it’s actually difficult. the bottom one looks better the more I look at it but I feel like the top makes more sense since their faces would be a little more symmetrically positioned 

Jonathan

And that's the same conclusion I sent to the artist 😩

Marysue

Well what does the artist think? 

Jonathan

He sent the first one, I told him I loved it, and then he said "maybe this direction is better..." and sent the second one and I said I think I like the first one better but the more I look at it the less sure I am. Then I said I like them both and he just said awesome lol so i'm going to wait for his next update to ask.

A pair of artists coming in to collaborate reached out to me because I had messaged them last month, their client just ghosted and they needed a 3-day commitment for the convention. I love their style and I wanted to work with them so bad but I had already made a two day commitment with this current artist and refused to hang him out to dry with only a couple days to go. Their original asking price for the three-day collaboration was 15k and they were so desperate they offered to put me all-in at 6k total. I wanted to cry. I'd have made the commitment with them at 10 to 12 for a custom design. And there's exactly one artist coming that I'd have been willing to commit to for 15, no hesitation, even if she wanted to freedraw on me. I'd prefer to work strictly with women but I'm not too hung up about it.

My 2-day artist: 

https://www.instagram.com/miloalfring

The collaborators:

https://www.instagram.com/hugofeist

https://www.instagram.com/diogonunestattoos

The artist I'm probably flying to LA for: 

https://www.instagram.com/green.vesper

Marysue

I mean I think that would be a valid reason to cancel a tattoo session also, I am just realizing the price of tattoos. 

Jonathan

Any reason may be valid if I want to cancel, but the weight of what I would gain by cancelling on my artist is less than the weight of what I would cause him to go through with only a couple days left to find a new two-day client. Working with the duo especially at the price they offered would be a hell of an opportunity, but I've already committed to an artist I'm happy to work with and he doesn't deserve to be ghosted. Maybe the grass would be slightly greener, but it would definitely taste sour.

I typically expect to pay $200/hr for a premium tattoo, and artists usually book half days or full days. If Maria had charged me at rate then my Hecate tattoo would have cost around $2000, but she charged me at booking so it cost $1400 and I tipped $200 on that because she spent so much extra time and did such a great job.

So, for the convention, a full 3-day booking at 200/hr with 1 artist could run about $5600 if charged at rate. But for highly sought-after artists, I've seen rates up to $350/hr, and celebrity artists at up to $500/hr. 

Marysue

Ahhh I seeeeeee. Makes more sense now. $1600 sounds very reasonable for good art on your body forever! 

Marysue

Let me know when you are home from your appointment 

Jonathan

I've been back at my apartment for a couple hours

Marysue

You buying gta? 

Jonathan

Maybe when it comes out on PC, but I don't think that even has a release date yet. I might get a console and a copy if I had friends to play with but I don't see that happening.

Are you?

Marysue

I thought about it but idk if I’ll be invested in the story enough to play it, I saw that people were complaining that going to too much strip clubs would impact your in game relationships lol 

Jonathan

That's funny. I've heard people are being dramatic about the relationship mechanic but I mostly stay tuned out. You've got a really great console though, might as well put it to use. I think you might be surprised.

You used to say you liked getting rewarded for being stealthy in combat, there was a satisfying mix of opportunities to do that in the last one so I'm sure this one will scratch that itch too.

The Witcher 3 got new DLC very recently as well. You never finished Hogwarts or Mass Effect. And hopefully you still have Rock Band. We never finished It Takes Two or Grounded, and Grounded 2 is out. But I'm not going to ask you to play anything with me. All of these things should be accessible to you though, let me know if you have any difficulty should you try to get back into it.

Would you come wander around with me for a while tomorrow instead of calling? I can get your ticket tonight.

Marysue

Omg I’m so sorry I could have sworn I sent this. Are you at the event? You sure you still want to talk on the phone while you’re there? 

Jonathan

Not yet. If you'd have read my last message, you would already have my answer to your second question.

Jonathan

I need a response.

Marysue

Im confused. On going to the event center with you? For that I’ll have to pass I’m sorry. But I appreciate the offer. 

Jonathan

Then don't bother calling. Send the offer you made on the truck in writing as a response to this email. Send proof of the updated registration along with it. Preferably within the hour, but by five today at the latest. I won't respond. Your email addresses will be blocked on all of my accounts after that window closes. I'll have a third party reach out to you to arrange closure of final affairs.

Goodbye, Marysue.