Mornings still send
me thoughts of you, thoughts that constantly linger until the dead of night;
and drifting away in slumber, I even find you in the farthest corners of my
subconscious. I open my eyes every dawn only to live over that same routine –a
seemingly infinite loop, wandering with the ghosts of my past. Once, you were
only a dream. Then you came true for a moment and went back to what you really
were. Again, a dream... Something intangible, something I could only grasp in
the vicinities of my fairly ambitious fantasy. It’s not that easy to abort a
love I’ve long been waiting to have, but the hardest part is waking up everyday
knowing that I couldn’t be with you any longer. The saddest thing is breathing
these hopeless breaths, knowing it is not you whom I breathe for anymore.
When you left,
you took away with you the colors of my life. I had to force myself to go on
living but I carried on, feeling that the world has already lost its very soul;
that even the sunset seems to mock me. That sense of calm I consistently found
in witnessing it was replaced with piercing sorrow. I never thought sunsets
would make me feel so lonesome until I lost my heart to you. Now, the seamless
fusion of crimson and sapphire skies only provides me a constant reminder of
this vacant space in my side where I long for you to be. The dusk has always
been a glorious spectacle, the sun bidding farewell with such pride and victory
after a day’s great show. But presently, all it looks like to me is a withering
day –with missing vibrancy and dramatically diminished incandescence. The stars
appear at night, hanging splendidly in display all over the heavens. I used to
make constellations out of them but now they’re just plain, unpatterned white dots
in an empty canvass. I still count shooting stars though, but not anymore knowing
what to wish for because I know there is no way I can get the one thing I
really want. And whenever I look at the moon, I wish I could still tell you how
luminescent it appears to be so we can both share its grandeur even though
you’re miles away. Yet again, the moon only illuminates the fact that we have
hell of a great distance between us and not the fact that we just live under
the same horizon.
Friends trick me
into thinking that the sadness isn’t supposed to be there but I know it’s
there, it’s just a fact waiting to be accepted. Sadness as well is something
that you couldn’t just turn off, like love. I only have to look for ways on how
to make the agony more bearable. Perhaps, I could use some solitude and cut off
the noise to find myself peace. But now even the silence is noisy, resonating vivid
hallucinations of our memory. It only heightens my awareness of your absence.
The silence, as empty as I am. And I still consider any sound nonessential
until I could once more hear you speak to me because by far, only your voice
has the capacity to make me think that things have fallen into place again.
That voice which often whispered the words “I love you” to me was the same
voice which gave me the power to single-handedly conquer any battle. It’s gone
now, that voice. With it, what was once my stubborn will has vanished in an
instant and it’s like I’ve been robbed of my own sensibility.
Since I’m not
one to waste time on dealing with lost causes, I would have turned my back on my
shattered history. I would have turned my back on you. Yet I refuse to move
forward because the worst part’s that tomorrow will not bring you to me
anymore. It only took three months, after all those years I’ve survived alone,
to make me forget how to live without you. Before, I was only scared not to
find you in my tomorrow and for the rest of my tomorrows to come. That
paranoia-turned-reality got me living in a nightmare. Without you, my future
seems like a vast field of barren land; and my present, a decaying process. I
am more afraid to find that this insatiable gap inside me can be filled by no
one or nothing else but you. How I wish I could just scrape you off my mind as
fast and as easy as you did with me. But I have found out with your help that
the love I have inside my heart is capable of setting no boundaries. I have
discovered that my heart knows no limits, it doesn’t know how and when to stop
despite the grievances and tragedies it suffered. And each passing hour, my
heart slaps in my face that it hasn’t stopped loving you until now. Even if it
now knows how it hurts to be forgotten. Even if it now knows that there are
just things one can’t really have despite how they want it so bad, regardless
of how it has learned that lesson the hard way.
What a disastrous
sight it is, being left in love alone. It’s like being left for dead in
swirling memoirs of a distant past. It reminds me of how I extremely detest the
phrase “used to be” --the most embittering thing in the world, it splits my
ears when I hear it. It’s the sound of deprivation of the ability to turn the
situation around simply because it’s over and done with. Looking back only to
find the wreckage, I feel rather sorry because I never wanted ‘us’ to end in
the first place. Especially now that our used-to-be’s are very much alive,
co-habiting with me in the form of your smell in my pillow or your shirt in my
closet and even your little tokens of thoughtfulness piled up in my bag. When I
walk along these streets in the town which used to be our sanctuary, I imagine
us sitting in our hangout places and still grabbing on to the small chance that
maybe, just maybe, I might walk right past you even if I know for a fact that I
never will. Not anymore. When I come home, I still see you sitting in the
kitchen of my apartment and blasting some music from your iPhone. I’d sit there
and sing along, ignoring the truth that it’s just me and the songs you used to
play that are there. I always doze off, make-believing that my bed isn’t just
too big for me because I have you to share it with, and I could once more wrap
my arms around you and spend my entire night basking in the scent of your hair
and the warmth of your skin.
Only a few
months have passed but all of these seem not only so far away but dreadfully
irretrievable. All those kisses, the tight embrace. The long nights and the hot
chocolates. The teamed up cups of coffee and bunches of reviewers. Having
dinner at midnight and eating breakfast on afternoons. Sleeping just after the
sun rises and waking up with hands clasped together, ignoring the alarm. But
the best part of it all was looking straight into your eager eyes that reflected
great fervor and the similar contentment we had in each other’s company. Oh,
how it made me feel ecstatic every time. I will always be fond of these moments
because these are the moments when I was aware that grief can possibly be
halted from dominating this planet. There is no denying that I’m still tethered
to the world we made for ourselves. How can I not hold on to someone who made
me experience things that are seemingly surreal? Honestly, you’re not that easy
to recover from. I must get there, nevertheless. I have to. But if the time
comes when I finally have the strength to pass by your dorm again, for example,
I know I wouldn’t help but glance at the window of your former room. And if I
catch its light turned on, I know that I would never be more delighted than how
I used to be back then when that certain beam of light still tells me that
you’re just there, passing the time or maybe browsing through your handouts. You
can’t be with me anymore but the shadows of your image still remain in my
actual reality. It’s the aftershock, the echoes of memories from a very special
era in my timeline. They’re forever plotted there like the ink you put on paper
whenever you’d doodle on my notebook and how those doodles used to make me
smile...
Of all the great
things that ever happened to me, you were my most favorite. I’m not trying to
buy you but seriously, you were the bestest of my best friends, the most
awesome person I came across with in my two-decade existence. Even then, I knew
that it would be hard for someone else to take your place in being the awesomest
person I know. We undeniably shared a very exceptional and intimate bond, given
the fact that falling in love wasn’t exactly a part of the plan. And it felt
awful watching my best friend, of all the people in my life, let slip and
return to being a stranger. We were pretty cool together, comfortable
together... Happy together. And if there’s one thing I miss the most right now,
it’s the way I can talk to you just about everything. But what I have right
here, and all I’ll ever have, is the mere illusion of your presence, close at
hand, intently listening as I make up these conversations which the luckless
circumstances already made impossible to happen. And every time I’m down and
out, I randomly blurt some words to thin air, pretending that I’m talking to
you just like what I’m doing now. It’s foolish but nothing else can give me a
lighter feel. (Well, I’m actually just high on fairy dust.) I couldn’t stand
losing the romance but what I couldn’t stand more is losing the companion I had
in you.
Now that we got
to bid this inevitable farewell, I’ll just be happy that I never missed a thing
in the whole span of our relationship. Every moment was cherished and
re-cherished, every kiss was heartfelt; every story you told was intently
listened to and noted ; and every ‘I love you’ that you heard from me was
sincere and evidently acted out. And although I can never get you back in my
life, I’d appease myself by thinking that at least I gave a shot at
relentlessly trying to keep you here. Another thing that I don’t regret is that
your love for me never has to have a posthumous recognition. After all, I never
–not even once—took you and everything we shared for granted. I guess love just
has an ironic way of turning someone special into a person you can’t stand
having around, like how you feel towards me now. Fate is just a jerk sometimes,
placing detours after having two people cross their paths and unfortunately,
time has terrible means of turning “we are” into “we used to be”. Love, fate
and time. Sometimes, they can’t just work well altogether. And we are the
children of their failure.
With that, I
remember when you once gave me a rose as a sign of your affection. I’d like to,
just for pretend, give one back to signify its death. Roses are offered as
expressions of love but satirical as it is, they are also offered as
sympathetic gestures in times of bereavement. Suffice to say, your love did
wilt away with your rose and there’s no hope in reviving something that’s
already dead. Lifeless things are only meant to be discarded, thrown away, put
underground where they now belong. I killed you with words, didn’t I? But
you’ve exchanged the same share of blows by depriving me of those. You left
stains in my memory that I couldn’t just rub clean. Well, your silence said a
lot. It was enough to leave me as good as dead, except I cannot be buried
because people still think I’m breathing, unaware that I’m sauntering through
these streets already lacking a soul. But I guess it’s just part of the deal.
Like the song goes, “What do you get when you fall in love?”. It’s pain,
motherfuckers. It’s pain. In the economy of romance, there’s gotta be a price
paid for the bliss enjoyed. It’s just how love goes, right? Love and its
universal rules, giving us the penalty of pain for abiding by the laws. So you’re
not the one who’s cruel. Life is, and how it designed love to be overly
destructive.
Still, the
thought of our parting has locked me in this phase of dissent. I admit that I have
no idea how I will ever teach myself not to condemn this mishap. On the
contrary, I shouldn’t be remorseful about this fairytale meeting its end.
Instead, I have to acknowledge the idea that just for once, I’ve known what it's like to have a portion of that ‘happily’ even without the ‘ever after’. With
that, I couldn’t thank you more for everything –the love, the inspiration, the
joy, the laughter, and the awesome adventure; however, our paths have only
crossed in an intersection and after that, we’re meant to go our separate ways.
But like I told you, I know you came into my life for something quintessential.
I have already seen that purpose and indeed, you taught me a lot of things. I
have also tested it true that some people idle in our lives for too long but
hardly make a dent while some only stay for a while but leave a mark that lasts
a lifetime (Like Boysen paint). And yup, you’re part of the latter (you’re the
Boysen paint). Sadly. Had I known that, I would have kept my world from
orbiting around you but serendipity must have sensed that I love surprises so
she never let me see that coming. It was worth it, though. You were worth it...
But we can’t dwell on that anymore. It’s not like it’s gonna change what is
now.
The green
light’s already on and prepared or not, we have to drive past each other and
set off to different directions. I’d steer looking at the rearview mirror
because that’s the only way I can catch a glimpse of you now. Hell, I can even
be a pro at driving in reverse. I know I can only move forward by stepping on
the gas and driving straight where I’ll get myself far away from where I’ve
been. Far, far away from you. My friends, the ones saner than me in the
meantime, are trying to drag me up the highway because I think my foot’s still
stepping on the break until now. (They said, “You’re causing traffic,
dumbass.”) As I get dragged farther and farther, the more I can’t resist
looking behind. And the most distressing thing is watching you speed up to
where you want to be, barely glancing back. Can’t I just have 5 more minutes? 5
more days, 5 more years with you? Or maybe even just one last glance will do. But
I can’t anymore, right? As much as I want so bad to still have you in my
present and future, you’re already the one who chose to be left in my past. But
if the time comes when you get lost and you don’t anymore know where to go,
keep in mind that I’m still right where you left me. Just in case you might
want to go back. I am not going to promise to forget you because forgetting you
is like letting go of a very significant part of me. It’s like giving away
something I can’t survive without. But if erasing me from your life and not
hearing anything from me ever again is how much your happiness costs, then... Let’s just put it this way.
Remember when I
used to tell you, “I love you, forever. (Hearts, hearts. ^_^ Haha.)”? That ‘forever’
isn’t just a word, it’s a commitment. Also, remember when you said you know you
truly love someone when you start sacrificing things for them? Indeed, you were
right. Lastly, remember when I sometimes address you as “mon raison d’être”?
Well, the human body is a vessel, worthless and empty without its raison d’être
–its reason of being. Since you’re my ‘raison d’être’ and you preferred to get
rid of me, I’d leave you be and stay here with these bare, shriveling layers of
skin and bones while my heart and mind –the very essence of my being – quietly cling
to you until time puts an end to eternity. I don’t care whether or not you take
notice but this is my sacrifice. And whether you take it or leave it, I’d stay
committed to the forever that I gave you. All I have are words to offer you
right now but you know damn well how I hold on to them. But until then... So
long, so long, dearly beloved. My unreachable star. (You fucking heartbreaker.
Asshole. Nah, just kidding!)
I’m right where you left me,
always.
