Weeks have gone by and nothing changed. The clawing guilt is still with me, the nagging voice of my own still shouting at me, the pain of what I have done still lingers at the back of my head and lodged between the cracks of my heart. Staring blankly ahead, I waited for the bell to ring. Listening to nothing, I looked around my desk at the pile of papers that should be checked, read and organized. Nothing changed. I am still a professor who has the responsibility of watching over the students, helping them achieve their goals, building them to who they would want to be, yet here I was, destroying a person while I build mine.
The will to resign and stay away for a while is my last option after having a week vacation since I broke up with Lana. That was my biggest mistake so far but I have to accept the consequences and bear with it till I learn from it.
A tap and a nudge on my back informed me of a presence behind. "Hey there, sexy professor." She greets. For a moment I forgot about her name and reminded myself that she is my current girlfriend. It should be one of the biggest reason why I should remember what her name is, Annie.
My smile forms upon remembering her name. Somehow she is keeping me sane and safe from myself.
"Hey." She lets herself be pulled towards me. The voices of the students occupied the hallway apart from the faculty room that we were in. Tilting my head, I met her brief kiss and went back to our job at hand. As I kissed Annie, I remembered the last one that Lana and I shared. It seemed so long ago. Kissing Lana in the latter days that we were in a relationship was hard. I cannot look at her straight in the eyes, tell her I love her and kiss her on the lips without thinking of the cheating I'm doing on the side. Bad Blake. Everybody would agree to that. Even some of my friends would tell me the same thing. I blinked away the tear and regret as I went back to my life in the university.
Time has passed that the darkness crept outside while I'm stuck with all the paper works I'm supposed to finish by the end of the day, but still I'm on the third exam paper, staring at one character that has no relevance to everything. If only things wouldn't complicate my job. Annie said goodbye almost an hour earlier. I promised I'd be done and will go home right on time but no. I'm still here, I haven't finished a stack of papers, with the thought of lying on my bed persistent on my head.
"Hey sister, what's up?" She answered on the very first ring. I was glad to hear a cheerful voice void of the same emotion I am dealing with now. It was fresh and something new to the ears. "Hello?" She says not hearing anything from my line.
"Hey. What are you doing? How are you, guys?" I said adding a little enthusiasm in my voice. I reached for the wine I had in stock from the kitchen cabinet. Dinner would be good but I don't have the energy to cook. I should maybe order and have the food delivered but I have a lot of excuses lined up not to. Wine then.
"We are okay, so far. Mom is cooking dinner while I am in the room doing my homework. How are you?" She emphasized, making the question a little bit harder to answer. They would worry if I give them the reason to. Instead, I lied.
"I'm doing great. I just have a pile of work waiting for me. I just finished dinner here with some pizza. I really hope that you are here, maybe you can help me with the checking of papers and my visuals for next week. I chuckled.
"That's good, at least you're back to being yourself. So who's the new girl now? When are we going to meet her?" She says pertaining to Annie. Annie is nice. She is kind, a strong and compassionate woman. Sometimes, I see Lana in her. Most of the time, she's an entirely different person. She is never too clingy, not too sweet, just right. She is also not possessive, a matured woman if you're looking from the outside. She's sometimes workaholic. Yes, very different from Lana.
"Soon. I'll bring her over for my birthday." I said although I haven't discussed with Annie yet how and when I'm going to bring her there. Her schedule's pretty tight and just like what I have mentioned, she prefers to work than relax and have fun with me. "I have a favor to ask from you though, very out of topic and out of the blue." She stayed silent on the other line which I took as encouragement to continue. "Can you try to know, or ask, or call, I just want to know how she is doing now." I hesitated.
"Who? My sister asked.
"Lana." I shortly answered. Biting my lip, I dreaded what her answer would be. I am quite afraid she would start nagging at me again but she stayed quiet. My paranoid thoughts came to the surface.
"Okay." She agreed, without a fight. It was a bit unusual but I silently thanked her for that. "Would you want her to know that it's you who asked?" I'd rather not and I voiced it out.
"No. I would really appreciate if she wouldn't know that I was asking about her. I would like to give her space to breathe and move on and maybe, forget about me." Being honest with my sister was never hard that's why she's my greatest confidante. She knows everything about me and that makes it hard to lie as well.
"Sure, Blake." Silence. "You want to know how she is. I get it, but how about you? How are you now? It has been weeks since you last talked to us." Sometimes my youngest sister does not act her age. She's matured for her age, even much matured than I am.
I tried my best to tell her how I have been for the past days. I wouldn't want to trouble them on my heartaches so I made the story a little less emotional. Knowing my sister, she wouldn't believe it completely but she wouldn't say a thing about it.
After the phone call, I walked back to the kitchen to get a glass of wine. Walking back to my room, my eyes caught the keyboard sitting on my bedside table. It seems to suddenly have eyes and ears that I was so afraid to move and get its attention. I should start packing Lana's things in a box before they start to haunt me every day.
When was the last time I tried to play on it? Seems like years have passed and not days since I last felt the keys on my fingers. My life's music has been out of tune since then. I can still remember how Lana would watch me play. She would sometimes sing with me while I play her favorite song on the keyboard. She would urge me to play before going to sleep, or when she's having a bad day. My music had been part of her daily routine when she was still here with me. Now that she's no longer here, I don't see the reason why my fingers should touch it and play a song.
My eyes blinked with my fingers gliding over the keys. It pulled me to it and encouraged me to play. I slowly started with a few keys, until I realized how sad I was playing. I don't know such song, I just played from what has been humming in my head every time I am alone. I have created a melody. I named the melody I've created: Lana.
On the first light that struck me awake, I grasped the other side of the bed, expecting somebody there, but there wasn't. I wished I wasn't awake then. I am pretty sure that I woke up at the other side of the bed and I don't want to stand. The emptiness beside me is just a proof of how wrong I had been. I reached for the pillow she had been using back then. Her pillow smells like the morning, fresh, dewy, new. It smells just like her.
As much as I convince myself that I am okay, I am not. I miss having her presence around. Changing my phone number doesn't even matter since her number is etched in my brain. I have to stop myself from dialing and calling her because I am missing her. I still need to give her the space she needs to heal and to move on. She needs the time away from the person who hurt her.
Dialing her number and seeing it on the screen of my phone gave me the chills. I should remind myself that I am already committed to another. I removed myself from the happy relationship and indulged in another relationship that is quite different from what I am expecting. Annie is a career woman. She puts career in front of everything else. It is her first priority. With Lana, every other thing comes second. I was always her first. Tell me I am dumb and I'll gladly, wholeheartedly accept it. If only I could make it more obvious, I might already have done it.
"Hello?" Lana answered on the eighth ring. She probably wondered who was calling her early in the morning. I held back a response. It feels like I was brought back to life like somebody smacked the reality on my face. "Hello?" She repeated after not hearing anything from my line. I choked on the sob that has formed in my throat. Wondering when my sister will call her, I slowly ended the call, looking forward to what news my she would tell me probably by the end of the day.
Today was nothing better than yesterday. I went through it like a scheduled robot; eat, work, eat, work, stare, drink, think and try to sleep. Mechanical should be the right term. I wouldn't want to hurt Annie by letting her think that I am still affected by issues of the past. Good thing is that she doesn't have a clue on what I was dealing with mentally and emotionally.
I have a lot of shortcomings with Annie. She does have them with me too. It was a relief that I don't have to think too much about it since it's not a big of a deal for her. All she does is work. I have never seen such an industrious person in my life more than her. Her views are more into the future. She wanted to settle down and retire at a young age complete with her own house, own car and the luxury of enjoying her remaining days in comfort.
She smiled up at me when I gave her a quick hug on our vacant time in the faculty. "Are you hungry?" I shook my head with a giggle, no. I hugged her a little tighter to squeeze the stress out of my muscles.
"I miss you." I shortly said. "Will you go home with me tonight?" She stared at me like I've grown another head. It might be unusual that I am asking her these things; demand or ask for love and attention. In fact, it's the first time that I invited her to stay the night with me.
"Aww, sweet baby, why what's wrong? Are you not feeling well today?" She said in a voice as if she's talking to a toddler. "I just have to finish this one document then you can accompany me home so I can get some of my things. That fine with you?" She sweetly asked. I nodded my agreement and went back to my table.
My phone rang and I was more than excited to hear from my sister. "One ring. One ring was what it took for you to answer, not too eager aren't you?" She asked teasingly.
"Spill it," I asked her. "Any news? Were you able to call her?" I whispered through the phone, afraid that Annie might hear.
"Yes, Blake. I have some good news and a bad news. What would you want to hear first?" She tested. I asked for this, I should be ready for what she would give me. This would be my first information about Lana from the day that I visited her in the hospital.
"Let's hear the good one first." I braced myself and took a lungful of air.
"Good news, she was happy to hear from me. She was not expecting a call and she didn't know how I came to know what happened to her. So I just told her that I heard the news of your visit to the hospital. Second good news, she seems to be okay now. Recovering. She is no longer doing the trips to her doctor though, says she's doing well. She will start working again in a week." She narrated. Listening to the news she has for me kept me silent. I was waiting for the rest if there's still more.
"Are you ready for the bad news, though? If not, we can end it on a good note and leave the bad untold." She hesitated and waited for a reaction from me.
After thinking for a few seconds of silence, I evaluated how ready I was and decided to just deal with it. "Go on."
"Are you sure, Blake?" She again asked. Looking at the ceiling I released a heavy breath. "We know that Lana's memory of you is very limited, right? Haven't you noticed how come she knew me when I called her? She knows that I am your sister. She knows you. The question is, how much does she remember?" As she continues to speak, the slight choking that I suddenly felt became disturbing. I coughed to release the tension forming on my neck.
"How much?" I gasped.
"Blake, in a span of a month and a half, her progress on recovery was quick." She paused adding more drama to the call. I hated it but I'm grateful for it. "Blake, she now remembers everything."
