MAY 03, 2017 - RENATUS
It had been several weeks since I first talked to Gabriel, the guy who saved me and broke his arm in the process. I was still talking to him every now and then since he wouldn’t stop calling me every day. He also texted me whenever he could and updated me with whatever he was doing. Sometimes, I didn’t know what to say or reply to him anymore, but the thought of someone enjoying my company is refreshing. It was as if I was reborn as another person, like I was another Dionne Vargas. A Dionne who had a true friend. A Dionne who was happy to wake up every day.
My mom was also happy that I got a friend from that tragedy or accident or whatever you would like to call it. She said that there was always a rainbow after the rain and I got my rainbow from that disaster. My rainbow was supposedly Gabriel, but I couldn’t believe that. Well, not until these past few days. He had been doing things to make me feel special. He always visited me just to talk to me. It was a little weird at first, but it made me feel happy. My mom was so nervous the first time Gabriel visited me. She secretly took pictures of Gabriel and saved it on her laptop just in case he’s a criminal. After weeks of visiting and just hanging out, my mother became comfortable with him. He was actually a very nice man. It was nice to make a friend in times of distress.
“Since we’re really close now, would you care if I asked you things?” He carefully asked with measuring eyes. He seemed afraid to step on a landmine.
“What kind of things?” I returned the question.
He shrugged, “You know, things about you?”
“Ask away.”
“Well, um, could you tell me why you decided to kill yourself? I mean, you have a wonderful life. Your mom is very caring and you aren’t financially unstable. You seem to be intelligent too,”
I closed my eyes for a second, thinking of what I was about to say. There were hundreds of reasons why I did it, but I just couldn’t seem to make the words for it. It was just so hard to explain things that you didn’t want to talk about.
“Lots of things; like school, people, and whatsoever,” I answered.
“You really don’t like to talk about it, do you?” He asked again. Why did he keep asking questions anyway? It wasn’t like he’d get a proper answer from me. He knew that I was too stubborn to actually say anything.
“Obviously,” I said, while rolling my eyes at him. He giggled. “Giggling is so gay, Gabby.”
“Oh please, Dionne. Stop changing the subject. We’re talking about you and not me being gay, because I’m not,”
“I’m not changing the subject,”
“Yes, you are. Stop being so stubborn,”
“I’m not,”
“This conversation is futile,”
“It’s a good thing you know,”
He stopped talking. He stopped eating his donut. He just looked at me. No, it was more like staring at me. It was a cue saying he was serious and that I needed to be serious too.
“It was about my friends, I guess?” I said, not so sure about what just came out of my mouth. Was it about my friends? Maybe. I was not so sure whether I really have friends, because ever since the incident, nobody called me to ask if I was okay. Only Gabriel did that. For sure, everyone knew that that was me on the news. I was on the news for two weeks, for Pete’s sake!
