If

In cartoons, there's that moment when the cartoon character realises he's two steps off the cliff.

In relationships, there's an exact moment when the breakdown begins.

And from that point on, it looms like a time bomb—

unsure when it'll combust

but certain in its aftermath. 

Some of these moments are so blatant you can't miss them. 

You see it coming, you know you'll be hurting. 

But then there are moments that at first seem "sudden" or "unexpected",

only to reveal themselves crystal clearly in retrospect. 

These are the ones that hurt the most,

not because of their magnitude,

but due to the sheer surprise of it all.

These are the ones you didn't mean to end. 

These are the ones you replay in your head as you lie on your bed at night,

the ones you watch over and over again,

seeing the hundreds of ways it could've played out,

if only you did that differently,

if only you phrased that better,

if only you

if only 

if
...

Truth Behind the Lie

It's been the longest while since I've been able to plaster on my face a smile that touches the very edges of my eyes. I had a first day of work describable only as drastically fantastic, and the best weekday ever post-work with my favourite darling sister. 

I guess when the closest relative you've had is the most unfathomable of lows, the slightest of buoyancy can feel like the utmost peak of all highs. 

It's almost like I'm actually happy. 

But a post-dinner walk at our local mall where Jerome and I spent shared so many dinners and coffees and conversations and feelings, backed by the most tragically appropriate of coincidental soundtracks blurred existence into clear illusion. 

My perfect delusion of "okay" shatters into countless, question-mark shaped shards of play-pretend. In its wake is but a stinging truthfulness.

And the truth...

The truth is that it hurts more than it doesn't. The truth is that every dazzling smile is but an semi-automatic call to arms, an increasingly firm grip on that reality falling away into an infinity of drops from the saltiest ocean, depths unknown but shaded with darkness as certain as the endless abyss standing below.

I'm sorry. I know it's all on me, and I know it in my feels. It's almost laughable, but...

You're a world away

Somewhere in the crowd

In a foreign place

Are you happy now? 

The Beginning of The End.

The long-drawn path to betterment has found a climax. So tantalising in the way it excited my every emotional nerve, it didn't disappoint.

You see, I've been seeing the therapist for close to a year now, once a week. And the final piece of the puzzle emerged with my cousin's wedding last December, where she revealed that it all started before I could even remember.

Then after, we spoke about the Rapes. To utmost unconscious reluctance, I suppose. But we spoke about them, nonetheless.

So in a way, if this path to recovery was structured like a narrative—then the climax has drawn its final conclusion, and what we have now is the beginning of the end.

What I have now is the beginning of the end.

Because there is no we as I near the finish of my story. No Jeromes, Jians or Jazzes to hold my hand as I cry. No Daryl to break brunch and drink wine with in celebration of triumph against adversity.

Because with every touch of my clumsy, stubby fingers, I destroy. I guess they had more foresight than I wanted to believe when they dubbed me the "Hands of Destruction" back in high school.

If a tree cries "Eureka!" in the woods and no one hears it, did it even cry?

As monumental as it is supposed to be, my cries go out across the endless void of nothingness. And even the loudest sound needs a wall to echo back from.

But there is nothingness. And there is nothing.

In the end, it's nothing more than just much ado about nothing.

Of Last Seens and Could-Have-Beens

I wish you'd stop chasing the dreams

of your profound, deep friends;

cause though they indulge in shallow

they're full where you end.

I wish you wouldn't push me away

and in moments of weakness, beg me to stay;

I wish I could be the strong I said I would

But when you lash out I don't feel the ground where I should.

I'm so tired of staring at you
staring at me
staring through last seens
and all-we-could've-beens.

I worry if I'm lying
even when I mean the truth;
cause you said you don't believe in my trying
in my trying to be good.

I hate that you hate me
that you love me
and me you, too.
I want you to be free
but please don't be,
I won't know what to do.

When you're told enough that
what rings in your head
is not the sound of truth,
should realness wash in
you'll feel the action:
tooth-on-tooth.

I'm sorry I cheated
I'm sorry it happened
I'm sorry you're snapping
& I'm sorry we're broken

Why Do These Sweet Strawberries Bring But Tears To My Eyes?

Of course I'm here because I'm sad.

It's been more than a year since we've parted ways. I always had an inkling that you've held that soft spot for me somewhere deep down in your closed-off heart, but today my hopes were rudely subverted into an illusion I can no longer bring myself to believe.

As I lay here on my bed, still half-inebriated from whatever I drank earlier in the night, I only wish the pain would subside as my tipsiness eventually would.

But as I get less drunk,  I get more intoxicated by the sadness of reality.

You wanted me when I was the mysterious cutie bathed in the club's fleeting spotlight. But the more you got to the core of who I was, the more you pulled away.

I lulled myself into the delusion that your issues kept us from being together.

But it's time I face the facts—I was never the one you wanted.

And when I say goodbye, I only wish it stings you half of how it stung me. More delusions I should do without.

Goodbye, Shen.

I was never the one you wanted.

I was never the one.

I was never.

Take Your Nothing Back

An ex gave me his military band name tag about five years back, similarly to how high school kids in the US gave their significant others letter jackets. It wasn't worth anything, but I loved it just the same— it was an acknowledgement that what we had was real.

They said many things. That it was apparent you didn't accept all of me. That you only wanted me physically. And that our relationship was not conditional of what was inside my head and heart... But this changed things, right? It meant that I could disregard what others said about our relationship.

Right?

I guess the saddest thing about the need to disregard what others are saying is that they're right.

And on some level I probably knew.

So maybe that's why I pretended I lost it when you wanted it back. Or maybe I'm just making shit up as I go along. But does it even matter anymore?

I'm ready to return it.

I'm not making it up as I go along.

It's just tiring. To feign hatred for someone I really don't hate. To hold onto something that was everything that was really just nothing.

Nothing.

You can take it all back.

Are You Looking At Me From Behind Your Opaque Glass?

Time has gone by.

I know that I am not the person I once was because of my lack of specificity. No longer do I keep the tiniest details on my retrospective speed dial, no longer am I able to put my finger on exact moments. Here I am, trying to recall the precise number of months since our ephemeral narrative came to a close. Here I am, not remembering.

There is a curious kind of heaviness on my chest. Am I mourning the passing of the person I was? Am I a different K, maybe a stronger one, who does not feel the need to cry at the thought of forgetting something so trivial? It is different from what I'm used to, and I don't know how to feel.  

We and two others sat on four sides of a square table. It was as merry as a weeknight could responsibly be, and I really appreciated that you took an Uber out to join us. To join me. Singleton in hand, you offered me a space cake. I declined. Sober K kind of hates Stoner K.

The drinking games came to a close. The girls started talking, SSS (bestie) was having a hard time with SS (her ex). With my phone dead and nothing to distract myself with, I became almost painfully aware of your existence. Next to me. Glancing. Twitching.

Only there it didn't hurt. It wasn't pain. It was a nothingness, threatening to expand into everything. It was like having anaesthesia imposed on my feelings by an already numb person.

We were no longer together, regardless of whatever feelings run beneath. But it was so reminiscent of how it felt to be with you that I shivered. Maybe it was because I've been feeling so full of wholesome love lately, but it spooked me, how empty your affection felt.

As opposed to my headfirst, deep-dive approach to love, most people would think that your slight-distancing mode of choice is more appropriate and culturally "cool".

That was my chilling realisation that fitting into your world meant accepting numbness and hollowness as the norm. It finally made sense, how you never tried but always effortlessly fit in with the cool kids. Because being cool meant feigning casual nonchalance (which is the opposite of me). Only you're not faking.

I've always thought that you had a wall up, but it just never seemed exactly right. Tonight it dawned on me that although there was a wall, it was not between us. It was between you and yourself.

So yes, what you said all those unspecified months ago was right.

I want more.