DISCLAIMER: Some of the characters in this original work of fiction have been created by and belong to the author Keiko Nagita.
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Terry moved on his bed, burying his head under the pillow, growling to the insistent ringing of the alarm clock. He must had no more than three hours sleep. He was never an easy sleeper to start with, in fact he could not remember when it was the last time he had a good night's sleep, but he was certain it had to be many years ago. This past year however, since Susanna had died, his insomnia was torturing him every night. Its claws dug into his mind from where memories sprung, tasting bitter and sweet, of another time with another girl, back when everything seemed possible.
He was never the same since the relationship with the one he loved ended with such finite and abrupt way but with time, the pain from Candy's absence from his life became numb to the point it felt natural for him to carry like this day in day out. Almost ten years now. The pain inside him always reminded him that he was alive. For, apart from the temporary high the theatre was giving him, that sensation remained a constant, having become the baseline of his life and feelings.
He stretched his arm, knocking the clock on its head. The maddening sound stopped and he sighed with relief. He got up, pulled the black pyjama bottoms over his naked body, and trampled to the bathroom, holding his head; he could feel the hangover drilling at his temples with the same frequency the alarm clock woke him up from the land of dead.
He had stayed out the night before on one of his usual bar crawls. A pretty brunette Puerto Rican was hitting on him hard when he was drinking alone, but he wasn't in such a mood on that particular moment.
Not that he hadn't had sex, even when Susanna was alive. He may had been by the side of his fiancée for ten years but in reality, despite him wishing hard to feel something romantic or at least a flicker of desire towards her, the only thing he felt was the insurmountable sense of duty towards her. Not only she physically had lost a limb to save him from death, she actually was willing to jump to her death if he turned away from her. He never blamed her. He blamed himself though for not snipping from the bud, her sick infatuation for him from the moment it started to materialise. After a decade though, even those blame thoughts had subsided. They weren't serving any purpose apart from pushing him close to madness. He never touched her like a man touched his love, not even when she silently longed for his touch. His urges were quietened with casual sex a lot of women were willing to give him. He was upfront and honest about it. Pleasure for pleasure's sake, experienced between two consenting adults for a few hours, a night, even a couple of nights but no longer than that. He never had been on the lookout for a steady lover, another troubled relationship in his life.
He looked at himself in the mirror and grimaced at his awful sight. He looked drawn and sleep deprived. His adult face had lost the roundness of its youth leaving behind high cheek bones and a well defined jaw while his azure eyes looked bigger, more intense, despite looking empty off stage. He pushed his fingers through his hair, trying to tame its wild spikes. Back to his rebel teenage phase, he kept them long despite the vocal disapproval from his father and the insistence from college to keep them on a ponytail at all times. He now kept them short on the sides, longer on top, and in a way he felt better for it, shedding something that connected him with the life he wanted to forget. He washed and started shaving.
"FUCK!!", he growled.
He looked at the bloody cut on his jaw, feeling his blood starting to boil. Certainly he was in a bad mood today. He finished shaving and wiped his face clean.
He had the day to himself to study Hamlet, the big play they were to stage for spring season. Robert was anxious. Over the years the theatre company had gone from strength to strength thanks to Robert's wise management and Terry's powerful performances. He was not in a particular mood to read today, but he had to do it, otherwise he would suffer the continuous mumblings of an over the top stressed director.
He went into the kitchen, made himself a cup of strong black coffee and moved to his study to unearth the play from wherever he had thrown it a week ago. It wasn't only insomnia that he was battling with but he was also passing a period of annoying absentmindedness with his head being ever more occupied with other things, making it frustrating for him to focus on day to day things.
He looked at his unkempt study while thinking that he really needed to pull his act together. He left a sigh, put the coffee on his desk and started looking around for his papers. He cursed while time was passing on a fruitless search until he stared on the tall wide bottom drawer of his desk. He wished in silence that his quest would soon be over. He opened the drawer and started shuffling the papers inside. He pushed his hand further in and returned with a pack of papers. His eyes brightened, he burst into a smile.
"Thank God for that!", he exclaimed with relief in his voice.
He stood up and without taking his eyes from the papers in his hand he placed the pack on the desk too close to the cup of coffee for comfort incidentally pushing it down the open drawer. His look transformed to that of rage within mere seconds.
"FOR FUCK'S SAKE!!", he yelled.
He rushed to the kitchen and came back with a towel, patting spilled coffee off the wet papers. He started emptying the drawer while moping coffee in the drawer at the same time. He did this until almost the entire drawer was empty. He kneeled and his hand dived in one last time, to pick up the bits of papers stuck in the back. He pulled them out and looked back into the drawer. His eyes widened, a sparkle of amazement shone through them.
Down at the bottom of his drawer, behind all that paper, laid the harmonica Candy had given him at college to encourage him stop smoking. She had failed miserably but he had tried at the time. He took it out bringing it in line with his eyes, staring at it. He flipped it in his fingers, feeling its metal surface. He had wondered where it was. He had stopped playing it for years. Every time he played after Candy left, painful memories would surface, erased by booze until he passed out. He wondered if playing now will make him feel this way.
He passed his index finger over its openings. He took a deep breath, brought the harmonica to his lips and blew. A sad sound came out. He expected goosebumps and they came, but what followed was an intense feeling of longing, a desire to see her in front of him again. The images of her in his head became brighter than ever, teasing them as if they were alive.
Did he have the right to do that? Enter her life again all of a sudden without sending her all those years a word from what he was busy in his room writing all that time? Half of all that stored paper in his drawer consisted of half written or completed letters to her left unsent, by now they were almost like a journal. He sighed, realising that he entered the same warp of thoughts he was coming to from time to time since Susanna had died. He placed the harmonica on the floor, picked up the play and commenced reading. Hamlet may wondered whether to be or not to be, but in Terry's mind, the thought whether to finally pull the courage and send a letter was playing about. To write or not to write...that was the question.
