Someone To Lean On

And They Linger

IT'S BEEN A FACT THAT events in life are surprising, even when you expect it or not. I know that fact and I hate it. There are some events that I'm not entirely prepared for that were suddenly shoved into my face, and then I wouldn't know how to act nor even think. It isn't an ideal situation at all. I wish it doesn't happen to me for almost all the time. Unfortunately, it does; an example would be right now.

     The quiet, muffled music still can be heard even after crossing the street to somehow find a quieter place, but not too far from the party. How I ended up agreeing to go to a party, I don't know; although deep inside my mind, I blame my brother for bringing it up and dragging me. Now here I am, under the white light of the streetlight along with the yellow light provided by the moon. It feels like a déjà vu somehow, standing here with a cold breeze gently passing by and thinking what to say to the man beside me. Something lodges up my throat for maybe the fifth time today.

     "What do you want to talk about?" I say, and I could swear I also said the same thing before. I try to swallow the something that settled in my throat. He stays quiet just like before. I gather the courage to speak up again, "It's a cold night. How are you holding up wearing those?"

     'How are you holding up without me?' my mind supplies, and I immediately dispersed the thought away. I shouldn't think about that right now.

     "I got used to it," he says. I look over at him. He's looking at the gigantic house across the street where the party was held; where we met again after months of no contact. It's awkward, and I hope it wasn't just me feeling it. I hope he does too.

     "It's weird looking at you now," I see his eyes shift over to me. I look away with a tightening chest. "I mean, you never wear light clothes in a cold weather before and it's new to me."

     "And you haven't changed."

     Tears well up in my eyes, and I blink those away. I look up at the yellow moon. Whether he's talking about my choice of clothing in this kind of weather or just me in general, I don't know, but it certainly did something to squeeze the life out of my heart. It hurts. I take a deep breathe to calm myself down and cleared my throat.

     "How do you say so?" my voice sounded pretty weak, and I just hope he won't address it.

     "You're still..." he stops and I wonder what's up with that. "You're still you, I guess. The same old Lovino I knew."

     I want to disagree with him, but my mind betrays me. I couldn't think of what to say to him, so I settled with a quiet hum that I'm not sure whether he heard it or not. I think he did. We welcome the silence that envelopes us, paying attention instead to the somewhat humming music that came from the house across the street.

     "How are you?"

     I want to say that I'm not fine, that I'm feeling conflicted with him here, that I still need more time to move on to get the most appropriate closure I can get. I want to say that I haven't been the same ever since, and that I'm still getting back on my feet after that, but then he came and made me feel things that I've desperately trying to get rid of again. I want to say that I don't want to see him yet; I can't, not right now. I didn't say anything similar to that. I lied instead.

     "I've been fine," I reply. "Just like you said, I'm still the same. Nothing much has changed."

     A beat passes.

     "How about you; how have you been, Toni?"

     I notice him crossing his arms, tensing just slightly; I don't know if it's from the cold or from my question. Then he replies: "It was a hard year without you."