*clicks*

*hissing sound*

Hello? Test. Test.

*clicks*

*dead silent sound*

*hissing sound*

Hello.

I don’t have a pen. That’s why I’m recording this.

Hi. My name is Alexis. And. I don’t know who you are. I don’t know if anyone would pick it up. I’m 22 years old. No, not really. That’s bullshit. I don’t know how old I really am. With my body versus my mind, I am torn between subjecting my facts to what I know versus what I can see. And I don’t think I’m anywhere near that age at all.

*sighs*

I’m tired. Of being jaded. I don’t think I’d ever fall in love again. I don’t think I’d want to fall in love AGAIN. I want to stay with what I have. I want to stay in love with what I have. I have seen broken hearts too much. I have seen wants and likes and dislikes and compatibilities, and it’s just so fucking hard to settle sometimes that finally, I think I see something I’d want to stay with for a long time. It’s not perfect, and that’s the irony of it. It’s perfect that it’s not perfect. Because if it were, then it might not be real. Real is when you try to love someone despite the improbabilities of making it last but it does because you know you want it so bad to last the universe does it for you. No kismet, no happy ever afters. Well, there’s hope, and struggle, and happy mostly and a few angers in between. But I want to stay with her. She makes me WANT to stay with her. And I really think that’s a good thing.

*long pause*

You know, once I thought you were the one. Yeah, you. You proved to me that soul mates never exist. I mean, they probably do. But you didn’t for me. You kind of broke it off. But thinking about it, maybe you were, but just in a way we never thought it would be. Counted a few broken lifetimes and now you have what I had before but you were too happy to notice. Now I’m happy but I’m still noticing, and I can’t say I don’t care but we’ve been friends for such a long time, sometimes it’s hard not to care even if I’m mostly apathetic. But that’s that.

*sniffs*

Now you. No, not the other one. The other you. The new you.

You scare the hell out of me.

You scare the hell out of me because you went from a dream to unreal to semi real to a dream all over again, but this time, a dream to aspire with, not a dream to simply moon about. That’s kind of the point, isn’t it? When you go with the term “with.” God, sometimes I still think this is not happening, but I feel overwhelmed how we manage to make it work. And I truthfully like it. But honestly? I’m scared. I’m so scared—no, I’m fucking scared shitless—to be in something so real again. To be looking at futures this early when we talk about things and I can’t help but have a private smile and wish you won’t stop talking about it even if I may seem distant sometimes because I just pretend but I love it when you factor me in on everything. I just wanted you, period. You wanted me for a long time, and that’s scaring me sometimes. Because hope is never quite the same after you dropped it from 30 floors down.

I…

I don’t want to go.

And…I know. Sometimes, I run.

But…I’m just worried I might fuck it up if I do, so I let things cool down a bit and my head won’t be spinning with I told you so phrases on eternal repeat. Like, “I told you, Alexis, you shouldn’t have gone with a dream.” Or, “I told you, Lex, she’ll wake up soon.” Or, “Lex, she’ll give up one day.” Or “Lex, Lex, Lex, you pathetic little girl, stop thinking she’ll be your new world. It’s a breakable aspiration.”

But that’s the problem. You always manage to break those negatives. And sometimes, saying “forever” doesn’t seem too bad.

*coughs*

God, it’s so fucking cold out here. It’s been raining again, and it’s such a bad fucked up feeling being all cooped up in here without the warmth of you.

*cricket sounds*

*gulping sounds*

You know, sometimes I just don’t know how to deal with some news. I’m sorry.

*more gulping sounds*

But I think , I just don’t know how to really say “I’m so lucky” better other than ranting like this out in the open with an old recorder. Ugh. I have to go in. It’s really freezing. I’m just ranting this one time. I don’t know if I need to listen to this again, I hate listening to my own voice. So I’ll throw this tape in to the creek and you won’t have to know.

*pause*

Yeah. I’ll just tell you I love you in the morning. You won’t have to know.

*click*

“You’re a bitch.”

I hung my head low. I don’t really know how to really put it.

“ I know.”

She looked at me exasperatedly, as if repeating a useless fact. I tried looking somewhere else, some stone that’s gone astray in the pavement, but I felt much more foolish. Here I was, in my boxers, wearing a gray shirt and my favourite plaid long sleeves. I was a carryover of the whole day’s toll. I was wasted without effort. And I was standing in front of her and getting a beating.

“You’re snarky, you’re selfish, and you’re horribly painful with your mood swings. You’re a jerk. You’re very grumpy. You’re very unpredictable. You want me to see you, and here I am, and you wouldn’t do anything other than stare at me or just stay silent. You wouldn’t even tell me what’s wrong. And I’m here, wondering why I’m here when you’re being an ass. Just. What. The. Hell. Do. You. Want. Me. To. Do?!” She folded her arms on her chest, and I stood there, just stood there. There’s nothing else I could do.

“Stay.”

She looked at me like I just said the most inapplicable word there is.

“What?”

I took a deep breath.

“One day. One day I’ll realize that I’m not that special. That the world would not put up with me and my shortcomings. That I’m foolish beyond reason. But I’m this. And a whole lot of other bad and weird things. I’m moody and bitchy and I would demand of things that I wouldn’t even know why I would and why I did. But please. I’m not…asking you to put up with it. I’m asking you to…stay.”

She softened a bit. But there was defensiveness.

“Isn’t that the same thing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Putting up with it? And staying?”

“No. You don’t have to do anything. Just stay with me.”

“That’s awfully hard, you know.”

“I know.”

She stayed silent. I think at this point, she was simply tired of arguing. We don’t argue much. I think that’s what set it off.

“Please.”

“Alexis, if you want me to stay, give me a reason to. Because this,” she motioned to an unseen lot of emotional baggage “is just hard to understand.”

“I know.” I bit on my lip. How do I make her understand? “But these are my troubles. I’m not asking you to be a part of them. I just…want you to stay.”

“But don’t you want me to help you with that? Every time I’m here you bitch about things in a detached manner but you don’t tell me things. Make me a part of your world, Alexis. When I’m here, you just either bitch or you stare.”

“That’s the point.” I was desperate. “They…become meaningless and much more bearable when you’re around. You make things beautiful. You’re enough.”

And she looks at me, torn between wanting to sigh and bash my head. But she nods.

And that was enough.

February 29th
From the desk of Alexis

She has always had cautious eyes. On the times when she thinks nobody’s looking she still has a guarded look, not like as if anybody is posing to strike, but as if someone might hurt her. That’s the distinction, I suppose. While other people’s guarded looks are out of distance provided to help them cope, hers were more of a simple wary look, almost pleading without exactly voicing, please, don’t hurt me. I have had enough.

I have always been a slave of being misled in translating such facade from different people, but hers is by far the most interesting. While other people have obvious happiness or sadness, hers always had a tinge of sadness on both—a little unsure whether she’s allowed to be happy, a little hesitant whether she’s allowed to be sad. She was trained to observe. What she doesn’t know is that I’m noticing. And despite the soft blush on her face, the perfect lips, and the sharp eyes, even that precautious smile—all of them lead to only one hope for those who does translate accurately: that she finds that one person who does make her happy genuinely.

Sadly, despite all my perception and science of her, I wouldn’t be that character.

—–

In 1989 I would be found tying a thread on a balloon which I would try to fly across the clouds. It wasn’t vain, but it didn’t fly very high. I would recount that it was because I was planning to fly it like a kite, but was later on distracted when an airplane came transversely through my peripheral vision, and having a very short attention span, I would point out to the sky, and at such a young age, I had the ambition to fly to meet my grandmother who was then situated overseas. A brother’s friend would approach me and ask what I was pointing at, and we would both coo, bye, bye, airplane while waving at it. I resumed to flying the balloon, this time with the desire of making the balloon reach the gargantuan steel beast to bring to my grandma.

I would recount this same story to someone late this year after he asks me for the earliest childhood story I have. It came next after the question what was my passion, which was revised to become who was my passion.

It would take me some days to realize that it was not an extremely different question. That while I was a kid back in 1989 I would have the ardour to fly a plane to reach my grandmother, while today, in my twenties when I’m capable and older, I would sit and deny myself of running towards the person I would want to convince. And all it would take is one cab ride.

—–

Leap years were created by the scholars for the romantics (or irrational). You cannot deny yourself that fact.

See, it must have been foresight that, out of a human’s struggle to live foolishly and create an elaborate drama to forget, there would be one year which would spare you all the drama of remembering after maybe four years after, when someone has somehow—if not fully—healed. So if you create something that you would want to hurt you less, better have it experienced on a Leap year and wait for February 29th four years after—that way, you live and forget.

Isn’t it convenient? You grab a random romantic (or irrational) and make him pine over someone, weep his self silly, write poignant poetry and if skill allows it, create a song or an ambiguous film about the hurt, wrap it up in gold cellophane and couple him with unfounded moments—all in one day: February 29th. The key though is to ensure he would not repeat the same events so as not to prolong the drama, then, mark it as the one day memorial. The next year, he won’t be able to celebrate anything. Nor the year after that. It’s simple, it’s romantic (or irrational), it’s genius.

So, that being said, I’ll see you in four years.

(written sometime mid-Feb. I just didn’t get to post this)

SHE CAN’T REALLY DRAW. But In the middle of meetings, data gatherings and all the other energy heist in the office, she found herself doodling in a quaint little coffee shop in the metro which happened to serve the best pasta as well. She slipped in a little beer, for lunch, and while she’s waiting for the pesto to arrive, she kept replicating a memory she couldn’t erase from her mind: her sleeping under the covers of some foreign yet oddly familiar sheets, with the rays of the sun giving ample light for her to gaze at the sleeping form of Ender, letting her marvel at the beauty in front of her. It was a sight that she couldn’t seem to control herself into not imagining over and over. Traces of mascara on her lashes and on her cheeks. Her eyes lost into the transition of her body’s rest. The quick succession of her breathing. The soft curves of her nose. The sharpness of her upper lip’s heart-shaped arch. The way her lower lip quivers after some involuntary pouts.

Alexis stopped her pencil. It was really that image she was trying to keep perfecting, despite her best efforts. The paper has already lost its smoothness after re tracing some lines, only to erase them again. It’s those lips she wanted to come to life, to haunt her, to consume her. She realized she wanted to touch those lips badly she had to have them on paper.

A plateful of pasta materialized in front of her. “Artist?” The waitress who served the food asked as she took a glance at Alexis’ notebook. She wanted to cover it as an impulse, but realized that all she has drawn are bad lines altogether, really. She smiled.

“Hardly,” Alexis replied. “Just inspired.”

“Ah.” The waitress remarked knowingly. “Then that’s much better, isn’t it?”

“It is.” Alexis agreed, her smile growing wider.

“Lucky person.”

“Not as lucky as I am.”

The waitress grinned in agreement, then left Alexis to her lunch. She took another swig of beer before going for the pasta. She paused—the beer had a sudden distinct bitter taste, reminding her of something. Tequila? The same taste she remembered savoring after her lips parted with Ender’s that same night—except Ender’s lips had a strange sweet aftertaste that Alexis couldn’t fathom. Mixing it with Tequila made Ender her sweet suicide.

Alexis shook her head. It’s never going to stop, is it? She whispered to herself. Then she realized, maybe it’s not that bad at all.

Sometimes you wonder why nobody ever made doctors about moments. I mean, yeah, it can be pretty hard to define for now, but if you think about it, it makes sense. I mean, come on, it’s almost like pre-empting possible psychological damage. Half of the nut case issues out there are because of moments, really.

Nobody ever listed moments as a primary need. But when you consider how much we are made by moments, you would realize how much of a slave we really are to it: a defining song to intensify a feeling; a lingering look; a perfect Sunday morning in the room which lets you gaze at someone while sleeping and you’re both under a comforter; a hand held while driving; a laugh shared while thinking of a word. Then there are the lethal ones: a request to stay five minutes so you could be looked at and remembered how you are because you would be missed; starting to walk away but you stop because deep inside you’re trapped in the middle of your decision to either make another step or go and run back; making that decision and running back and making that final kiss of the day, week, possibly longer. And you walk more and linger and you know you can’t do anything else but look sadly as the person goes. And when it has finally sunk in that it’s gone, you still stay in your spot wondering whether you should ask for the person to come back or you go on and let things run its course. And you know you have to choose the latter.

See, every freaking day of our lives we are taught about the basics of living: money, food, shelter, clothes, more education, more money, more food, better shelter, better clothes. And it all revolves around it. But nobody ever bothered to have told me, goddamit, Alexis, one day your heart will be torn from you and it’s all because of you and your decision to linger on moments.

It’s cruel. But that’s the essence of everything, isn’t it? The world would have to be cruel for you to do something, damn it, and make it less cruel for you. And I wonder, when would be that time I would have the courage to step up and make it less cruel for that person, for me, and for us?