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Gatsby was a bold, beaming, spirit of a man despite his dark and dreary position. A force so composed his words may as well be shaved to the finest of serif prints. Yet like any other man he is no less exempt from the treacherous cycle that many befall against. It was something, to see a man so grand fall against perhaps what is the purest of all human emotion.
At that point in time, Gatsby had already foregone the state of shock so telling of this very cycle. I had not been there to witness the event. Despite that I was treated to a display worthy of standing alone, an hors-d'oeuvre with the sharp tang of sweat and tears.
Denial.
“‘I’m leaving you for him,’ she’d said.” And every word he spoke seemed to throng in Gatsby's own temples. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing. She just needs more convincing again, more—“
If there was anything Gatsby was renown for, it was his ability to hope. The ability to hold an entire crime organization in one hand, but also to bear the weight of the grand world he imagined for himself on his shoulders. But with that slipped mention of past affairs, the circle had been unbroken, and Gatsby - or at least the desperate, longing, shell of a man Daisy had left in his place - finally saw how his dream had crumbled down before him.
The fruit of all those penniless dreams. The girl he had plucking grapes from the palms of his hands. The brilliant ray of sunlight he bounded toward with valiant hope each passing day. All gone.
He crashed down with a cacophonous crack against the oakwood desk, an impact that almost startled me out of my boots at the time.
Anger.
In his broken arch I saw the picture of a man who had lost everything he had. Clenched fists wringing the sweat from his taut skin and skull poised like a sinner begging for forgiveness from a God he’d abandoned long ago.
He had grasped and longed for her touch like a newborn babe, blindly sucking the nectar of hope with bruised gums from her teat. Yet she had abandoned him, blanketless at mercy’s door.
For the first time since the encounter had begun, Gatsby looked me in the eye and I found myself struck.
In his pupils birthed an image that was neither Daisy Fay or Nick Carraway. And yet its ominous, shapeshifting figure only brooded over me as Gatsby closed much of the distance between us within a single breath of time. I had faintly registered the cacophony of clattering tins and glass from the desk.
I’d then had a second to scour the image of the man before me. He’d been frowning, as if confused by my presence, yet recognition had registered in his eyes - the recognition of someone he’d trusted with his secrets, someone who’d been by his side since the day he was unwittingly brought into this life.
Someone who could help him.
Bargaining.
Gatsby in that moment was lost to the world, and, to him, the entire world be damned.
“I’m sorry,” he’d hissed, breath on mine, before snatching the distance between us away with a yank of his hand.