The next few nights, she didn't show up to work. Which cause a little disturbance among her admirers in the bar. Question after question from them annoyed me a little, nevertheless I still come out with a reply that will satisfy their curiosity a bit.
"She is on vacation" I answered to each of them when they asked about her whereabouts.
After closing hours I heard the cringing sound of the wooden door. Amidst the busyness I am in, I glanced toward the wooden door. Behind the door emerges a familiar figure that people has been searching for. That person is Miss Weirdo. She walks straight toward the bar table and sat down immediately. I didn't say a single thing, not because I am angry with her but I just can't think about anything to say at this moment.
"I am sorry" she said in meek voice.
"There are many things that can't be solved by saying sorry, but do you care to explain what is this all about?" I replied without taking a look at her.
She didn't raise her head to see me and kept bowing down.
"Boss, can I have a beer?"
I took it as a sign that she is ready to talk about that incident few days ago.
I opened a can of beer which I found in the mini-fridge below for her.
Holding the beer with both of her palms she spoke.
"That day.... I met my ex" she uttered. "I saw him walking away from me and I wanted to chase him"
Why would you wanted to chase after your ex in such fashion? Her answer bewildered me further. I have a hunch that she is still hiding things from me.
She gulps down the beer before I ask her another question. Sound of throat choking comes out from her as she keeps drinking the beer.
"I don't know why I wanted to chase after him and I have no idea what to do even if I found him" she voices her confusion. "It is as if I have an urge! No! A desire to find him"
Now Miss Weirdo face is turning bright red and she begins to uttering out some inhumane grunt. She is drunk... I laughed bitterly as she keeps on drinking the beer in her hand.
She stands up and walks across the room before stopping in front of the wall. She lied down against the wall facing away from me.
"Sigh"
I approached Miss Weirdo at the corner she sat. The dimly lighted room makes the atmosphere feels heavy. I don't know what to say to her. I crossed my arm as I stood far from her flank. She hugs her knees in the dark corner with a can of beer beside her.
"You should stop drinking Missy"
"Who are you?" her jaded eyes stare sharp at me and that signals the beginning of a long talk between us.
"Don't you remember who am I?"
"Of course I remember! You said that you loved me. How could I forget?"
"Did I?"
She has mistaken me for someone else.
"Yes you did! That night when you are drunk, I confessed to you. You touched my face and said you love me too, you will never know how happy I am" She exclaimed to me as if I am the person in her story.
"How could you take a drunken man's word seriously?" I replied her with my usual compose and nonchalant tone.
"Just because you said so, I've waited for you since then. Thereafter you said that you will take me with you to a place where no one knows us, but you never did" She resumed without bothering to reply my question. "You said that I am the one you love but how could you chose your wife over me!?" She hissed at me.
At that precise moment I remembered a piece of similar story in the edge of my memory that begins to resurface again. Someone I dubbed as Mr. Punctuality. These all fragmented chains of events are just a small part of her story and that hit me hard in the face for not seeing it coming.
"After that, I can't find you anymore, no news of you whatsoever. So I kept on searching for you, wandering everywhere day and night until I found this place where someone tell me that you've been here. Eventually, i met you again with your wife... and I thought that if I kill your wife who you claimed is the woman you loved the most, will bring you back to me again. But I didn't do that, because I don't want to prove that she is!"
I can see tears begin to pile up on her eyelids as she turns her face towards me. Once again, I was proof wrong by my own belief, alcohol really makes someone honest.
"I wanted to know if I am the one you loved the most, but it doesn't matter anymore. If there is one day that I ever ask you again. Although it may not be the truth please! Please tell me that you love me!" She bursts out in tears and cried like a child.
That night, time past very slowly for me. I kept on wondering whether that I've taken a liking on her or maybe I've always knew this day would come and just played along with her. The answer shows itself to me in the end, the reason why she is drunk answered that. She doesn't drink and the brown liquid I gave her is never an alcohol. Perhaps I already know why she came here at the first place. I was just amusing myself in her sorrow. After all it is just another game of lying and being lied. Soon after that, her crying subsided and she fell into a deep sleep on the sofa. I put on a blanket on her before retiring to my bed.
Later that night I felt someone touching me in my sleep. The person who caresses me is none other than Miss Weirdo. I opened my eyes slowly as she touches the right side of my face, her hand shifted from my face to chest and arm. I didn't sound a single word and closes my eyes in the same manner again. She pressed her face on my shoulder as she reaches out for my cheek. As I felt a puff of breathe blowing down my chest I can feel my shoulder slowly getting wet. The long and cold night felt much warmer with her presence, this reminded me of how much I yearn for bodily warmth of a person. As I can feel my shirt getting wetter, I noticed her grasp on my body getting tighter. The urge to embrace her back came up to me but hearing her slight sob quickly refrained me to do so. I knew it very well that I am not the one she wants to touch, she was just imagining me as someone else.... Not like I can complain about this as it is the same for me as well. Her hands are very soft, just like those of the woman I loved.
Accompanied by her warm embrace, I fell asleep once more. The next day, her presence is nowhere in sight and I begin to wonder if this is all just a dream. But my still-wet shoulder from tears reminded me that it is not what I've thought. A few days later I put on the job's vacancy post again.
