Jameson is Deep Pain & Tender Love
By: Kellie Burley
Tags: Breakups, Life, Travel, Love, Friendship

We broke up for a week once.

In that week, I booked a trip to Ireland with my closest childhood friend. A spontaneous trip is something I can always get behind, especially when it’s with a dear girlfriend. Little did I know that it would have been in Ireland, or four years from Ireland and in my kitchen, where she’d still be the friend, ready and waiting, to take care of me when he and I inevitably break up for good.

But, just before the trip, one of us ends up making the first attempt at getting back together. It’s raining out and he’s in my front seat. We are catching up, small talk. I tell him about my exciting trip and he says, “You were just going to go to another country without telling me?”

In my head I think to myself, “Do you still tell the people you’re broken up with, where you go, and what you plan to do?”

Regardless, my best friend and I still go to Ireland. We drink Guinness at a dive bar, eat beef stew, see endless rolling green hills, and for the majority of our trip it’s nothing but those gray, drizzly, skies we had heard about. We see the breathtaking Cliffs of Moher, visit stunning cathedrals, drive on the other side of the road in the pouring rain, and visit a castle that traces back to the ancestry on my mother’s side.

The nightlife was very entertaining. We went to nightclubs in Galway and danced. We partied with hilarious women from New York. A drunk Irishman even flashed us his penis in the middle of a dance floor. Out of instinct and pure shock, I punched him in the face. He made a face and his body language basically said, “Alright, yeah. That’s fair.” The DJ gave a thumbs up. I looked at my friend and we shrugged. Ireland, man.

We pour endless wine one night and our truths come pouring out, too. Sex over the years, money, family, health, and our dreams. We laughed over tapas at a random and delicious Spanish restaurant we found. I throw my head back from laughing so hard that I smash my head off the brick wall behind me.

We buy trinkets for our nieces or nephews and visit a museum or two. We do the Guinness and Jameson tours, where I purchase a fancier bottle of Jameson and get his last name printed on the label. When I eventually take it home to him, he makes certain to only take sips on days filled with milestones or for special occasions. The condo he later purchases, his promotions, and old friends visiting from out of town, for example.

On the day we break up, we’ll sip from it, too.

My best friend and I fly home with our beautiful and hilarious memories. Single or not, the trip was everything we thought it would be and more.

The Jameson lasts from November 2015 until it’s final drops in February 2019. Our last night together in that condo was filled with our final attempts on how I could somehow stay. There is endless sobbing, deep embrace, and so much love.

How powerful it was, that through our sorrow and heartbreak, we could still love each other enough to ensure we honor the relationship for all that it was.

A toast to the end of an era.

He reaches for that special bottle of Jameson, that has witnessed first hand, all of his accomplishments from the last four years. As he finishes filling up our shot glasses, the bottle gives one last drop, and then it empties for good. A perfect pour for two. He sits on the bed. The bottle having emptied gives us this undeniable confirmation that it really is time. Our crying is put on hold, and we sit across from each other on the bed, now smiling. It was as if even the Jameson knew it was our time, too. We smile and nod and take a deep breath and we hold up our glasses.

While looking into each other’s eyes, we see the best friends that we are, and the true family that we became. We smile. “Cheers.” “To us.” He says. “And to our healing,” I say.

The shot glasses clang and we hold eye contact until the whiskey hits our tongues and it makes our eyes close. We sip the last of the Jameson, from the trip I planned while broken up, four years ago. We hold each other’s hand and for the first time in awhile, we feel connected again. We kiss and put down the shot glasses. I place both of my hands on his face and we are forehead to forehead. I want to remember this unique feeling: deep pain and tender love.

Somehow, it is the Jameson that has us surrender to one another on this night. No more convincing, just a quiet acceptance, even if temporary. Time feels as though it is fleeting. We don’t want to fall asleep because when tomorrow comes it will mean goodbye. But, we are exhausted from the sorrow that our last week together has brought on. Curled up we look into each other’s eyes before bed one last time. I gently rub his face the way he likes, slowly on his forehead, and then on his scruff which I have always loved. He starts to fade and I am fading too.

I can’t help it, but I say it. “I don’t want to go.” And, I cry. “You can stop this from happening, Hellie.”

I feel sick. It is as if there is a death taking place tomorrow and I have the power to make the last minute decision to save that very life.

“I don’t want to go, but it’s that I have to go.” “I don’t understand, but I’ll keep trying to,” he says.

We let sleep and the subtle taste of Jameson take us into morning.