July Morning, July Evening
My keys are in my handbag somewhere, yet for the life of me, I can’t seem to find them. And what a time to loose them; the rain won’t be letting up anytime soon, a bag of groceries filling my right hand, while my left rummages for the house keys in my handbag, which hangs lazily ON my right hand. Putting my groceries on the ground is not a choice, on account of the rain, plus I don’t want my pricey heads of spinach to get drenched; I’m sure its going to affect the taste somewhat. I am getting soaked badly, my skirt, my shoes, my blouse, everything; I can even feel the cold rain through my panties. I knew I should have brought my umbrella. Yet time marched on, like the great Mongolian horde of Genghis Khan towards the Kalka River. No time for regrets now, though; I have to find my house keys.
Of course, I can just ring our doorbell, but I’m not sure if my husband is inside the house. Besides, even if he is in, it won’t solve the problem concerning the wayward house keys. I might get inside our house for now, but the fundamental query was still there; where did my keys go?
Through the windows, I see someone coming for the door. Then, the doorknob turns, and along with the clicking sound of the lock, the portal opens.
There he is, my husband wearing his favorite jeans and white shirt. When was the last time I washed those? I can’t seem to remember.
“You know, you could have just used the doorbell. I’m right inside. Give me the groceries.”
“I can’t find my keys”, I answered. The light spilling from inside had a nice warmth to it, in complete contrast to the rain and wind bellowing behind me. Inside and out, so different.
“And you won’t find them out there. You can’t even look inside your own bag.” He relieves me of our dinner, and takes my hand, guiding me carefully into our warm home.
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Except for this evening rain, my days are pretty much normal. Although at times, deep inside us, there must be some kind of a measure for what we call normal. I am married for two years already, yet it seems like the days are pretty much the same as any domestic setting. My husband is a freelance photographer; I work as a secretary for an accounting firm. Truth be told though, me marrying this person is the only un-normal thing in our current circumstance.
He said that he had my eye on me when we first met, at a party. Which one, I can’t really remember. Then he asked me out, and seeing as that I’m not doing anything at that time, I went with him. Then one date led to another, until finally, we got married.
From an outsider’s perspective, this seems like an ordinary occurrence. But this is far from the other happy family preludes. Because, when we got married, I didn’t love him. It is the cold, hard fact. It’s not really his fault. He is good-looking, mature and funny. Except for his unpredictable bouts of “creativity”, thus making him carry his Nikon camera anywhere he goes, he is a very decent man, the kind of guy any decent girl would like to marry.
Gradually, day by day, I learned to accept him in my life. I cook all of our meals, I wash his clothes, and together we pay our bills, and have sex. This is what I have to do.
There are times, though, that I feel like I’m missing something. Like a dragonfly without wings, hastily trying to survive the day without flying. And during these times, I wonder if what I am really doing is living. Or maybe this is some form of a pseudo-existence, the kind that swirls under the blanket of complacency. We bother ourselves with work and family, yet deep down, we sense it. Spinning, it crashes along the shorelines, forming foams of bubbles along the surf. We ride on top of the clouds, and underneath us, the roiling waves of uncertainty, continuing on its spin since our time, like a washer set in full.
I traded something, and this is what I got. Divine punishment? I don’t know.
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While washing the spinach, I chop some onions and tomatoes. I turn on the stove, warm up the skillet, and then I pour some vegetable oil; once the oil is warm enough, I fried the onions, and then I add the sliced tomatoes, and some cubes of wieners, then finally, some scrambled eggs. On the other pan, I warm up last night’s casserole, then I put the sliced heads of spinach in it.
At the living room, my husband is listening to some jazz music, a compilation he made. Ella Fitzgerald, Thelonius Monk, John Coltraine, and some other artist I haven’t heard of. He hums along the rhythm floating in the living room, while he keeps himself busy with his camera, carefully cleaning the lens, adjusting the joints and other fittings, which I can’t really distinguish. I peek at him while waiting for the omelet to cook. His eyebrows are furrowed, and in his eyes, I see him concentrating. I know that his F-2 camera is expensive, but still, this seemingly mundane task of cleaning a camera somehow reflects his dedication to his.. job? Hobby? In his case, I can’t tell.
He looks up to me, and he smiles. “I hope dinner is almost ready. I’m starving.”
“Yes almost, so go clean up.” The rain still falls outside the window.
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After dinner, I take a warm shower. A few minutes in the blistering blast of water, along with the steam to rival that of any hot springs, and I feel much better. A long day at the office, plus the sudden change in the weather can really dampen anybody’s spirit. Even in the bathroom, I can hear the downpour outside. A flash of light, blinking in the space of a mere millisecond, followed by a low rumble, all these convince me about the rain outside.
At this point, my mind suddenly wanders off, somewhere. Like a raven leaving its nest at the dead of night, in search of nocturnal insects, I find myself flying off in the distance, towards another possibility. I leave behind the rain, my husband, my house, myself.
“Is this the life I am meant for?”
Somebody is knocking on the door. Knock, knock. I gather my conscious self back. From the oblivion beyond, back to my self, to my husband, to my home, to the rain outside.
“Honey, you ok there?”
“Yeah, I’ll be out in a sec.” I shut the valve of the shower, open the glass portal, and reach out for the towel rack.
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“So how was your day?” I sit beside my husband, at the sofa in our living room.
“Pretty hectic actually. Didn’t realize that we have that many orders. We actually have to put clients on hold today, can you believe it?”
He puts his right arm around me, and I snuggle up to him. I can smell our bath soap, lingering along his scent. “Well you work too hard. It’s your fault that your office becomes busy; you treat your customers too well. That’s why they call you back.”
“No matter how many clients we get, that doesn’t mean we are going to get any raise now, right?”
“Not really. That’s why you shouldn’t work too hard for them”
I look at him, and he is giving me one of his trademark grins. A boyish grin, like the ones you find on 9-year olds, all muddy and sweaty, holding out a bullfrog in front of you. Mischievous, yet innocent. I try to smile at him, but at this point, we are kissing.
After a few minutes, he looks at me. He seems distant, yet my face is so close to him.
“Something wrong?”, I ask him.
He smiles at me, “No, nothing…”
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“You sleepy?”
“Not really.”
“Well I’m going to bed. For some reason, I feel so tired. And I’m the one guarding the house, hehe” At this, my husband stands up, and yawns.
A low thunder rumbled somewhere, and as if that reminded him of something, he said, “By the way, there’s a package for you. It’s in the study.”
“Who’s it from?”
“No clue. It doesn’t have any return address, and it looks like it was forwarded from one place to another, I don’t know.”
I make my way towards the study. The usual piles of books and magazines are still there. The rain is still outside, although it’s not as heavy a few hours ago, just a slight drizzle. The only source of light in the study room comes from the desk lamp, yellowish beam spilling on top of a box, covered with simple brown paper. I look at it, no return address, just as he said; only my name and our address on the center, hand written with a blue marker. Postage markings are all over it, all of them prompted with a “FORWARDED” stamp. The brown paper covering the edges are a bit thin, and looking at it closely, the box is actually colored black. I lift it, its weight surprisingly heavy. I try shaking it, hoping that whatever is inside would move, revealing its identity. A little rustling, but nothing else.
“What is this?”
“No clue here. Anyways, why don’t you open it? It’s not like it has anthrax or something, right?”
I turn around. My husband is by the archway separating the study from the rest of the house. I can’t see his face, only the outlines are visible to me. The light from the kitchen illuminates his hair, his ears, his neck, his form. But his other details, I can’t see them; the color of his eyes, the thickness of his lips, the rise and fall of his chest.
“Well I’m going to bed. Don’t stay up too late babes, you got work tomorrow.”
“I know. Goodnight.” I blow him a flying kiss, which he nimbly catches with his right hand. And he smiles, or at least I think he smiles, since I can’t really see it; only the creases in his cheek, crinkling, convinces me that he did. And with that he turns around, walks to our room, and I hear the clicking of our door.
I look at this strange package in front of me. Who sent this? Where did it come from? Why? There are no special occasions coming anytime soon. And I can’t remember anyone who would even send us anything, out of the blue. I decide to plunge into this dark unknown, with a letter opener.
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“I didn’t really understand a lot of things.”
Inside the box is a stack of papers. Probably one ream, maybe more. Printed words, organized into sentences, expressing some kind of thought. Neatly organized with Microsoft Word. Nothing out of the ordinary here. As I flip through the pages, I notice that only the first seven sheets have something printed on them. The rest are blank. I wonder who sent this? My mind is still wading on the confusion when I decide to go on and read.
“My life back then was pretty simple; I wake up at 4am, eat a hearty breakfast (while yawning every 30 seconds) then a shower, put on my school uniform, and then I’m for school. While at the classroom, I try hard to study; at recess, I try hard to eat. And when its time to go home, I go home. That was my life in a nutshell.
Yet everyday, a miracle happens. Nothing grandiose, just little things that gives substance to our daily routines; a sudden rain to cool off an otherwise warm and sticky afternoon, a cold glass of soda after a long, hard day, a smile from someone we don’t really notice till then. Yeah these are the little miracles of our times."
Flipping through the pages, I see that this is some sort of a rough draft for a short story. The writing is pretty much amateurish, yet reading through I feel a sense of truth, a sincerity flowing through the words. As if the author is pouring out his feelings, like water from a pitcher. No, it’s more like the rush of water, cascading from a waterfall. I keep reading, noting some grammar mistakes here and there, until I reach this part.
“She was the prettiest girl in class, even then. Her straight, long hair reached her shoulders, hiding her shapely ears. Her skin, white and clean, like the white sheets my mother hangs in our backyard fresh from laundry. Her smile which pierces the gloom of any day, transforming it into hope and enthusiasm, just like any July morning…”
By this time, I’m positive that this is an amateur’s work. The opening paragraphs are a bit vague and murky; the setting is not established, the protagonist is kind of flaky, and trying to grasp the essence of the story, the why of the scenarios, is like trying to catch a live catfish with your bare hands.
Still, why would anyone send me this? I don’t know anyone who works for a publishing house. And the riddle of the blank pages keeps on nudging my mind. They are blank for a reason, I suppose. Maybe some form of a metaphor. But what good would that bring?
“I didn’t really understand a lot of things.”
Yet the pacing is well thought, and the author is good with words, properly using them to create the scenes in the reader’s mind, just like watching a movie. By the time I reach the third page, I can see myself in their world…
I am wearing their school uniform. The sun is barely up, yet here I am up and already walking on the sidewalk. It is a bit cold, so I shove my hands inside my windbreaker. The birds are chirping their morning lauds. The horizon takes its colored hues from the rising sun, while the wind is breezing softly through the cicadas lining the sidewalk. I see a few students, wearing the same school uniform as mine, and there are some who are not. Yet my mind is busily moving in the opposite direction. Still murky from last night’s sleep, I try to organize my thoughts; all the while my legs are walking in their regular phase, independent from any of my conscious thought. The scenery out here is amazing, yet my mind couldn’t care less, since at this moment, it’s focused on one world-defining task: my homework.
While worrying about last night’s homework, I bump into someone along the way. We are going in the same direction, but since our pace is different (my legs walk fast, he is too slow), plus the fact that I’m not really paying attention, just made the situation unavoidable. I am about to say something in the lines of an apology and..
“I didn’t notice her at first, because I was worried about our homework, so we bump into each other. I was about to shout at her, say something like “Watch where you’re going!”, when I saw that it was Irene. Time slowed down, or maybe my perception of the moment became minimal, I wasn’t sure. Yet, I was convinced that all this happened on that fresh July morning. I was surprised, flustered, and then scared. All within a span of ten seconds max. It’s Irene alright. And at the precise moment that our eyes met, my heart started beating faster. What should I do? Where should I go? Racing in my head are 50,000 possible scenarios, flashing thru and fro, until my body decided to just run away.
I couldn’t bear to look any deeper in her eyes, because I know, if she looks into mine a few seconds longer, she’ll find out that I’m in love with her.”
I turn my eyes away from the story for a few seconds. I try to take a deep breath, but I can’t. It’s like an ancient cobweb that I am unaware of suddenly appeared in my chest, constricting me, depriving me of oxygen. When I finally draw breath, only then did the reality settled in me. My name is Irene. I am in this story.
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Even with all the lighting and thunder outside, my husband is still peacefully asleep. His back is turned away, him facing the wall and the bedroom window. Only my bedside lamp is on. Watching him sleeping, I feel a sense of calm settling within me. In the midst of the chaos of the outside, of the reality, seeing him snuggled comfortably under the blankets, maybe dreaming off somewhere, anywhere the dream-weavers desired so, I feel secure. His back rises and falls regularly, marking his body with life. If I even feel alone here, I can easily convince him to come back her by my side. I just have to wake him up, that’s it. Although, I feel that, right now, I’d better leave him to his dreams, entrust him to Morpheus. I close our bedroom door partly, and I walk softly, first to the kitchen for a glass of water, and then back to our study room, where the story is atop the table. Still illuminated by the yellowish light of the lamp.
I pour myself a glass of bourbon, and I resume reading.
“Seeing Irene everyday makes it impossible for me to concentrate on ‘living’. The more I look at her, the more I realize the things that I lack. I live alone in an apartment complex near school. I don’t have anybody who I can really call friend. Actually, the sense of being alone is what defines me. I come home from school, study, and read books. I’m pretty much used to this idea of being alone, no one bothering me, and I guess I became comfortable with this. Its like this dark blanket that covers me every day is the fence that keeps me loosing who I really am. That was my life before I met her.
Yet, I admit, I dread the mornings. Those daily walks towards school, they make my heart beat so strongly, I fear that my chest would burst open, revealing my blood and organs on the sidewalk. Because it’s during those mornings when I see her. And the more I see her, a living, breathing person, normal in every way, the more I grow afraid of the world. In her eyes, I see all the things I was meant for, yet I did not have. In her eyes, I become more aware of what I can become. And with that realization, I grew more fearful of loosing myself, like sugar melding with coffee. Take a sip, and you have an idea that it is there. Yet, you can’t separate it from the rest of the mixture. You just know, because of the added sweetness.
Strange as it may sound, despite all this fear and anxiety, I am drawn to her. I am afraid to see her, yet I am afraid of not seeing her, too. We are two different polarities of an existence. And so, I think, my relevance, my importance, can only be found through her. Sadly, I can’t say the same for her. For all I know, I am just a stranger, someone who exists beyond her world, a prop if you will. And so, I decided to remain beyond her line of sight. If she looks beyond the horizons, I am just the cicada tree standing beside, just a part of the scenery.”
I try to remember the boys in my class. Who could the author be? Maybe it’s the class president. I seem to remember him living alone in an apartment at that time. Of course, I didn’t bother to find out if it’s true. Naoko and Alicia would have laughed at me if they find out I’m remotely interested in Mr. President. Besides, I know that the class president is more.. mundane. He always wore the latest brand-name watches, and he was not afraid of flirting with other girls. Sure he was smart and charismatic, but, the more I remember his face and his ways, the more I’m convinced that he is not this author.
Still, in reading this short story, I never realized that someone is actually looking at me this way. Other women would be horrified, if they found out that they have a stalker. But I have a feeling that, whoever wrote this, is far from being a stalker. He is just a boy after all. Albeit a boy, who is incredibly deep, and complex. A person who looks inside himself, unbothered by neither time nor society.
I read the story, even after I’ve finished my glass of bourbon. The rain stopped outside, and by the window, I see the glow of the crescent moon, surround by the dark clouds. By the time its 3:00 AM, I reach the last page of the story.
“I finally worked up the courage to talk to her. Maybe, courage is not the word. It’s more like.. I convinced myself that I should talk to her. The more I see her each day, the more I’m drawn towards her, the opposite polarity. All I remember is that this urge to speak to her grew inside me, penetrating each cell of my body, rushing along with the circulation of my blood. I couldn’t stop myself. I have to do it.
It was a beautiful March sunset, a Friday. Irene and I were assigned for room cleaning. So after classes, everyone was in a hurry to go home, except for the two of us. Outside, dusk was settling on the horizon, the woven hues of red and orange were embedded on the skies, giving the impression of blood and guts scattered on the sky. Consequently, everything else inside our third-floor classroom was bathed with colors so different from what the desks, the chairs, the chalkboards, really were. After I finished clearing the garbage cans, I looked at her. She has her back turned on me, busily sweeping the floor. Her long, reddish-black hair was swaying opposite the direction of her arms. As I came nearer to her, I can faintly smell her perfume, sweet yet indistinct. Like the smell of morning roses in an orchard. Along this assaulting scent, my heart started beating at a rate I’ve never experienced before. I breathed here essence inside, and I tried to calm my nerves.
Once I am near her, she turned at me, and…”
At this point, the story is finished. Exactly at the bottom of the seventh page, my world in the eyes of the protagonist came to a halt. Once my eyes are fixed on the last three periods, I felt a sense of loss. An unfinished story is one of the worst things that could happen ever. It’s along the lines of an unfinished song, an incomplete sketch. Because, this simple world, created from someone else’s mind should come to some sort of a finality, a definition. It’s not fair to the characters, to the ballad, to the object of the sketch, to be suddenly dropped and left by the creator.
And with this ceased story, my delicate past and my past in the eyes of the author, seamlessly melded into one streaming entity, is suddenly severed. It feels like my soul, that has taken a symbiosis with my soul in the eyes of the author, is abruptly separated, one piece from another. A violent storm inside me started burning. As if shouting “THAT’S NOT FAIR!! WHY!?!”, my essence trembled, rocking my brain back and forth, trying to convince me that this can’t be. I close my eyes, cloaking myself into the darkness, hoping to be sheltered from this catastrophe.
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I calm down after a few minutes. I’m still sitting in the chair, still inside my home, where my husband is still asleep at the adjacent room, our room. I have this sudden urge to go to bed, to sleep. I know that once I am asleep, I will open my eyes for the next day. And everything will be back to the way it was. I will be the accountant working for ___ Incorporated again. I will be the wife of ___ again. At this very minute, I want to go back to the way things are. Back to the smooth flow of the everyday world.
As I stand up, I notice that at the back of the last page of the story, there’s something written there. The author, or maybe the person who send me this, used a neon green highlighter, and with the yellowish light, I didn’t notice it before.
I turn the page, and sure enough, there’s something written there.
“we flow along the lines of the wind; as the flow changes, so we follow it..”
At the bottom of this message is a telephone number.
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The next day flows freely as usual. The husband is still asleep (he is a heavy sleeper, after all).After a hasty breakfast of coffee and French toast, I grab my shoulder bag from the table and I make way for work. It is a beautiful day; the world exudes an aura of freshness. In a sense, a sort of rebirth after the deluge from the previous night. The streets are a bit wet, with puddles here and there. The birds are chirping happily, circling the morning skies. Students are about, going to school. Another ordinary day outside. My mind, though, is dwelling farther from the ordinary.
That story from last night opened a door from my memories. Yet the incoming flood is so strong, so harsh, I couldn’t make sense out of it. Like a beaver dam bursting from the overflowing current of a river, thus sorting through the dirt is impossible.
Still, that phone number would clear a lot of things; besides, that’s the only clue left in this mess. And as I step inside my office, I am pretty much set into calling that number. But before I do that, I have to go back to the flow of the everyday world. And that involves phone calls, meetings and other meaningless paperwork.
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Come lunch break, I dial the phone number. Pressing the 11-digit numbers in my office phone, my heart starts to beat a little faster. Along with this quickened pace, my hands start to sweat. Why am I feeling this way?
Ring ring.
I hope he (or maybe a she?) won’t answer the phone.
Ring ring.
“Hi Irene.”
I try to match the voice with a face, but try as I might, I can neither see, nor hear, this face or this voice. Who are you?
“Who is this?”
I hear him chuckle at the other end of the line; a dry, weary laugh. His chortle sounding like cackling chickens at my end of the line. “Nice to hear from you, too.”
“I’m sorry, but whoever you are, I don’t take to receiving odd packages as a laughing matter.”
“Sorry about that, but there’s no other way around it. I have to get it out of the system, you know? Kind of like airing some laundry on the roof.”
“Who are you?”
“It’s a beautiful day today. Why don’t we go out for some coffee? My treat. And when we meet up, I’m sure things will be much clearer, ok?”
“If you’re not willing to tell me who you are, then what makes you think I’d be willing to drink coffee with you?”
I hear a faint rustling at the background, just like wiping the receiver of a telephone with a cloth. “Because I know for a fact that you are curious about the story. And, yes, I based it from an event that happened in my life. You could say that it’s a bit, autobiographical. But don’t worry, I have no intentions of publishing that amateurish work. I just want you to read it, that’s why I sent it to you. ” And with that he chuckles again. Like cackling chickens at my end of the line.
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4 PM. I get up from my desk, and I ask my boss if I could be excused for the rest of the day. Ok, there’s not much left to do here anyways, he said. I thank him, and I grab my shoulder bag from my chair, and I say goodbye to everyone else at the office. I leave work early once in a while anyways, so this is just one of those days. Nobody would really wonder, or at least that’s what I think. Besides I don’t have to explain myself to anybody; it’s not like I am doing anything immoral.
It’s only a few blocks from our office to the Village Perk, yet it seems like a mile or so. My mind is full of those scenes from that short story. An ordinary school day, early morning. Birds in the sky, the cold morning mist, and that boy. Strangely though, his face is a blank. And no matter how hard I try, I can’t remember what he looks like. Or even his haircut. Is he fat, or thin? Is he pale? Does he have crooked teeth? All these minute details, along the others, are the summation of what he may have looked like. Yet, even if I close my eyes, and think hard, I can’t come up with anything. The memory simply vanished into the yawning depths. At times, the young boy’s face is replaced by someone else’s: the kid who manages the copy machine at the office, our class president, even my husband. Yet their faces don’t match with the boy from the story, because they are out of proportions, like caricatures found in editorial comics. And so, when I open my eyes again, the face of the boy is still a blank.
The memory simply vanished into the yawning depths.
The deeper question plaguing me, though, is the truth of this story. Did all that really happened? If it did, why can’t I remember? If it didn’t, then why do I feel so uneasy?
I take a deep breath, filling my lungs with the air that surrounds me. Across the street is the Village Perk. Is there someone waiting for me there? Who can he be? And why is he waiting? Once I step inside of that coffee shop, I am about to cross the great divide. I’ll find out the truth about the short story. His explanations would cause me to bleed away my old blood, my old life. He is a knife that stabs and slices on the stretched skin. And with the skin ruptured, bright red blood will flow freely. This is not as simple as changing a shampoo brand; I may not be the same person when I walk out of that establishment. A shift towards something different, a Copernican Revolution maybe. With these thoughts, my ears start to hear a slight, very slight ringing; a small, piercing note that travels with the very air that I breathe.
One step, two steps, three steps. I reach for the door with my left hand, giving it a slight push. And immediately, the aroma of coffee stormed my faculties, assaulting my senses. With home-brewed coffee.
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I walk inside the coffee shop, and immediately my attention focuses on the man who sits at the back. He looks a bit haggard, with his unkempt hair and gaunt cheeks. A slight stubble grows on his chin and upper lip. A picture of a man who has forgotten the basics of self-care. Yet he wears an expensive-looking white polo shirt, sans the wrinkles, complete with a short, black necktie. Dark chino pants and shiny, black Florsheims complete his outfit. He looks at me, while he adjusts his black-framed glasses on his nose bridge. A slight waft of cigarette smoke floats lazily beside him; on the ashtray are three crushed Marlboros.
I draw my gaze away from him for a second, as I scan the place for other patrons. There’s nobody else around here. I hear some noise coming from behind the bar; somebody is still working the kitchen. Or something that resembles a kitchen, since this is a coffee shop after all. I look back at this figure, and again he smiles. I turn behind me, checking to make sure that there’s nobody else there. And when I look back at him, he waves at me, motioning over to his spot. A jazzy tune plays in the background. Miles Davis perhaps, though I can’t be sure.
“Do you know how long I have been waiting for you?” I try to answer back, but I can’t think of anything to say. I don’t know who this man is. I stand frozen on my spot, just behind the chair in front of him.
“Why don’t you sit down?”
“I’m sorry. Who are you again?”
He adjusts his eye glasses again. He just looks at me behind them, yet it seems that he felt something with what I just said. I never really put any thought to it though. And I didn’t mean to sound rude to him. But after a few seconds, he regains his composure, and he offers the vacant chair. I pull it away from the table, and I sit down, slinging my shoulder bag at the backrest.
“So…”
“Actually, it’s me who should apologize, sending you that package out of the blue. I really shouldn’t have done that. Normal people, what they usually do, is that they call first right? You know, get in touch with the other person, especially with those whom they neither have seen nor heard from for the past twelve years.”
I nod. He takes the silence that follows as his cue to go on.
“Well, the thing is, its kind of urgent. And I have to act. Any day later would be a disaster.”
“Exactly what are you talking about, mister..”
“Sorry I can’t tell you that. Just go ahead and call me… hmm, Martin sounds fine.”
Agitation starts to build up in me. Who is this person, anyways? Why won’t he tell me his name?
“If you can’t be honest enough to tell me who you are, then, excuse me. I want to go home now.” I stand up from the chair, but he reaches over the table, and he holds my hand. I look at him, and he seems.. afraid. Like a child who doesn’t want to be left alone in a dark room.
“Please hear me out, Irene. I need to ask you something. I promise you, this won’t take any minute longer after I finish my coffee.” I look inside his coffee cup; it’s half-full.
“This involves your life. And, possibly, other people’s lives as well. So please?”
I sit down on the chair. “What do you mean?”
He lets go of my hand, and he sighs a relief. He takes a sip, a loud sip, from his coffee cup. After that, he puffs at his cigarettes.
“So what is this all about?”
“I know you feel uncomfortable right now. I won’t do anything that would harm you, Irene. Not then, and certainly not now.”
“You sound like you know me pretty well. How do you know about me?”
He takes another drag from his cigarette, flicking the ashes off to the ashtray. “We were high-school classmates. Although back then, I kind of flew under everybody else’s radar, if you know what I mean.”
“I try to remember those days, but, no matter how hard I try, I can’t remember you.”
“I know. Don’t worry about that. It’s all in the past anyways, although..”
I stare at him; I can’t make any sense with anything he tells me. Both of us are like foreigners of different nationalities, speaking in our foreign tongues. Without a translator, someone, or a something, to put us in a common ground, we would never understand what one tries to convey to the other.
I try to shift our conversation back to the short story. “You said something about that short story as.. autobiographical?”
He nods, so I continue. “So, by autobiographical, you mean to say that everything there happened in your past? And in your past, I am in it?”
“Yes.” He crushes his cigarette, dashing the ember at the bottom of the glass ashtray.
“Then how come I can’t remember anything? Because ever since we spoke at the phone this morning, I try to remember you, and..”
He lightly puts his hand on top of mine. “Don’t strain yourself. You’ll just get a headache.”
I look at his hand. They are small hands, too small for a man. They are like the hands of a young adult, maybe a 14-year old. And I can’t help but notice that his hand is cold. It is a bit cold in here; although I can’t hear the air-conditioning anywhere. They make a low, humming sound, despite the claims in commercial ads. Silent-type rotors, the next wave in air-conditioning units.
“So you don’t remember anything at all?”
“Not really. Although your story made me visualize the scenery so well. Just like the opening pages of “Norwegian Wood”.
He grins at that revelation. “I know that novel! That was brilliantly written. I loved that book. Actually, when I finished reading it, that’s where I got the inspiration to start writing that story I sent you. Just as how Toru Watanabe wants to remember Naoko, by putting his memory to paper. Yet the more he tries to recall her, the more those memories slip by.”
I smile at him, remembering some of the lines of that particular book. About imperfect vessels of writing, to imperfect memories and imperfect thoughts.
He looks at me, straight in the eyes, and I stare right back. Behind those clear glasses, dark brown pools peer into my soul. In his stare, I don’t feel any kind of animosity, the scowl, the kind that any of us may feel when other people give us that look. Rather, his is much more soothing. And I feel arrested in his eyes. The funny thing is, I willingly give myself up to him, this stranger of a man, whom I should remember, but I don’t. I know now for a fact that I should remember. Because in his stare, I feel incomplete, as if a certain part of me was taken away, stolen. In the midst of this sense of loss, my eyes became watery, and my vision of him becomes blurry. The tears start to well up, and they crawl on my cheeks. Yet, I don’t rub them away; these are not dirt which we hastily remove from our clothes, as if their mere presence revolts our sensibilities. This is the reality that I try to accept, and this tears that keep on flowing are there, because they are for the missing parts inside of me.
He just stares ahead. He makes no move to wipe away the flowing tears in my cheek. He accepts them instead, and in his comforting stare, the lost parts in me are somewhat stressed, accentuated even.
“Would you like to remember, Irene?”
On a shaky voice, I ask him, “How? Are you going to tell me?”
“Telling the past is no different from telling the future. No matter how much words I use, you won’t remember, you’ll simply learn.”
“So how..”
“How about.. you will go back in that time? Re-live? Do a take 2?”
I keep silent, so he continues.
“You can go back to those days, Irene. Breathe the past, touch past. That’s the only way you can remember. And maybe.. change some things. But there is a price though.”
“How much?”
“Your present. That is the price. Who you are now, the people you have met, anybody whom you affected. They will go on a different path once you made the changes. Some may become happier, some may be dead. Either way, everything you see here will become something else. That is the price.”
Is he suggesting time travel? That is not possible. That concept is beyond the realms of science; that can only happen in the movies. Martin reads my face, and he knows that I don’t believe him.
“You don’t believe me? Would you like a sample then? It won’t be anything grandiose, but…”
He points at the speakers mounted on the ceiling. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Kenwood surround speakers, hooked up to a player somewhere behind the counter. I can hear Nina Simone voice from those speakers. Suddenly, the sound becomes garbled, then some static. At the same time, the whole object becomes hazy, the colors squirming here and there, like slugs in a basket, until finally, the speakers start to take a more definite shape. I close my eyes, hoping that what I am seeing is merely an illusion, a trick. Again, the ringing noise, that single piercing note, I can hear it. I try to cover my ears, to block the sound away, but its still there. This time it’s louder.
“You got a great speaker system here, Harry.”
“You noticed huh? And to think I almost bought the Kenwood’s.”
With the ringing sound gone, I open my eyes again. Hanging from the ceiling are Bose surround speakers, Nina Simone’s soulful playing filling the whole café. I look at Martin sitting across from me, as he takes a drag from his cigarettes. His coffee cup looks half-empty now.
***********************************************************************
I start to think about my husband. What will happen to him then? He would probably go on with the kind of life that he had. He never openly talked about his past, his life before we met. On that fateful evening at a party. What kind of a man is he back then? The only clue I know of, is that once, he told me that he was really thankful that we got married. “I don’t want to go back to what I once was”, that’s what he said.
“Have you decided?” Martin lights another cigarette. I need to make a decision then. Do I go back, or do I stay? I want to remember, but at the same time, the face of my husband, smiling, is in my head. That sense of loss is still here, a hole inside me that can never be covered by anything else. But in that loss, my husband’s beaming grin, I remember that one. If I go back, will he ever smile like that again? Or will that, too, be lost forever, just like the memory I should have, but taken away?
I don’t want to go back to what I once was.
“I’ve decided Martin. I’ll stay here. Even if this memory, my memory of you, is missing, I think it's hidden for a particular reason. And no matter how much I want to take it back, I can’t. I have a responsibility now. I can’t leave my husband alone. He needs me. I’m sorry.”
From the small Bose speakers, I hear Ella Fitzgerald singing “Misty”. Martin smiles again, a weak smile. “I understand. Looks like you’ve made your choice then.” He then crushes his Marlboros into the ashtray, and he leaves some money on the table. Without saying anything else, he gets up from his chair, and he walks away. I couldn’t bear to look at his comforting eyes. I don’t deserve them. So as he drifts farther away, like a distant memory leaving towards the uncharted unknown, I stare down at the floor.
“You know, things that are hidden tend to reveal themselves, in one way or another. They don’t stay underground for too long....” I look up, but there is nobody else inside the café.
******************************************************************************
Three days later, a powerful earthquake hits the whole country. I was on my way back from work when it suddenly happened. Starting out as a low rumble, then building up its intensity, a crescendo of destruction arose. The surrounding buildings swayed and buckled, the lamp posts fell from their concrete stand. I couldn’t keep my footing, and I fell on the ground. Everyone around me was wailing and screaming. I remembered Martin then, sitting across from me, with his unkempt hair and his expensive clothes, smoking his Marlboros. His voice on the phone, and his cackling laughter. In the midst of the destruction, his face was the very first thing that came to my head, as I tried to run, and I took shelter on a waiting shed. For a few tense minutes, the ground roiled and shook, until finally, its intensity began to abate, slowing down, then the aftershocks. And at last, it stopped. I tried to stand from the ground, and I looked up. There were no birds flying around, thick clouds darkened that July evening.
Across the nation, everything was rendered vulnerable to the might of the earthquake. A college building in a nearby city topples, killing hundreds of students, trapping some of them under the pile of ruble and debris. Bridges collapsed, roads were gutted open. Our house was not spared, although it wasn’t as bad as the others; just a large crack appeared on the south wall, and all of our china was shattered. My husband was immediately called by a newspaper, asking him to do some front-page shots of the aftermath. When I got home, there was a note on the fridge door, explaining just that.
Somewhere far away, the sounds of fire trucks and ambulances can be heard. One of our neighbors’ houses was toppled to the ground. Was there somebody inside when it fell? I couldn’t tell. I made my way towards our study room. Once on the doorway, I saw everything in disarray; books from the shelf were scattered all over the floor, piled magazines, or what used to be “piled”, were now jumbled, not one magazine on top of the other. I looked at the table, and the brown box is still there. I reached over and opened it, and there was nothing inside but a ream of blank paper. I flipped through each page, but there was nothing left. Martin’s story was erased, cleared and filed somewhere else.
“Maybe I should have..”, then I stopped on that thought.
Of course, I can just ring our doorbell, but I’m not sure if my husband is inside the house. Besides, even if he is in, it won’t solve the problem concerning the wayward house keys. I might get inside our house for now, but the fundamental query was still there; where did my keys go?
Through the windows, I see someone coming for the door. Then, the doorknob turns, and along with the clicking sound of the lock, the portal opens.
There he is, my husband wearing his favorite jeans and white shirt. When was the last time I washed those? I can’t seem to remember.
“You know, you could have just used the doorbell. I’m right inside. Give me the groceries.”
“I can’t find my keys”, I answered. The light spilling from inside had a nice warmth to it, in complete contrast to the rain and wind bellowing behind me. Inside and out, so different.
“And you won’t find them out there. You can’t even look inside your own bag.” He relieves me of our dinner, and takes my hand, guiding me carefully into our warm home.
***********************************************************************************
Except for this evening rain, my days are pretty much normal. Although at times, deep inside us, there must be some kind of a measure for what we call normal. I am married for two years already, yet it seems like the days are pretty much the same as any domestic setting. My husband is a freelance photographer; I work as a secretary for an accounting firm. Truth be told though, me marrying this person is the only un-normal thing in our current circumstance.
He said that he had my eye on me when we first met, at a party. Which one, I can’t really remember. Then he asked me out, and seeing as that I’m not doing anything at that time, I went with him. Then one date led to another, until finally, we got married.
From an outsider’s perspective, this seems like an ordinary occurrence. But this is far from the other happy family preludes. Because, when we got married, I didn’t love him. It is the cold, hard fact. It’s not really his fault. He is good-looking, mature and funny. Except for his unpredictable bouts of “creativity”, thus making him carry his Nikon camera anywhere he goes, he is a very decent man, the kind of guy any decent girl would like to marry.
Gradually, day by day, I learned to accept him in my life. I cook all of our meals, I wash his clothes, and together we pay our bills, and have sex. This is what I have to do.
There are times, though, that I feel like I’m missing something. Like a dragonfly without wings, hastily trying to survive the day without flying. And during these times, I wonder if what I am really doing is living. Or maybe this is some form of a pseudo-existence, the kind that swirls under the blanket of complacency. We bother ourselves with work and family, yet deep down, we sense it. Spinning, it crashes along the shorelines, forming foams of bubbles along the surf. We ride on top of the clouds, and underneath us, the roiling waves of uncertainty, continuing on its spin since our time, like a washer set in full.
I traded something, and this is what I got. Divine punishment? I don’t know.
************************************************************************************
While washing the spinach, I chop some onions and tomatoes. I turn on the stove, warm up the skillet, and then I pour some vegetable oil; once the oil is warm enough, I fried the onions, and then I add the sliced tomatoes, and some cubes of wieners, then finally, some scrambled eggs. On the other pan, I warm up last night’s casserole, then I put the sliced heads of spinach in it.
At the living room, my husband is listening to some jazz music, a compilation he made. Ella Fitzgerald, Thelonius Monk, John Coltraine, and some other artist I haven’t heard of. He hums along the rhythm floating in the living room, while he keeps himself busy with his camera, carefully cleaning the lens, adjusting the joints and other fittings, which I can’t really distinguish. I peek at him while waiting for the omelet to cook. His eyebrows are furrowed, and in his eyes, I see him concentrating. I know that his F-2 camera is expensive, but still, this seemingly mundane task of cleaning a camera somehow reflects his dedication to his.. job? Hobby? In his case, I can’t tell.
He looks up to me, and he smiles. “I hope dinner is almost ready. I’m starving.”
“Yes almost, so go clean up.” The rain still falls outside the window.
************************************************************************************
After dinner, I take a warm shower. A few minutes in the blistering blast of water, along with the steam to rival that of any hot springs, and I feel much better. A long day at the office, plus the sudden change in the weather can really dampen anybody’s spirit. Even in the bathroom, I can hear the downpour outside. A flash of light, blinking in the space of a mere millisecond, followed by a low rumble, all these convince me about the rain outside.
At this point, my mind suddenly wanders off, somewhere. Like a raven leaving its nest at the dead of night, in search of nocturnal insects, I find myself flying off in the distance, towards another possibility. I leave behind the rain, my husband, my house, myself.
“Is this the life I am meant for?”
Somebody is knocking on the door. Knock, knock. I gather my conscious self back. From the oblivion beyond, back to my self, to my husband, to my home, to the rain outside.
“Honey, you ok there?”
“Yeah, I’ll be out in a sec.” I shut the valve of the shower, open the glass portal, and reach out for the towel rack.
************************************************************************************
“So how was your day?” I sit beside my husband, at the sofa in our living room.
“Pretty hectic actually. Didn’t realize that we have that many orders. We actually have to put clients on hold today, can you believe it?”
He puts his right arm around me, and I snuggle up to him. I can smell our bath soap, lingering along his scent. “Well you work too hard. It’s your fault that your office becomes busy; you treat your customers too well. That’s why they call you back.”
“No matter how many clients we get, that doesn’t mean we are going to get any raise now, right?”
“Not really. That’s why you shouldn’t work too hard for them”
I look at him, and he is giving me one of his trademark grins. A boyish grin, like the ones you find on 9-year olds, all muddy and sweaty, holding out a bullfrog in front of you. Mischievous, yet innocent. I try to smile at him, but at this point, we are kissing.
After a few minutes, he looks at me. He seems distant, yet my face is so close to him.
“Something wrong?”, I ask him.
He smiles at me, “No, nothing…”
************************************************************************************
“You sleepy?”
“Not really.”
“Well I’m going to bed. For some reason, I feel so tired. And I’m the one guarding the house, hehe” At this, my husband stands up, and yawns.
A low thunder rumbled somewhere, and as if that reminded him of something, he said, “By the way, there’s a package for you. It’s in the study.”
“Who’s it from?”
“No clue. It doesn’t have any return address, and it looks like it was forwarded from one place to another, I don’t know.”
I make my way towards the study. The usual piles of books and magazines are still there. The rain is still outside, although it’s not as heavy a few hours ago, just a slight drizzle. The only source of light in the study room comes from the desk lamp, yellowish beam spilling on top of a box, covered with simple brown paper. I look at it, no return address, just as he said; only my name and our address on the center, hand written with a blue marker. Postage markings are all over it, all of them prompted with a “FORWARDED” stamp. The brown paper covering the edges are a bit thin, and looking at it closely, the box is actually colored black. I lift it, its weight surprisingly heavy. I try shaking it, hoping that whatever is inside would move, revealing its identity. A little rustling, but nothing else.
“What is this?”
“No clue here. Anyways, why don’t you open it? It’s not like it has anthrax or something, right?”
I turn around. My husband is by the archway separating the study from the rest of the house. I can’t see his face, only the outlines are visible to me. The light from the kitchen illuminates his hair, his ears, his neck, his form. But his other details, I can’t see them; the color of his eyes, the thickness of his lips, the rise and fall of his chest.
“Well I’m going to bed. Don’t stay up too late babes, you got work tomorrow.”
“I know. Goodnight.” I blow him a flying kiss, which he nimbly catches with his right hand. And he smiles, or at least I think he smiles, since I can’t really see it; only the creases in his cheek, crinkling, convinces me that he did. And with that he turns around, walks to our room, and I hear the clicking of our door.
I look at this strange package in front of me. Who sent this? Where did it come from? Why? There are no special occasions coming anytime soon. And I can’t remember anyone who would even send us anything, out of the blue. I decide to plunge into this dark unknown, with a letter opener.
*************************************************************************************
“I didn’t really understand a lot of things.”
Inside the box is a stack of papers. Probably one ream, maybe more. Printed words, organized into sentences, expressing some kind of thought. Neatly organized with Microsoft Word. Nothing out of the ordinary here. As I flip through the pages, I notice that only the first seven sheets have something printed on them. The rest are blank. I wonder who sent this? My mind is still wading on the confusion when I decide to go on and read.
“My life back then was pretty simple; I wake up at 4am, eat a hearty breakfast (while yawning every 30 seconds) then a shower, put on my school uniform, and then I’m for school. While at the classroom, I try hard to study; at recess, I try hard to eat. And when its time to go home, I go home. That was my life in a nutshell.
Yet everyday, a miracle happens. Nothing grandiose, just little things that gives substance to our daily routines; a sudden rain to cool off an otherwise warm and sticky afternoon, a cold glass of soda after a long, hard day, a smile from someone we don’t really notice till then. Yeah these are the little miracles of our times."
Flipping through the pages, I see that this is some sort of a rough draft for a short story. The writing is pretty much amateurish, yet reading through I feel a sense of truth, a sincerity flowing through the words. As if the author is pouring out his feelings, like water from a pitcher. No, it’s more like the rush of water, cascading from a waterfall. I keep reading, noting some grammar mistakes here and there, until I reach this part.
“She was the prettiest girl in class, even then. Her straight, long hair reached her shoulders, hiding her shapely ears. Her skin, white and clean, like the white sheets my mother hangs in our backyard fresh from laundry. Her smile which pierces the gloom of any day, transforming it into hope and enthusiasm, just like any July morning…”
By this time, I’m positive that this is an amateur’s work. The opening paragraphs are a bit vague and murky; the setting is not established, the protagonist is kind of flaky, and trying to grasp the essence of the story, the why of the scenarios, is like trying to catch a live catfish with your bare hands.
Still, why would anyone send me this? I don’t know anyone who works for a publishing house. And the riddle of the blank pages keeps on nudging my mind. They are blank for a reason, I suppose. Maybe some form of a metaphor. But what good would that bring?
“I didn’t really understand a lot of things.”
Yet the pacing is well thought, and the author is good with words, properly using them to create the scenes in the reader’s mind, just like watching a movie. By the time I reach the third page, I can see myself in their world…
I am wearing their school uniform. The sun is barely up, yet here I am up and already walking on the sidewalk. It is a bit cold, so I shove my hands inside my windbreaker. The birds are chirping their morning lauds. The horizon takes its colored hues from the rising sun, while the wind is breezing softly through the cicadas lining the sidewalk. I see a few students, wearing the same school uniform as mine, and there are some who are not. Yet my mind is busily moving in the opposite direction. Still murky from last night’s sleep, I try to organize my thoughts; all the while my legs are walking in their regular phase, independent from any of my conscious thought. The scenery out here is amazing, yet my mind couldn’t care less, since at this moment, it’s focused on one world-defining task: my homework.
While worrying about last night’s homework, I bump into someone along the way. We are going in the same direction, but since our pace is different (my legs walk fast, he is too slow), plus the fact that I’m not really paying attention, just made the situation unavoidable. I am about to say something in the lines of an apology and..
“I didn’t notice her at first, because I was worried about our homework, so we bump into each other. I was about to shout at her, say something like “Watch where you’re going!”, when I saw that it was Irene. Time slowed down, or maybe my perception of the moment became minimal, I wasn’t sure. Yet, I was convinced that all this happened on that fresh July morning. I was surprised, flustered, and then scared. All within a span of ten seconds max. It’s Irene alright. And at the precise moment that our eyes met, my heart started beating faster. What should I do? Where should I go? Racing in my head are 50,000 possible scenarios, flashing thru and fro, until my body decided to just run away.
I couldn’t bear to look any deeper in her eyes, because I know, if she looks into mine a few seconds longer, she’ll find out that I’m in love with her.”
I turn my eyes away from the story for a few seconds. I try to take a deep breath, but I can’t. It’s like an ancient cobweb that I am unaware of suddenly appeared in my chest, constricting me, depriving me of oxygen. When I finally draw breath, only then did the reality settled in me. My name is Irene. I am in this story.
************************************************************************************
Even with all the lighting and thunder outside, my husband is still peacefully asleep. His back is turned away, him facing the wall and the bedroom window. Only my bedside lamp is on. Watching him sleeping, I feel a sense of calm settling within me. In the midst of the chaos of the outside, of the reality, seeing him snuggled comfortably under the blankets, maybe dreaming off somewhere, anywhere the dream-weavers desired so, I feel secure. His back rises and falls regularly, marking his body with life. If I even feel alone here, I can easily convince him to come back her by my side. I just have to wake him up, that’s it. Although, I feel that, right now, I’d better leave him to his dreams, entrust him to Morpheus. I close our bedroom door partly, and I walk softly, first to the kitchen for a glass of water, and then back to our study room, where the story is atop the table. Still illuminated by the yellowish light of the lamp.
I pour myself a glass of bourbon, and I resume reading.
“Seeing Irene everyday makes it impossible for me to concentrate on ‘living’. The more I look at her, the more I realize the things that I lack. I live alone in an apartment complex near school. I don’t have anybody who I can really call friend. Actually, the sense of being alone is what defines me. I come home from school, study, and read books. I’m pretty much used to this idea of being alone, no one bothering me, and I guess I became comfortable with this. Its like this dark blanket that covers me every day is the fence that keeps me loosing who I really am. That was my life before I met her.
Yet, I admit, I dread the mornings. Those daily walks towards school, they make my heart beat so strongly, I fear that my chest would burst open, revealing my blood and organs on the sidewalk. Because it’s during those mornings when I see her. And the more I see her, a living, breathing person, normal in every way, the more I grow afraid of the world. In her eyes, I see all the things I was meant for, yet I did not have. In her eyes, I become more aware of what I can become. And with that realization, I grew more fearful of loosing myself, like sugar melding with coffee. Take a sip, and you have an idea that it is there. Yet, you can’t separate it from the rest of the mixture. You just know, because of the added sweetness.
Strange as it may sound, despite all this fear and anxiety, I am drawn to her. I am afraid to see her, yet I am afraid of not seeing her, too. We are two different polarities of an existence. And so, I think, my relevance, my importance, can only be found through her. Sadly, I can’t say the same for her. For all I know, I am just a stranger, someone who exists beyond her world, a prop if you will. And so, I decided to remain beyond her line of sight. If she looks beyond the horizons, I am just the cicada tree standing beside, just a part of the scenery.”
I try to remember the boys in my class. Who could the author be? Maybe it’s the class president. I seem to remember him living alone in an apartment at that time. Of course, I didn’t bother to find out if it’s true. Naoko and Alicia would have laughed at me if they find out I’m remotely interested in Mr. President. Besides, I know that the class president is more.. mundane. He always wore the latest brand-name watches, and he was not afraid of flirting with other girls. Sure he was smart and charismatic, but, the more I remember his face and his ways, the more I’m convinced that he is not this author.
Still, in reading this short story, I never realized that someone is actually looking at me this way. Other women would be horrified, if they found out that they have a stalker. But I have a feeling that, whoever wrote this, is far from being a stalker. He is just a boy after all. Albeit a boy, who is incredibly deep, and complex. A person who looks inside himself, unbothered by neither time nor society.
I read the story, even after I’ve finished my glass of bourbon. The rain stopped outside, and by the window, I see the glow of the crescent moon, surround by the dark clouds. By the time its 3:00 AM, I reach the last page of the story.
“I finally worked up the courage to talk to her. Maybe, courage is not the word. It’s more like.. I convinced myself that I should talk to her. The more I see her each day, the more I’m drawn towards her, the opposite polarity. All I remember is that this urge to speak to her grew inside me, penetrating each cell of my body, rushing along with the circulation of my blood. I couldn’t stop myself. I have to do it.
It was a beautiful March sunset, a Friday. Irene and I were assigned for room cleaning. So after classes, everyone was in a hurry to go home, except for the two of us. Outside, dusk was settling on the horizon, the woven hues of red and orange were embedded on the skies, giving the impression of blood and guts scattered on the sky. Consequently, everything else inside our third-floor classroom was bathed with colors so different from what the desks, the chairs, the chalkboards, really were. After I finished clearing the garbage cans, I looked at her. She has her back turned on me, busily sweeping the floor. Her long, reddish-black hair was swaying opposite the direction of her arms. As I came nearer to her, I can faintly smell her perfume, sweet yet indistinct. Like the smell of morning roses in an orchard. Along this assaulting scent, my heart started beating at a rate I’ve never experienced before. I breathed here essence inside, and I tried to calm my nerves.
Once I am near her, she turned at me, and…”
At this point, the story is finished. Exactly at the bottom of the seventh page, my world in the eyes of the protagonist came to a halt. Once my eyes are fixed on the last three periods, I felt a sense of loss. An unfinished story is one of the worst things that could happen ever. It’s along the lines of an unfinished song, an incomplete sketch. Because, this simple world, created from someone else’s mind should come to some sort of a finality, a definition. It’s not fair to the characters, to the ballad, to the object of the sketch, to be suddenly dropped and left by the creator.
And with this ceased story, my delicate past and my past in the eyes of the author, seamlessly melded into one streaming entity, is suddenly severed. It feels like my soul, that has taken a symbiosis with my soul in the eyes of the author, is abruptly separated, one piece from another. A violent storm inside me started burning. As if shouting “THAT’S NOT FAIR!! WHY!?!”, my essence trembled, rocking my brain back and forth, trying to convince me that this can’t be. I close my eyes, cloaking myself into the darkness, hoping to be sheltered from this catastrophe.
************************************************************************
I calm down after a few minutes. I’m still sitting in the chair, still inside my home, where my husband is still asleep at the adjacent room, our room. I have this sudden urge to go to bed, to sleep. I know that once I am asleep, I will open my eyes for the next day. And everything will be back to the way it was. I will be the accountant working for ___ Incorporated again. I will be the wife of ___ again. At this very minute, I want to go back to the way things are. Back to the smooth flow of the everyday world.
As I stand up, I notice that at the back of the last page of the story, there’s something written there. The author, or maybe the person who send me this, used a neon green highlighter, and with the yellowish light, I didn’t notice it before.
I turn the page, and sure enough, there’s something written there.
“we flow along the lines of the wind; as the flow changes, so we follow it..”
At the bottom of this message is a telephone number.
***********************************************************************************
The next day flows freely as usual. The husband is still asleep (he is a heavy sleeper, after all).After a hasty breakfast of coffee and French toast, I grab my shoulder bag from the table and I make way for work. It is a beautiful day; the world exudes an aura of freshness. In a sense, a sort of rebirth after the deluge from the previous night. The streets are a bit wet, with puddles here and there. The birds are chirping happily, circling the morning skies. Students are about, going to school. Another ordinary day outside. My mind, though, is dwelling farther from the ordinary.
That story from last night opened a door from my memories. Yet the incoming flood is so strong, so harsh, I couldn’t make sense out of it. Like a beaver dam bursting from the overflowing current of a river, thus sorting through the dirt is impossible.
Still, that phone number would clear a lot of things; besides, that’s the only clue left in this mess. And as I step inside my office, I am pretty much set into calling that number. But before I do that, I have to go back to the flow of the everyday world. And that involves phone calls, meetings and other meaningless paperwork.
************************************************************************
Come lunch break, I dial the phone number. Pressing the 11-digit numbers in my office phone, my heart starts to beat a little faster. Along with this quickened pace, my hands start to sweat. Why am I feeling this way?
Ring ring.
I hope he (or maybe a she?) won’t answer the phone.
Ring ring.
“Hi Irene.”
I try to match the voice with a face, but try as I might, I can neither see, nor hear, this face or this voice. Who are you?
“Who is this?”
I hear him chuckle at the other end of the line; a dry, weary laugh. His chortle sounding like cackling chickens at my end of the line. “Nice to hear from you, too.”
“I’m sorry, but whoever you are, I don’t take to receiving odd packages as a laughing matter.”
“Sorry about that, but there’s no other way around it. I have to get it out of the system, you know? Kind of like airing some laundry on the roof.”
“Who are you?”
“It’s a beautiful day today. Why don’t we go out for some coffee? My treat. And when we meet up, I’m sure things will be much clearer, ok?”
“If you’re not willing to tell me who you are, then what makes you think I’d be willing to drink coffee with you?”
I hear a faint rustling at the background, just like wiping the receiver of a telephone with a cloth. “Because I know for a fact that you are curious about the story. And, yes, I based it from an event that happened in my life. You could say that it’s a bit, autobiographical. But don’t worry, I have no intentions of publishing that amateurish work. I just want you to read it, that’s why I sent it to you. ” And with that he chuckles again. Like cackling chickens at my end of the line.
***********************************************************************
4 PM. I get up from my desk, and I ask my boss if I could be excused for the rest of the day. Ok, there’s not much left to do here anyways, he said. I thank him, and I grab my shoulder bag from my chair, and I say goodbye to everyone else at the office. I leave work early once in a while anyways, so this is just one of those days. Nobody would really wonder, or at least that’s what I think. Besides I don’t have to explain myself to anybody; it’s not like I am doing anything immoral.
It’s only a few blocks from our office to the Village Perk, yet it seems like a mile or so. My mind is full of those scenes from that short story. An ordinary school day, early morning. Birds in the sky, the cold morning mist, and that boy. Strangely though, his face is a blank. And no matter how hard I try, I can’t remember what he looks like. Or even his haircut. Is he fat, or thin? Is he pale? Does he have crooked teeth? All these minute details, along the others, are the summation of what he may have looked like. Yet, even if I close my eyes, and think hard, I can’t come up with anything. The memory simply vanished into the yawning depths. At times, the young boy’s face is replaced by someone else’s: the kid who manages the copy machine at the office, our class president, even my husband. Yet their faces don’t match with the boy from the story, because they are out of proportions, like caricatures found in editorial comics. And so, when I open my eyes again, the face of the boy is still a blank.
The memory simply vanished into the yawning depths.
The deeper question plaguing me, though, is the truth of this story. Did all that really happened? If it did, why can’t I remember? If it didn’t, then why do I feel so uneasy?
I take a deep breath, filling my lungs with the air that surrounds me. Across the street is the Village Perk. Is there someone waiting for me there? Who can he be? And why is he waiting? Once I step inside of that coffee shop, I am about to cross the great divide. I’ll find out the truth about the short story. His explanations would cause me to bleed away my old blood, my old life. He is a knife that stabs and slices on the stretched skin. And with the skin ruptured, bright red blood will flow freely. This is not as simple as changing a shampoo brand; I may not be the same person when I walk out of that establishment. A shift towards something different, a Copernican Revolution maybe. With these thoughts, my ears start to hear a slight, very slight ringing; a small, piercing note that travels with the very air that I breathe.
One step, two steps, three steps. I reach for the door with my left hand, giving it a slight push. And immediately, the aroma of coffee stormed my faculties, assaulting my senses. With home-brewed coffee.
********************************************************************
I walk inside the coffee shop, and immediately my attention focuses on the man who sits at the back. He looks a bit haggard, with his unkempt hair and gaunt cheeks. A slight stubble grows on his chin and upper lip. A picture of a man who has forgotten the basics of self-care. Yet he wears an expensive-looking white polo shirt, sans the wrinkles, complete with a short, black necktie. Dark chino pants and shiny, black Florsheims complete his outfit. He looks at me, while he adjusts his black-framed glasses on his nose bridge. A slight waft of cigarette smoke floats lazily beside him; on the ashtray are three crushed Marlboros.
I draw my gaze away from him for a second, as I scan the place for other patrons. There’s nobody else around here. I hear some noise coming from behind the bar; somebody is still working the kitchen. Or something that resembles a kitchen, since this is a coffee shop after all. I look back at this figure, and again he smiles. I turn behind me, checking to make sure that there’s nobody else there. And when I look back at him, he waves at me, motioning over to his spot. A jazzy tune plays in the background. Miles Davis perhaps, though I can’t be sure.
“Do you know how long I have been waiting for you?” I try to answer back, but I can’t think of anything to say. I don’t know who this man is. I stand frozen on my spot, just behind the chair in front of him.
“Why don’t you sit down?”
“I’m sorry. Who are you again?”
He adjusts his eye glasses again. He just looks at me behind them, yet it seems that he felt something with what I just said. I never really put any thought to it though. And I didn’t mean to sound rude to him. But after a few seconds, he regains his composure, and he offers the vacant chair. I pull it away from the table, and I sit down, slinging my shoulder bag at the backrest.
“So…”
“Actually, it’s me who should apologize, sending you that package out of the blue. I really shouldn’t have done that. Normal people, what they usually do, is that they call first right? You know, get in touch with the other person, especially with those whom they neither have seen nor heard from for the past twelve years.”
I nod. He takes the silence that follows as his cue to go on.
“Well, the thing is, its kind of urgent. And I have to act. Any day later would be a disaster.”
“Exactly what are you talking about, mister..”
“Sorry I can’t tell you that. Just go ahead and call me… hmm, Martin sounds fine.”
Agitation starts to build up in me. Who is this person, anyways? Why won’t he tell me his name?
“If you can’t be honest enough to tell me who you are, then, excuse me. I want to go home now.” I stand up from the chair, but he reaches over the table, and he holds my hand. I look at him, and he seems.. afraid. Like a child who doesn’t want to be left alone in a dark room.
“Please hear me out, Irene. I need to ask you something. I promise you, this won’t take any minute longer after I finish my coffee.” I look inside his coffee cup; it’s half-full.
“This involves your life. And, possibly, other people’s lives as well. So please?”
I sit down on the chair. “What do you mean?”
He lets go of my hand, and he sighs a relief. He takes a sip, a loud sip, from his coffee cup. After that, he puffs at his cigarettes.
“So what is this all about?”
“I know you feel uncomfortable right now. I won’t do anything that would harm you, Irene. Not then, and certainly not now.”
“You sound like you know me pretty well. How do you know about me?”
He takes another drag from his cigarette, flicking the ashes off to the ashtray. “We were high-school classmates. Although back then, I kind of flew under everybody else’s radar, if you know what I mean.”
“I try to remember those days, but, no matter how hard I try, I can’t remember you.”
“I know. Don’t worry about that. It’s all in the past anyways, although..”
I stare at him; I can’t make any sense with anything he tells me. Both of us are like foreigners of different nationalities, speaking in our foreign tongues. Without a translator, someone, or a something, to put us in a common ground, we would never understand what one tries to convey to the other.
I try to shift our conversation back to the short story. “You said something about that short story as.. autobiographical?”
He nods, so I continue. “So, by autobiographical, you mean to say that everything there happened in your past? And in your past, I am in it?”
“Yes.” He crushes his cigarette, dashing the ember at the bottom of the glass ashtray.
“Then how come I can’t remember anything? Because ever since we spoke at the phone this morning, I try to remember you, and..”
He lightly puts his hand on top of mine. “Don’t strain yourself. You’ll just get a headache.”
I look at his hand. They are small hands, too small for a man. They are like the hands of a young adult, maybe a 14-year old. And I can’t help but notice that his hand is cold. It is a bit cold in here; although I can’t hear the air-conditioning anywhere. They make a low, humming sound, despite the claims in commercial ads. Silent-type rotors, the next wave in air-conditioning units.
“So you don’t remember anything at all?”
“Not really. Although your story made me visualize the scenery so well. Just like the opening pages of “Norwegian Wood”.
He grins at that revelation. “I know that novel! That was brilliantly written. I loved that book. Actually, when I finished reading it, that’s where I got the inspiration to start writing that story I sent you. Just as how Toru Watanabe wants to remember Naoko, by putting his memory to paper. Yet the more he tries to recall her, the more those memories slip by.”
I smile at him, remembering some of the lines of that particular book. About imperfect vessels of writing, to imperfect memories and imperfect thoughts.
He looks at me, straight in the eyes, and I stare right back. Behind those clear glasses, dark brown pools peer into my soul. In his stare, I don’t feel any kind of animosity, the scowl, the kind that any of us may feel when other people give us that look. Rather, his is much more soothing. And I feel arrested in his eyes. The funny thing is, I willingly give myself up to him, this stranger of a man, whom I should remember, but I don’t. I know now for a fact that I should remember. Because in his stare, I feel incomplete, as if a certain part of me was taken away, stolen. In the midst of this sense of loss, my eyes became watery, and my vision of him becomes blurry. The tears start to well up, and they crawl on my cheeks. Yet, I don’t rub them away; these are not dirt which we hastily remove from our clothes, as if their mere presence revolts our sensibilities. This is the reality that I try to accept, and this tears that keep on flowing are there, because they are for the missing parts inside of me.
He just stares ahead. He makes no move to wipe away the flowing tears in my cheek. He accepts them instead, and in his comforting stare, the lost parts in me are somewhat stressed, accentuated even.
“Would you like to remember, Irene?”
On a shaky voice, I ask him, “How? Are you going to tell me?”
“Telling the past is no different from telling the future. No matter how much words I use, you won’t remember, you’ll simply learn.”
“So how..”
“How about.. you will go back in that time? Re-live? Do a take 2?”
I keep silent, so he continues.
“You can go back to those days, Irene. Breathe the past, touch past. That’s the only way you can remember. And maybe.. change some things. But there is a price though.”
“How much?”
“Your present. That is the price. Who you are now, the people you have met, anybody whom you affected. They will go on a different path once you made the changes. Some may become happier, some may be dead. Either way, everything you see here will become something else. That is the price.”
Is he suggesting time travel? That is not possible. That concept is beyond the realms of science; that can only happen in the movies. Martin reads my face, and he knows that I don’t believe him.
“You don’t believe me? Would you like a sample then? It won’t be anything grandiose, but…”
He points at the speakers mounted on the ceiling. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Kenwood surround speakers, hooked up to a player somewhere behind the counter. I can hear Nina Simone voice from those speakers. Suddenly, the sound becomes garbled, then some static. At the same time, the whole object becomes hazy, the colors squirming here and there, like slugs in a basket, until finally, the speakers start to take a more definite shape. I close my eyes, hoping that what I am seeing is merely an illusion, a trick. Again, the ringing noise, that single piercing note, I can hear it. I try to cover my ears, to block the sound away, but its still there. This time it’s louder.
“You got a great speaker system here, Harry.”
“You noticed huh? And to think I almost bought the Kenwood’s.”
With the ringing sound gone, I open my eyes again. Hanging from the ceiling are Bose surround speakers, Nina Simone’s soulful playing filling the whole café. I look at Martin sitting across from me, as he takes a drag from his cigarettes. His coffee cup looks half-empty now.
***********************************************************************
I start to think about my husband. What will happen to him then? He would probably go on with the kind of life that he had. He never openly talked about his past, his life before we met. On that fateful evening at a party. What kind of a man is he back then? The only clue I know of, is that once, he told me that he was really thankful that we got married. “I don’t want to go back to what I once was”, that’s what he said.
“Have you decided?” Martin lights another cigarette. I need to make a decision then. Do I go back, or do I stay? I want to remember, but at the same time, the face of my husband, smiling, is in my head. That sense of loss is still here, a hole inside me that can never be covered by anything else. But in that loss, my husband’s beaming grin, I remember that one. If I go back, will he ever smile like that again? Or will that, too, be lost forever, just like the memory I should have, but taken away?
I don’t want to go back to what I once was.
“I’ve decided Martin. I’ll stay here. Even if this memory, my memory of you, is missing, I think it's hidden for a particular reason. And no matter how much I want to take it back, I can’t. I have a responsibility now. I can’t leave my husband alone. He needs me. I’m sorry.”
From the small Bose speakers, I hear Ella Fitzgerald singing “Misty”. Martin smiles again, a weak smile. “I understand. Looks like you’ve made your choice then.” He then crushes his Marlboros into the ashtray, and he leaves some money on the table. Without saying anything else, he gets up from his chair, and he walks away. I couldn’t bear to look at his comforting eyes. I don’t deserve them. So as he drifts farther away, like a distant memory leaving towards the uncharted unknown, I stare down at the floor.
“You know, things that are hidden tend to reveal themselves, in one way or another. They don’t stay underground for too long....” I look up, but there is nobody else inside the café.
******************************************************************************
Three days later, a powerful earthquake hits the whole country. I was on my way back from work when it suddenly happened. Starting out as a low rumble, then building up its intensity, a crescendo of destruction arose. The surrounding buildings swayed and buckled, the lamp posts fell from their concrete stand. I couldn’t keep my footing, and I fell on the ground. Everyone around me was wailing and screaming. I remembered Martin then, sitting across from me, with his unkempt hair and his expensive clothes, smoking his Marlboros. His voice on the phone, and his cackling laughter. In the midst of the destruction, his face was the very first thing that came to my head, as I tried to run, and I took shelter on a waiting shed. For a few tense minutes, the ground roiled and shook, until finally, its intensity began to abate, slowing down, then the aftershocks. And at last, it stopped. I tried to stand from the ground, and I looked up. There were no birds flying around, thick clouds darkened that July evening.
Across the nation, everything was rendered vulnerable to the might of the earthquake. A college building in a nearby city topples, killing hundreds of students, trapping some of them under the pile of ruble and debris. Bridges collapsed, roads were gutted open. Our house was not spared, although it wasn’t as bad as the others; just a large crack appeared on the south wall, and all of our china was shattered. My husband was immediately called by a newspaper, asking him to do some front-page shots of the aftermath. When I got home, there was a note on the fridge door, explaining just that.
Somewhere far away, the sounds of fire trucks and ambulances can be heard. One of our neighbors’ houses was toppled to the ground. Was there somebody inside when it fell? I couldn’t tell. I made my way towards our study room. Once on the doorway, I saw everything in disarray; books from the shelf were scattered all over the floor, piled magazines, or what used to be “piled”, were now jumbled, not one magazine on top of the other. I looked at the table, and the brown box is still there. I reached over and opened it, and there was nothing inside but a ream of blank paper. I flipped through each page, but there was nothing left. Martin’s story was erased, cleared and filed somewhere else.
“Maybe I should have..”, then I stopped on that thought.
posted by Gendo Ikari at 4:32 PM
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