A LOVE STORY: AN EXCERPT

A/N: for a longing heart....

A LOVE STORY: AN EXCERPT

I

I was part of a story—a love story that is. I fell in love with the nicest lady who was married to the kindest man. She’s not beautiful but just too perfect for the face I’ve carved for gazing.

She hated drinking red wine but she drinks so often. I asked her once why despite detesting its taste she still savors every drop of it; she just said that she has no choice but to drink something that she doesn’t like.

She is like a child, always craving for chocolates. Her face would light up whenever she receives a box of it. The kindest man let her indulge on the things she loved the most, but there was something in her eyes when she put a piece on her tongue that she took from the plainly wrapped one I brought for her.

“Interesting… I always thought that I have tasted the best chocolate ever made. Still these are really heaven on earth.”

I did not quite understand her. She speaks in poetry, her language are something vague and mysterious. But I understand clearly that chocolate is the only thing she loves that she can have.

She has a pair of laughing eyes but the saddest when it stares at the farthest end of the sea by the lanai of their beach house. She smiled a lot, always seeing something beautiful in everything—even on the smallest creature there is.

She once spotted a lady bug and laughed out loud when a spark of playful humor entered her mind, “poor little lady bug, to be called a lady when no gentleman could ever love it because the poor thing is a he…”

She was the worst dancer but justifiably compensated this through making everybody laugh at her jester-like manners while saying, “oh come on you guys… nobody does it better than me!”

Still she tried her best not to step on any of my feet as we glided through the dreamy voice of Sinatra as he took the notes of, “…when the world is cold, I would feel the glow just thinking of you…”

No less than a dancer but far worst as a singer, she repeatedly tumbled at the lines she loved to sing, “… and in the middle of the colored curtain I started to cry…”

She’s the best liar I’ve known. Everything in her knows how to deceive and she handles herself very well. I asked her once if she really love her husband and she just smiled— the kind that a man would think too lucky to be loved by this girl. And after that smile, she giggled and looked into my eyes as if trying to figure out if its really dark brown.

“Silly, silly! Why? He gives me every reason to love him,” she said convincingly but made me wonder if it was a drop coming from her eyes or just a part of the splashing waves.

We walked at the beach one afternoon after I’ve seen the saddest part of her. She told me a story about the time when she was just a ‘lil lassy.’

“All the girls were scurrying about this boy, everyone was giggling and laughing when he said something— maybe something funny— I was just at a corner watching them but I really wanted to be near him…” her eyes glistened as if that person she is talking about is beside her.

I asked why she held back.

“But how?” her eyes glowed and resembled a perfect acorn shape as her pearl set of teeth smiled at me.

Then she showed me her empty fingers and beamed with a different kind of grin— somewhat melancholic.

“See? He gave me back my freedom…” then her eyes revealed what she tried to hide. “He asked me for the ring I wore for five years, so I gave it to him and he took his. Did you know what happened next?” she looked pensively at me.

“You don’t,” she whispered, “he threw it out of the window— into the sea. But I did not stop him…”

I was stricken by what she said. She looked so sad but elegantly wonderful.

“He said that he cannot give me the happiness I dreamed of because he was not—“ she stopped and continued walking, “please, when you come to visit again, can you bring me that chocolate?”

I nodded and left her by the shore. I did not look back.

II

I came back the next day. The familiar house welcomed me but only her fragrance was the remnant of her presence. I left the box by the side table and wondered how long it will stay there… untouched.

III

I spotted her by the empty space of the lounge in one of the busiest side of Buenos Aires. “I thought you hated red wine?” I took the seat across her as her eyes danced in glee to see me there.

“Well, I learned to love something I hate the most.”

There she started again with another verse.

“I’ve tried bloody mary and I liked it. It tasted pain,” she playfully batted her lashes, “when I was a little girl I loved singing the nursery rhyme that goes something like, ‘Mary, Mary quite contrary…”

She laughed out loud with the familiar tingle way back before, “do you know that bloody mary and that song have something in common?”

“Really?” I felt like talking to a little girl.

“They were created in memory of Mary Queen of Scotland. They cut her head off because she was ‘quite contrary’” she lilted then she looked serious, “and the wine resembled the blood…”

“Gross…” I managed to smile.

“Yes, gross!” she made face and once again sat straight, “I’ve read somewhere that she was beheaded because she fell in love with the wrong man…”

“Then we are lucky to live in the world where we don’t have to be beheaded for falling in love with the wrong person,” I blurted out without even thinking.

“Yes, lucky indeed… but we are prompted to behead ourselves.”

I always wonder if ever there would come a time that I would understand her.

“Did you ever think of beheading yourself?” I teased.

“Are you asking me if I fell in love with the wrong person?” she looked straight into my eyes then diverted her gaze towards the open window behind me. She looked so serene, “I asked you to come here for this little secret… after this, I will leave again. Somewhere far… somewhere I am hoping someone would find me…”

She handed me a perfectly folded pink paper and smiled, “please read it as soon as I step out of that open door…”

She stood and glided away…

You,

I want to fall in love with you all over again, the very same way I did when I first saw you in that little nook by the park in front of the fountain as you gently caressed the strings of your guitar. I can still clearly remember the simple curve on your lips as if you were thinking of some mischief to do and your eyes— they seemed to tell a secret as you focused on your instrument. I was sitting there— a few meters away from you, trying to catch your every move and dreaming… putting a spell on you to look into my direction. And the funny thing is you did look at me! Do you remember that? I almost fell out of my seat …

You were around pretty girls most of the time and they said that you were a perfect gentleman— well, for me you a perfect charmer! The way those girls giggled when you whispered in their ears gave me a mixed feeling of jealousy and regret… jealousy because of the attention you gave them and regret that I did not have the courage to be like them – taking the chance to be near you. I know that it was just a silly daydreaming and the hopeless-romantic-little-me could not contain my secret smile whenever you passed me by.

But that was all I ever stayed... a silent fan who wished for you to sing her favorite songs – the one she listened to every night before she falls to sleep.

Years passed… so many things happened… I managed to survive keeping those secret longings inside my dreams; and you – you continued to exist in my own world although you left our little to town to chase your dreams. I clung to your memories when you left… that little nook, the sight of guitars, the balcony of your house where you used to sit staring deep into nothingness, the songs you used to sing, the tunes you used to whistle, the girls who came scurrying over you and even the sky… they would always bring you to me.

Do you know that I was even counting the years when I last saw you? Funny as it seemed, I was like a faithful girl awaiting for her lover’s return. There were other boys who seemed to hold my attention but none of them can ever reflect the sparkle in your eyes or the sound of your voice or the smile on your lips or your simple gesture of hellos that were the highlights of my days before.

The waiting was taking so long that I suddenly realized that my feelings slowly drifted into an abyss that beholds you. My every second thoughts of you turned into minutes, then hours, then days, then weeks, then months… until years passed… they said that out of sight, out of mind…

My life went on… I celebrated my success, endured my failures, said goodbyes to friends who have left and exchanging e-mails with them now and then, met new acquaintances, grieved for the loss of loved ones, welcomed new life, cried for my mistakes, left my stressful work, searched for greener pasture… and the funny thing is I let love in my life in somebody else’s eyes…

Did my heart finally forget you?

It’s kinda different for me to discuss this thing to you as we managed to be back in each other’s lives without knowing what we meant for each other before…

I don’t know how to end this letter or if there will ever be an ending to this… but I am still hoping, and praying that once again you would find me…

Me

IV

My heart was throbbing with the speed I’m not so sure of. I was running too fast… catching every face in the crowd… I tried to find her on every dark alleys and corners of Buenos Aires. She is a puzzle I will go on figuring how to solve and she gave me another challenge to take. If I see her again would she still be the same woman with melancholic eyes and bittersweet smile I talked to just a few minutes ago? I have to find her… and then what?

I stopped in the middle of an old piazza as the heat blazed upon my skin… in front of me is an old little fountain… it doesn’t matter anymore. My heart smiled. I know where to find her.

V

The figure in front of me is like an apparition. She was sitting a few meters away from me… facing the fountain. She looks just like before— the girl who has became an object of my curiosity. She would always sit there looking away… as if waiting for someone. Is she waiting right now?

For me?

I walked over to where she could see me. She looked up to me and I sat down beside her with only an inch that separates us.

“You’re 27 hours, 18 minutes and 9 seconds late…” she started without taking her eyes off the display of water and lights, “were you looking in all the wrong places again?”