Forever Ago, Today.

Intro: Sometimes, you write things at 4 am cause you can't get back to sleep. You write it in your email, and you never hit the send button. Even after you type in that email address you painstakingly deleted from your address book but have memorized it by heart. It hides in your drafts folder, and as you start to clean up the cobwebs to say "hello" to the new year, you realize that you can still find it, sitting there, waiting for you to hit the send button. But you never do, cause forever ago is a lifetime away, and tomorrow promises to be kinder to your heart.

It's funny how yesterday feels like so long ago, but how today feels like it's lightyears away. I float about, doing things mechanically, and not really feeling anything, but wanting to feel like exactly where I was a year ago. I'd rather feel any emotion than to live as a vapid human being devoid of the capacity to feel. Mad, glad, happy, sad, and all the other emotions in between. Anything to take this void, this emptiness, away.

Shattered Rainbow

And the glass bowl she carried in her hand fell and created a pretty image of shattered glass amidst the scattering of rainbow-colored candies.

I couldn't hear much, actually, I was kinda spacing out. (Though to be honest, I grabbed a couple of my sister's painkillers and downed a bunch to calm my nerves and get me back to stoic normalcy versus the "jumping out of my skin" abnormal feeling I had fifteen minutes prior to the crash)

The bowl has always been my mom's favorite piece. It's small with some form of flower cut-out embossed thing on the side. I don't really know how to describe it, but it just happens to be her favorite. She has this Saturday afternoon ritual, you see, it has to do with eating her weekly dose of peanut M&Ms in front of the TV while watching her preferred showbiz gossip talkshow. By her feet would be the lady she hires to do her pedicure, carefuly, methodologically painting her nails in a gamut of colors from blood red to this shiny, transluscent-ish green. The color reminds me of scales. Fish scales.

But this Saturday would be different, I decided last Tuesday while Christmas shopping with my boyfriend and walking hand-in-hand in Greenhills. I saw someone who looked like my sister pass by the opposite row of stalls and I quickly let go of his hand, just in case my sister were to see me. We had an argument about it. He didn't like the sneaking around. After all, we've been together forever. I can actually see myself being Donya-ish just like my mom with him in the kitchen cooking our gluten-free dinner.

It Could Have Been Us

Another night, another "al fresco" bar with a name to be forgotten.The cold Christmas breeze entangles itself in my hair, lifting strands in a completely un-sexy manner. I exhale. Sip my beer. Pause. Sip again. I look at you from where I sit, you on the pathetic excuse for a stool a little bit off stage-right, waiting for your "big moment" to shine.

I don't know why I'm here. Then I see you look down at your shoes, your shoulders slumped inwards, you look defeated. Then I remember why I went. I'm your "support system", you said. I have been for the past two..three...five years. Everyone around us back then would wonder why we weren't together. We were young then, I think, and naive enough to believe that this special friendship was just, that, a friendship of sorts. Or at least I thought that way. (Though I'd find out later on that you always thought of me as a little more special than that).

Someone starts to giggle. A demure, high-pitched giggle. I look to where the annoying sound is coming from. It's your girlfriend. I cringe at the sight of her. Her: with her typical chinita features, the cutesy attire, the frail frame. She with her paisley-printed blouse and ballet flats. Whatever did you see in her? All fluff, no substance.

The breakup song

Have you ever had one of those moments where you kust knew what would be happening next? It's almost like being the omniscient narrator of your own life. It's not deja vu, but rather, just this sinking feeling in your stomach when all the warning signs are there and the logical next steps would actualize and become your reality.

For the past couple of weeks, nay, months, we've been rocky. I refuse to admit it, but I guess we were both just waiting for the other person to come out with it: I'm not happy anymore, let's breakup.

Breakup, breakdown. See, that's how my brain works. And, it's just not breaking up that would be the problem, it's going to be the untangling of ourselves from each other's lives.

***
We've been together for three years. He was my first boyfriend, but not necessarily my first love. Before he came along, I had no interest in being in a relationship. I just wanted to revel in my singlehood. And revel I did.

Date Number Two

I sat in the coffee shop, impatiently waiting for my date to arrive. We agreed to meet at 7 pm, a good 3 minutes ago. I feel so antsy, nervous and excited at the same time. I light my third cigarette, sip the slushy pathetic excuse for caffeine that I hold in my left hand and watch as couples walk past by my lonesome self.

Four more minutes pass, and he hasn't even texted.

"Calm down" I tell myself. It could be traffic. It could be that he had to render an extra thirty minutes at work. It could be. It might be.

The tabletop shakes slightly, causing the little pools of water to tremble. My phone has started to vibrate. I listen to the sound it makes against the faux wood table, counting, hoping it's a call and not a text message. Too bad, got my hopes up. It's just a text message.