Sometimes you think you’re finally over something you’ve painstakingly let go in the past until everything comes back to you in one swift moment. I was browsing through my mails when I came across one I haven’t heard from for years and whose silence I have tried breaking by sending emails that were never answered. While I wrote her long emails, she’d just reply with her usual but rare and curt one-liners – “I’m good.” … “I’m okay.” I would usually write her long emails because I was trying to find my way out of the burden of my desolation, to heal my hurts and the pains that have taken so much of my spirit when, back in 2007, she turned and walked away without turning back.
We met before 2007 when I was trying to fix an almost breaking relationship only that it was all broken even before I realized it and no fix can make it whole again. She was riding on the same boat that time. So to cut the story short, our miseries were the turning point of a loving relationship.
That day in January, she said she desperately needed a friend. “I need a friend right now.” I had the impression that she was feeling miserable for one reason or another… and I can only guess. She just needed a friend. She called a couple of days after. She was in some remote place in the Pampanga for some official business – timely for her need for space and alone time – to cry, to vent out her angst over what she called a beautiful relationship gone awry. She was crying and angry. I just held my phone and listened to her. Finally, I had all the answers to the nagging questions - the questions that have become the voices in my head.
I saw her last in 2012 when she finally agreed to see me in Ayala. I have not heard from her after 2007 and you can imagine how frustratingly I tried ways to reach her. She has changed her number just as fast as how she turned away and there was no way for me to trace her again. My last and only chance to get through her was through email hoping that she still checks it once in a while. I‘d leave her a message every now and then leaving her my number just in case she’d change her mind and decide to talk to me again. But my phone won’t show open numbers when it rings for calls or received messages. She really didn’t want to break her silence to let me in even briefly.
I stopped “blaming” her for leaving me in 2007. Around that time before her sudden “exodus” out of my life, the hospitals have become my second home due to a heart ailment that needed medical attention. It hit me at work the first time. It started to really manifest when I experienced frequent flashes and spasms in my chest. It hit me first time while I was at work and people had to rush me to Makati Med then I was in and out of the white buildings. I didn’t let her know because I didn’t want her worried and distracted. She was finishing her accountancy course back then. When she starts worrying, she’d really be affected and would want to be always around. So I kept my silence and before I knew it, we were already worlds apart.
I somehow had a part of the blame and I claim it. Maybe I was just too plain confident that when I’m finally clean of the heart mess and out of my silence, she’d come around and we’ll have our time again like we used to have… only that it didn’t happen that way for when I finally gave up on hospitals, she already drifted away to some place where she didn’t want me anymore. She wouldn’t talk to me. She changed her number getting me lost to nowhere. I went berserk when I could no longer find her. I was in denial for the longest time not really understanding why she closed her doors and wouldn’t even open a window. Is she with somebody else? Did she go back to an ex? My heart cringed at every thought. Still, I sent her emails with my number hoping she’d finally come around and talk.
I still remember that day she agreed to finally see me in 2012. She sent me an SMS to my number saying for me to meet her – time and place given. While on the road, I couldn’t help but draw up scenarios on my head – like she’d smile when she sees me, give me a hello kiss, and a hug.. then we’d start to walk to some place holding each other’s hands. I also wanted to explain what happened to me until we lost touch. I wanted to tell her that things are better now. I wanted to woo her back and promise her that I’ll make her happy, that things will be better. I wanted to tell her that I want a life with her.
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