The Eternal Reverie

         

I’d moved to Belgium from Paris to be closer to my mother, in an attempt to manumit my heart from its eternal bereavement. I lived alone, a life which I wasn’t accustomed, and but I assumed it would be for the best, to distance myself, refraining from any opportunity pertaining to anything extraneous to my isolation and solitude. I became severely vexed. I did not want anything to do with anyone. All I desired was her. In my aloofness, mother prescribed that I needed a woman. And then there was Claire – plain, ambitious Claire. We married, she gave me a child, her trust, her loyalty and her love; all of which made me somewhat happy, but merely temporarily seized my attention.The memory of her, my darling Angelina, still remains embedded in my mind.

It isn’t merely a memory that has distracted me from blessings of my picturesque family; it is a much deeper vexation. I have a yearning for her touch, her figure perfectly fitted into my bosom, the look in her eyes and to see her smile again, that heart-warming smile. If only I could see her again!

         Today, a desperate feeling has risen inside, my heart ablaze in anxieties and an urge to run. I want to find her! I could take a train to Paris without any trouble. Oh! What a foolish thought! I am a married man now, this will not do. But… I could see to it that Claire and our child are looked after – I can establish an annuity! But no, no I can’t. And besides, she is nowhere known to me. I do not know whether she is dead or still living among us. Is this angelic being walking the earth with another man perhaps, intermingled arm in arm as we once were? I have not been nearly the same. She completed me and now I have lost her. She is my reverie, and now I am ruined. I married someone I do not love, a wasteful, conceited endeavor in hopes of filling the void within me.

         I do not love my wife. I do not. It is such a shameful thought, but I can’t help saying what I feel. And I can’t continue to live in hypocrisy. This is the truth and this ugly honesty is unacceptable, detested in the sacred shire. Why must it be wrong? Why must it be? Father Hoffman ridiculed my endeavors and thoughts, “A great sin it is to lust for another woman,” he admonished, yet I remained unaffected.

         Oh, Angelina! Where are you? Why did you leave me there so many years ago? She was gone. Gone, gone! I could not believe it, I would not accept it, but then there was the letter, and I knew the truth. Whether I’d rejected it, this reality remains immovable, and I figure I will always be imprisoned to my thoughts and the memory of my past love.

Losing the light

         

The cold air slips into my lungs. It is one of the last breaths I will ever take. You stand beside me and hold my arm in your hand. It is too hard of a grip for it to be a caring gesture. I breath out. My breath is hurled into the air, twisting and turning, a river of white silk. It rides the wind up to the stars, curls over itself, and dies away. Just like us I suppose. I wonder at what point had you changed your mind. Chose her over me.

         Your eyes were what first struck me. Not your crippled leg. Not the limp that that leg had given you. Your eyes were the color of blue jade, of the sky after a storm. They were beautiful. You had an uncertain look in your eyes on that first day I saw you. I was the little girl you saw, peeking around a corner. That girl you waved to and smiled. I was 12. You, 14.

         We went to Starbucks together. You ordered the same drink I did. Cherry blossom frappucino. But for some reason, you wanted yours to be blue, so they put loads of food coloring in. They were just like your eyes. We laughed together. Remember? You had to use the restroom and I stole some of your drink. You came back and looked at me. I said I didn’t do it. Then you reached forward and wiped a drop of blue cream off my cheek. My mom called and ruined that moment. When we left, you held the door for me.

“Ladies first,” you had said. I was 14. You, 16.

         There was the pool party at the end of the school year. You convinced me to jump off the diving board with you. I shrieked as you betrayed me and pushed me off. I got my revenge by doing the same. The sun was warm on my back and your breath was warm on my neck. You got a sunburn, and I rubbed coconut oil onto your body.

         Your excuse that day for pushing me off the board was, “Ladies first.” I was 17. You, 19.

         On Christmas morning, you came to my house. We sat under the tree, talking. You were ranting on and on about how you couldn’t find me a perfect gift because nothing was worthy of being in my possession. And then you leaned towards me and we kissed. Our first kiss. Your lip pressed to mine, your hand gently resting against the small of my back. Your breath was sweet in my nose, of the smell of the chocolate you had eaten. The smell of you. At the end of the day, you said you actually had a present for me. And I had a last gift for you too. But you leaned over into the back seat and pulled out a present. It was small. And wrapped in red paper. I wanted you to open yours first but you insisted.

         You justified this with a, “Ladies first.” I was 19. You, 21.

         Then you met her. That was the day my life crumbled. She burned it in front of my eyes, brilliant, gold flares tossed into the sky, consuming it. It burned. When it had eaten me away, she kept it going, stoking the flames with tiny pieces of my soul. She slowly tore me apart. She saw you almost every day from then on. You went with her, forgetting me, drowning me in those frothing, writhing blue eyes of yours, pushing my head under the water and holding it there, until I drowned.

         When I asked you why you spent less and less time with me, you replied, “Ladies come first.” Something you suppose I’m not, something I never was. I was 22. You, 24.

         She said I was hateful, horrible. Jealous. And that I couldn’t stand your leg. You believed that. You fell into the dark trap she set you, following her instructions hoping that it would get you out. It only led to this. I knocked on your door later that night. You told me to go away. You screamed at me to stop coming to you, to stop ruining your life when all you did was ruin mine. Our voices echoed down the street. Neighbors shut their windows after shouting curses. My face aches at the spot where your hand left a print. It still hurts.

         “My relationship is with her only!” you shouted in my face, even though I was just two feet away from you. I was 23, you 25.

         She told you I was planning to end your life. Why would I? You believed everything. She made you her minion, her pawn. She ruled over your every move, discarded every thought that had anything to do with going out with me. And when she said, “Get her out of my life,” you obliged. I am 24, you 26.

         You told me you wanted to make up for everything that has happened. You wanted to go to a “special spot.” I was all too happy to go with you. You led me to a clifftop. Beneath us, the crashing bodies of icy salt water slammed into the rocks and created a spray of fine mist that veiled my vision. Here I stand, next to you. My arm tightly gripped in your hand. You say you are tired of choosing the wrong person. Tired of living with the decision, with all the things you said about me. You ask me to fly with you, into the embrace of the ocean. I reply, foolishly, “Yes.”

         Your hand holding mine, we face the sunset. The waves gnawed at the ankles of the cliff and lapped at the sand. You looked happy, content. You looked at me and I felt a hard nudge prod my back. Your hand was no longer in mine and I was tipping over the edge, losing balance, falling. And you stood, steady, on the cliff.

         I let you force me through unfamiliar landscapes of events, climbing over the boulders of your doubts, ducking under the branches that tried to stop me from reaching to you, wading through raging rivers of your anger. After all that and I stayed with you. But you left me. The cold spray of the ocean engulfed me, shrouding you from my sight. But not before I saw. I saw you. With her. And that was the last of you I had before the mist close around me.

Lifeless

People described her as soulless, hollow and empty. Maybe she was.

Complacent, quiet and withdrawn, she went to school every day, regarded it as a monotone procedure one simply had to do and did not object. Her grades were usually high, not because she wanted them to be, but because it was right for them to be.

Friends and teachers were formalities. She had a few of them, sure. Didn’t really enjoy their company, but laughed and went out with them nevertheless, trying to conform to the norms of the school society. She couldn’t though.

Maybe it was because she was so reserved, or maybe people resented her high grades and her above-average appearance, but people never really liked her. Maybe it was because she never liked them. She regarded humans with cold indifference, never once wondering who they might be and what they might do. She preferred her own company, lived in a world of solitude, engrossed in her books. A million and one stories, a million and one lives.

It wasn’t exactly the life she never even owned, but it was a good compensation.

She never really knew what she wanted to do with herself; she never cared to find out. Her body, her existence too was merely something that had to be endured until the course of life played out. She lived silently, pausing the closure of her mouth only to eat and to murmur a few words whenever required. She lived without caring, by turning off her brain.

For, thought isn’t necessary when you are the dead.

Psychologists, psychiatrists and clergymen could not even make a dent in her shell; she was already so far gone. She swallowed antidepressants bottle by bottle, attended therapy for years and years, again, to her these were only formalities, things she had to do because she just had to do them.

She disagreed with the principle they tried to teach her, that life was good. Life wasn't good or bad, ugly or beautiful. Life could not be described by adjectives adhering to those within life. Life was an external force, a necessity, a power that was uncontrollable, that one had to bow to.

Sometimes she would wonder what had got her here, and why she had become so. She would lament the loss of her spirit for nights until she would realize the truth, that she was formed without one.

That her existence was meaningless, that she was simply a mass of atoms drifting through the endless void called the universe. She would not mark it, or change it in anyway.

So she really saw no reason to bother. She buried herself in her books, tried to forget life, or lifelessness as it was to her.

But it always called to her, demanding to be felt. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t leave it. Her body existed, and as it existed, her surroundings and her responsibilities existed. Grudgingly, she kept going. School, study, books. A simple routine she never really broke, but agreed to conform to until she was gone.

Her reading spot was the balcony. She read under the cool light of the moon, assisted only by a small non-descript book lamp.

The balcony was a peculiar place, facing the city with all its lights and glamour. Even this couldn’t affect her in any way. To her it was all the same, black and white, meaningless.

One day, she left her seat to survey this city properly and looked down the balcony.

In this black and white, monotonous monstrosity, she finally saw in color.

She saw her purpose.

Slowly she climbed the railings and let herself fall.

She lived.

After he left

I watched in despair as he left. Rain dripped slowly from the porch roof, dripping like the tears that were escaping from my eyes. 

We had met at a youth group a mere year ago. He was my age, tall and blonde. His hair was soft and his eyes sharp and a deep sea blue. He was muscular but gentle and his smile lit up  his face. We hit it off immediately, talking about anything and everything. We had been friends for 3 months when he asked me out. I said yes. Our relationship was goals. we were passionate about each other and were never seen apart. We did everything together and he bought me gifts on a weekly basis. It was like a small flame turned into a forest fire. But all fires burn out if no one gives it more fuel. That's what happened to us. He didn't feed the fire and I ran out of fuel. We had been dating for 9 months. Then, on our anniversary, he told me he had met another girl. They had been texting and had hung out and he didn't love me anymore. And just like that the fire sizzled to a stop. 

He left a year ago. Sometimes I see him on the street with the girl he left me for. I hope he is happy because I am now. I met another guy who is deeply in love with me. But more importantly he is in love with God. He treats me like a queen when all I asked for was to be a princess. 

Lost Love

It feels as fresh as today that he was gone. As he left in peace, he left me in pieces. My imaginative contemplations often head me to every recent memory which we ever had together. Our favorite hangout, favorite movie, favorite band and everything else we shared on a common ground. All these things don't let me forget him. I lay there helpless and insecure left alone with confusion, pain, trying to cope up with every negative emotion I am encountering with. No real person to talk to about my emotions, nobody to take of me like him, no one to comfort me the way he used to.

                Terribly fighting back the urge to cry I rush my tears back into my eyes. No sooner I realize I can’t handle any more of the building up stress than I find tiny drops of them shedding from my eyes, uncontrollably. It becomes difficult to trust anyone with my secrets and let outs because then I realize that it’s not him and he is no more. I break down every time when I figure out that we won’t ever come back to me for my whole life and that I have to lead my entire life span without his presence. Its horrifying that when a person who is so dear to you, whom you are so in love with that you need him more than breathing suddenly has to walk out of your life and leave you alone forever. Then I prefer being in solitude so that no one can watch me in depression since I don't like upsetting others for my sorrow. He has left such a void in my life that no one can ever fill or even repair. I cannot think of anyone else but him. To comfort myself I watch all his favorite songs, listen to all his favorite songs, cook dishes he liked, be to places he loved going, staying around with people of his close association. Although these things make no sense but they still give me a happy feeling and a reason to live, a reason to fulfill each of his wishes and living up to his lifestyle. Never had I thought even in my wildest nightmare that I will have to be so strong, and brave to endure all this aggravation alone.

                      Life is sometimes so unfair. One moment you feel like you have everything you desire in life and you are on cloud nine while on the other you are forced to compel yourself to think that you are left with nobody and misery takes over your imagination. Life is so uncertain that you cannot predict what will happen to you after a short moment of joy. Today I feel so nostalgic that the real world seems like a dream and my dreams are the ones I want to convert into my reality.