In Continuum.

Many Partings

I remember it.
I remember it well.
This is what happened.
This is what i have to tell.

*

The red numbers on the panels ticked upwards to 19,counting up to the moment the doors are going to open,with your little petite figure inside,meeting me for the first time in a mentally-torturous long time.I dont even remember the last time we did meet,but rather the last time we parted.I seem to remember more of the parting than of the meetings,and everything in between always seem like a passing memory,smelling nice and sweet.The partings,those dreaded partings.I swear i am - like i said in a previous entry - that i am not a good person when it comes to goodbyes.Or rather,i dont handle it very well.At the end of those meetings that i've had,i dont feel a sense of loss,but emptiness and numbness.It's strange,because i havent felt this bored in my life,just because somebody left me for the day.

So the doors came apart,there you were in the corner of my eyes.You looked more fragile than before,an image i've seen only yesterday in my friend's own eyes.Strange,how everybody in this world,the ones that are so far apart,are feeling almost exactly the same way.That frail tired look,almost fragile and breakable stare.I saw it,and like i did with my friend,i hugged her without saying anything.Because it just felt so right,she just felt so right.And i didnt care too much about whether anybody is going to see us,because in that moment,nothing mattered.Not even the reason why she cried the whole night away.Nothing at all.

I loved the way the house was empty save for the both of us,and all the lifeless furnitures all around.I loved the way only our footsteps echoed down the corridors,that they werent interrupted by my sister's or mother's.I loved the way we were almost afraid as if somebody was going to appear around the corner,and catch us for doing whatever we were doing.It was that pure innocent fear that made me - as i locked the door behind me and saw you inside the familiar room of mine - smile.

You jumped into my bed,the concert of John Mayer at Webster Hall was still playing on my computer.I turned the volume down and joined you behind the sheets.And inside the cocoon that i made for the both of us,the morning sun shone and filtered through the fabric of my blankets and onto your face,a dull blue glow radiated around your features.You smile and whispered something into my room that sounded like "I hate your room".But i smiled anyway,and i whispered something to you - this time through our closing lips.

Our toes tangled,skin against skin.Arms wrapped and then your hair buried.I kept on coughing,i couldnt stop.I told you i was sick,but you insisted on coming anyway.You said you didnt care if i refused to let you in,or if i was sick.You were going to bust into my room anyway.And so you did,and now in that cocoon of mine and me coughing,you didnt mind it at all.What if i told you i was dying,i said.What if i am suffering from a terminal disease?

Don't die,she said.

Don't you dare.

*

The night came and you were hungry.We ate apples,the forbidden fruit.The apple tasted exceptionally sweet you said.But really,it was because of you.The day darkened,taken over by night.The yellow lamp by my bed shone,now with more pride than the morning when it was left that way.It filled the room with it's warmth,reflecting off your bare skin,as you turned over your shoulder from the computer screen and smiled at me.Your hair fell over your bare back,as if you were so shy about revealing that part of your body.I smiled in return,and then the world turned into just this room,with you and i in it.Because really,nothing mattered that evening,that night.You were there,and i was there.It was all that mattered,all that i cared about.

*

I walked you down to the bridge.I couldnt get you too far,because i was leaving for camp.As usual,our fingers tangled in the lift.Heavy hearts,heavy atmosphere.We were thinking of the same thing,but uttering no words of it.The parting was inevitable,you were hungry.But you were more unwilling than hungry,and the camera in the lift prevented me from grabbing you and kiss you.

We walked through the footpaths,crossed the road and out of my estate.We were hand in hand still,the lights from the bridge loomed up at the end of the road.Those white light lining the side of the staircases going up,on the railings inviting her on.We reached the foot of the steps and embraced,the cars zooming by around us like they didnt care.But it was hard,it really was.It's hard to explain now,but i remember at that time,not wanting to let go of her body,still a little fragile in my hands.Like a mended vase with superglue.No matter how well it looks now,there are still cracks and there ae still fissures that need to be filled.And it was parting,and it made them even more evident and obvious.

We embraced a million times,hands in each others,unwilling to let go.The longest goobye,the deepest pain.The Man of Little Goodbyes,breaking down inside and smiling on the outside.We pulled away,fingers releasing their grips.It was a natural countdown then,until the last contact point was gone between our fingers.We were now apart,the lights consuming her silhouette.She was a darkening shadow now,and i was walking away backwards.'So dramatic',she said.And smiled.

I counted the steps,merely three.And i couldnt take it anymore.Doesnt it piss you off when your will is not as strong as it used to be?I turned around,and there she was with her eyes over her shoulders as well.We smiled again,and turned back onto our road.And just as i took the sixth step,i turned back again and she was there too,smiling back at me.

We did it for the third time,and it was the final one.The longest stare,the painful longing.It was dramatic,almost poetic.Like those cheesy teenage dramas,but it happens.It happens.But it didnt feel cheesy or mediocre.It felt good,it felt great.It felt everything that i needed in this world was in that last and final stare.I felt comforted,to know that though it was the last stare of the night,there is going to be a whole lot more,until the very day i should get it no more...