Author: Tyrion Lannister
Date: December 21, 2012
In a few hours, the year would end. Not that I have a particular attachment to it. To be honest, I don’t really care.
Everywhere I look, there are kids that light firecrackers. Most of them don’t even know that they could lose several, if not all, of their fingers with just one miscalculation. But perhaps, they’re not that different from me. Ignorant. Naïve.
I found myself climbing the stairs of the overpass we used to frequent. Remember when I told you that I like climbing high places? This piece of concrete supported by a few pillars over the avenue near your place and decorated with green paint, stuck bubble gums, and broken liquor bottles, provide the best view of the sunset as well as the passing cars and people from down below. And at night, the hazy street lights give out a gloomy glow, illuminating what’s left of the day that passed. Somehow, it replicates the night I finally set everything straight and confessed my feelings to you.
Hmmm.
Do you remember when I told you about the origin of love? I know you never really liked reading stories and all, but I was happy that you listened, even if my storytelling was not as romantic as I intended it to be. Aristophanes, from Plato’s Symposium, set the story in the ancient times, when there were still three races: the children of the sun, who were like two males glued back to back; the children of the earth, who were like two conjoined females; and the children of the moon, who were a male and a female.
They were powerful creatures, as they could see all around them. They started to scale the heavens and set war against the gods. But Zeus, who doesn’t want to kill them and deprive himself of worship and offerings, launched his thunderbolts and cut them in half, separating them into two. Apollo then stitched the wound, but left a bit, the navel, which didn’t heal, in order to remind them of their treachery. They were then scattered around the earth, with a feeling of emptiness, until they find their other half.
When they finally find their other half, they become whole again. We call it love.
A few years ago, I found you. And I felt whole. People say it’s not like the movies. But for me, the wind singing a melody, the slow motion movements of the world around us, and the nervous beating of my heart when I see you, are all true. I was finally able to write again, with you as my muse.
We were able to get closer together. Even if we were studying in different universities, we would go home together and pass by the same dirty green overpass. Before we sleep, we would exchange text messages that, now that I think about it, perhaps I misunderstood. I found myself falling for you.
But everything changed when I finally confessed my feelings for you. I’m never really good at spoken words. I even rehearsed it a thousand times. I’m pretty sure I did a good job. And yet, your words pierced my soul whose very existence I doubt until that day. All of them, the wind singing a melody, the slow motion of the world, were taken away.
“There’s someone better than you.”
Emptiness.
I hated every waking hour for the reason that I was awake. All day I would stare in front of my laptop, hoping that my fingers would move, and waiting for words that would never come out. At night, I would stare at the oblivion that is the ceiling of my room, wasted by scattered bottles of beer and vodka, and intoxicated by the memory of who we were and what we could have been. I would sleep, with the thought that I could never be enough to replace your whoever.
Then I wake up again and curse myself, curse the scattered yellow papers and liquor bottles, curse my incompetence, curse the cobwebbed ceiling, and curse the world and my very existence.
The noise, the firecrackers, and the trumpets blown by the kids brought me up in this place. I look up at the sky and saw the orange glow of smoke and city lights. Every now and then, fireworks would envelope the night—sudden bursts of light that luminesce for only a fraction of a second, and fall into the darkness.
Perhaps Aristophanes was wrong in his metaphor on how love works. There are times when love makes you feel empty, even when you finally found your other half. Perhaps love is more similar to fireworks in the sky. They would radiate and light up the sky for a little time, and then they disappear into oblivion.
I found myself climbing the railing of the overpass. It wasn’t a particularly cold December 31, but I was high enough to feel the wind brush against my cheeks. Remember when I told you that I like climbing high places? It makes me feel superior, being above the cars and people passing by. It’s just sad that I couldn’t see the sun set from this overpass again. But I guess I’ll just settle for this night, amidst the hazy streetlights and the fireworks that you love, the only witnesses of my confession.
Do I have some final words? I don’t know. I love you.
I’m falling.
Hmmm.
And I thought my life would flash ahead of me before I die. But the only thing I see is your face. Your smile frozen in time as we sat over the freshly-mown grass of the amphitheater.
I’m falling.
Into the darkness.
Into oblivion.
