A little less of what is, a little more of what isn't

CHAPTER 3

Love is a strange thing. One moment you're up, the next moment you're down. It's real but also an illusion, warm but also scorching, selfless but also selfish, forever but also temporary, full of hope but also laced with despair.

I'm intentionally contradicting myself now. You'll know why.

Right when I decided to step out from the world of dreams, I woke up to another. To my joy and dismay, she was there. And we, the two of us, were the center of that world.

Walking, talking, running, chasing some unknown-dream-element from time to time. Holding hands at some points, delighting at the Sepia sunlight, we were absorbed into the strangeness of that dream - that strangeness that any decent dream would have. But as common as the strangeness was, the dream wasn't as common. It was, to say it more accurately, a little more of what isn't.

"We" weren't a reality.

The dream was as lovingly warm as the waking-up-to-it was painfully scorching. It was summer time. But the heat of the summer was more than literal. The scorching pain of a metaphorical wound borne out of the fact that there's nothing was as real as it gets. And though it's nothing, it kicks as hard as it can. Repetitively, continuously. Distract yourself or get used to it. Those are the only options.

Nonetheless, we go, we live, we strive, we hope, right?

So, I did.

Then moments later, what isn't became what is.

I opened my eyes to find myself, unexpectedly, living the life I was just imagining a few moments ago. Not fully, no, but it was there! Could you imagine the joy, the ecstasy? The selflessness and the selfishness of love finally found its equilibrium.

Shoulder-to-shoulder while in transit, you could hear the roar of the wind, the beating of my heart, when all of a sudden, a skull crept onto my shoulder. It was the loveliest skull I've ever seen. It was the most loving gesture I've ever felt. It was a spark. It was like I've lived all my life for this moment. To her, it probably didn't mean much, I thought. But it meant everything to me. That contradiction was fine. It's unbalanced, but it's a start.

Then transport me to that hidden park. Moonlight flowing throughout the park. Her face shining, radiating like no other star I've seen in my entire life. Her laugh, as real as it gets. She was the only one there with me but I felt the acceptance of the entire world. A park became paradise.

Those moments wouldn't last forever, I thought. They were time-bound. We were space-bound. But there's a "we". Finally. Every breath, every second, every inch etched into memory. Forever. It was a cliche like in the movies.

"Forever in numbered days, hours, minutes, seconds."

There I realized that forever happens when time stops and space is obliterated, becoming inexistent altogether. It was hopeful. It was happiness. It was understanding why we live while accepting you'll never ever grasp it in full.

It was forever in a world that would eventually die out. It was the once-in-a-lifetime encounter. It was her. And she was love.

She was love.

But it passed like all other worldly things.

And in just a few days later, even without me knowing, what isn't at that time became what is - to my despair. Like a wheel rotating in all of its wheel-glory, it rotated, took a wrong turn.

"Wrong?" 

I make myself laugh with dismay.

Just like that, it's gone with the wind. Air. Got nothing to breathe. I don't need to breathe anyway. I'm already lifeless, soulless. Yanked out of you when the lightning struck at the very place where you were standing. It's hell in here.

"But it's warm anyway." 

That's what I'd want to say. Hell as warm as this is worse than lifelessness.

All I could wish again is just a little less of what is, a little more of what isn't - all over again. Wish is the operative term. You could only wish for the impossible. I broke her heart. I made her life more difficult, more problematic. I became a problem she shouldn't have had. I broke her trust.

"I'm scum of the earth."

Un-scum-ming oneself pains the most when you didn't even know you had it in you to be that much of an asshole. That you could hurt her the way you did. That you were insensitive enough that you didn't even try to just care, even for a moment, for those who could see you and her, which would then affect her.

But she's the toughest girl I've ever met. Though if I could ask, I would, for another chance at life. But like the movies, it won't last forever. It ends. And so, it ended. Credits. Curtains closing. She won't change her mind about me anymore. It's my own doing. I deserve all the hate and despair. Though she won't hate me for it, because she's just that mature, I would. I should. I have as much responsibility to hate as much as I have to love.

I guess we do really only live once. And now, I'm lifeless. But this shell continues on, strives onward to accomplish its goal. It's just that, it's much lonelier now.

Actually, it's empty now.

There. I guess this should end this book, right?

"Hahaha."