Again, I stop myself from remembering everything.
It is awful to be like this. It's not like I lost my mind, no, it's just I've erased it for more than months. It would be silly to recall it again. I decide to write. It has been long since I don't write. If I don't write now, I would lose it all. After long having writer's block, I understand how precious ideas are.
* * *
It has been two days and I still can't reach Hendra. I know how
irrelevant I have become to his life, but it still bothers my mind.
Knowing someone is missing, I just can't let it be. Still, I don't give
it much thought and life goes on.
I told Pita, one of
the best friends I used to share with Hendra. A story about him has
been long become internal jokes between us. I always feel like laughing
on my old self, foolishly infatuated by his odd charm. Oh, no, he was
never the one to be called Prince Charming. He was not nicely built, his
words weren't sweet, he did not actually swept me off my feet. Instead,
he kept pushing me away, his words meant to hurt me- I know because he
actually admitted it was the way it meant- and he made me a joke for
the world. But it was because he was like that that I became interested
in him. And it is because it was like that that I learn to laugh on
myself.
I thought Pita would laugh along with me.
Turns out she thinks I still have a crush on him.
"It's a joke, Pita. It's a joke." Huh. I can't believe how she thinks I'm still on it.
"Yeah, right. You sound bothered to me," she denied.
"Of course I am! Would you forget it if someone's missing?"
"No, of course not. But don't you think this is exactly WHY you can't have a boyfriend?"
Now she's being ridiculous.
"What's the relation between this and a boyfriend?"
"Nothing," she says. "I just think maybe you laugh at this matter too long."
* * *
What
Pita says surely bothers me a lot. A part of me might have realized
sooner than my brain do- since it just realizes it now- that the hatred I
feel toward him is no longer my strength. It consumes me. It traps me
in the past. It turns what was once a joke to a hindrance. No, let me
ensure you, I am no longer infatuated by Hendra. I have stopped being
mad at him a long time ago. But I haven't stopped despising him. By
doing this, I'm making myself remember him always.
Monday, January 28, 2013
Saturday, January 26, 2013
A Phone Call part 4
The next morning, I try to call his mother. Just to make sure she's met her son.
"Hello?" the pitch is lower than yesterday. I am rest assured she's not looking for him anymore.
"Oh, hi, Aunt. This is Minah calling," I say.
"Oh, yes, Minah. What's up?" she answers like a youth. I rarely spoke to her, so I'm not sure if this is her real character.
"Have you found him?" I ask.
His mother does not take a long time before she says she hasn't found him yet. She doesn't sound worried to me, so I decided to end the call. But before I end it, I tell her that I've been trying to reach him, too, but he is out of reach. An information she must've known without me telling her. She thanks me and hangs on me. I just call her from my front door, so I go back to my room.
I'm watching a Korean drama series recently. I'm also starting to write again, so I turn on my laptop. I'll decide later whether to watch the drama or to write first. I open the folder to my project. There are many unfinished stories there... stories about love, family, failures. I haven't been able to finish any of them since late 2010. Since the last time I published a book. Too satisfied with my accomplishment? Nope. I can say for sure that I have writer's block not because I am too satisfied having published my novel. The first in my life.
I realize I had stopped writing since there's no more stories of him.
* * *
About four years ago, I was in the beginning of my career as a writer. I was in the last year of my junior high school. I loved writing stories, and I loved reading as much. There was a place where we can rent books and comics near my junior high school. The owner of the place held a writing competition where I turned out as one of the winners. I received training until I succeeded in writing a novel. I did not start out from scratch. It was one of the novel whose first chapter I had written two years before.
However, four years ago was when I met Hendra.
As a result, the rest chapters of the novel was inspired by him and our story.
* * *
I wrote about how I loved him. I wrote about the events that occurred between me and him. I wrote about two best friends in love and a stranger in the way. I mixed up the characters. Anything will do as long as the events between me and him were written.
The novel, right after it was published, was given to him. Not to my surprise, he said it was disgusting. He had his own way to talk to me, making me believe that the novel was being complimented. Or maybe I was just fooled by my heart? Yes, I'm sure I was. I scared him, perhaps, writing about him in a devoted way. Coming to my senses, I'm sure as hell to find it creepy if someone is writing about me.
Then the conflicts started to occur.
I stopped writing long stories. I wrote poems instead. I was infatuated by a friend of mine and her beautiful words. She has not published anything, but I swore her poems were one of the most beautiful and explicit poems I have ever read. She wrote poems, usually sad ones, about the boy she loved and about the friends who hurt her. I was instantly inspired. I bought a book for poems. I wrote them also in my laptop. Turned out those were not my first poems. I had written more in my happy times.
I wrote many of them I was able to make a book published on my poems.
But I didn't do so.
I didn't think I was qualified to be a poet.
I sent them to him instead. On his birthday. The last birthday I sent him a gift for.
And there's no more phone calls or messages from him ever since.
"Hello?" the pitch is lower than yesterday. I am rest assured she's not looking for him anymore.
"Oh, hi, Aunt. This is Minah calling," I say.
"Oh, yes, Minah. What's up?" she answers like a youth. I rarely spoke to her, so I'm not sure if this is her real character.
"Have you found him?" I ask.
His mother does not take a long time before she says she hasn't found him yet. She doesn't sound worried to me, so I decided to end the call. But before I end it, I tell her that I've been trying to reach him, too, but he is out of reach. An information she must've known without me telling her. She thanks me and hangs on me. I just call her from my front door, so I go back to my room.
I'm watching a Korean drama series recently. I'm also starting to write again, so I turn on my laptop. I'll decide later whether to watch the drama or to write first. I open the folder to my project. There are many unfinished stories there... stories about love, family, failures. I haven't been able to finish any of them since late 2010. Since the last time I published a book. Too satisfied with my accomplishment? Nope. I can say for sure that I have writer's block not because I am too satisfied having published my novel. The first in my life.
I realize I had stopped writing since there's no more stories of him.
* * *
About four years ago, I was in the beginning of my career as a writer. I was in the last year of my junior high school. I loved writing stories, and I loved reading as much. There was a place where we can rent books and comics near my junior high school. The owner of the place held a writing competition where I turned out as one of the winners. I received training until I succeeded in writing a novel. I did not start out from scratch. It was one of the novel whose first chapter I had written two years before.
However, four years ago was when I met Hendra.
As a result, the rest chapters of the novel was inspired by him and our story.
* * *
I wrote about how I loved him. I wrote about the events that occurred between me and him. I wrote about two best friends in love and a stranger in the way. I mixed up the characters. Anything will do as long as the events between me and him were written.
The novel, right after it was published, was given to him. Not to my surprise, he said it was disgusting. He had his own way to talk to me, making me believe that the novel was being complimented. Or maybe I was just fooled by my heart? Yes, I'm sure I was. I scared him, perhaps, writing about him in a devoted way. Coming to my senses, I'm sure as hell to find it creepy if someone is writing about me.
Then the conflicts started to occur.
I stopped writing long stories. I wrote poems instead. I was infatuated by a friend of mine and her beautiful words. She has not published anything, but I swore her poems were one of the most beautiful and explicit poems I have ever read. She wrote poems, usually sad ones, about the boy she loved and about the friends who hurt her. I was instantly inspired. I bought a book for poems. I wrote them also in my laptop. Turned out those were not my first poems. I had written more in my happy times.
I wrote many of them I was able to make a book published on my poems.
But I didn't do so.
I didn't think I was qualified to be a poet.
I sent them to him instead. On his birthday. The last birthday I sent him a gift for.
And there's no more phone calls or messages from him ever since.
A Phone Call part 3
I was all silent after he told me.
It was nothing as bad as a disaster, nor it was something as good as he's only going crazy.
"What was it, you said?" I confirmed what I just heard.
"Told ya, I went to Kota Tua with Tri," he said, again, cheerfully. I was not sure what had make him think he could be so happy telling me all of these.
"So, what was your exact problem?" I tried to go back to the focus of my wonder.
"It doesn't matter. I went to Kota Tua with Tri and that's enough," he said.
For your information, Tri is a girl. A girl I had known as long as I know him. One of our best friends. One I did not think would keep this information from me. Furthermore, one I did not think would go out with him.
* * *
I blink my eyes. It is so despicable of me to think about the past this way. It is awful that I even remember it. The memory of that night is something that hurts me more than I had thought it would be. I didn't think the memory would last this long, even after years of many conflicts. Yes, even after a thousand conflicts occurred in our relationship, this one is still the one that tortures me.
I try calling him again.
Still out of reach.
Inhale. Exhale.
Deep sigh.
I told you I can't recall the exact date, but let me tell you, even the events that followed are now sculpted in my head. I remember how I learned the truth that Tri had wanted to keep it a secret a year after the event had passed. And, it was not from Tri I had learned. It was from others.
Aya told me back then that Tri sensed I was upset with her. I agreed. I had told Aya the reason and I thought it was sufficient as an explanation. She lowered her voice and told me then that actually Tri was also in trouble for going out with Hendra. The statement made me raise my eyebrows. How could it be? I thought to myself. And there went the explanation.
She said that Tri, having a boyfriend at the time of going, had forgotten to tell her boyfriend she's going out. Moreover, it was with another boy, Hendra, and they were really just by the two of them.
I couldn't tell if Aya was trying to make me show mercy to Tri, which I know I couldn't because even until now a part of me has been trying to erase her from my circle of friends- as long as I remember, I have never even mentioned her whenever I went out with Aya- or if Aya was trying to provoke me even more.
Well, whichever it might be, it provoked me.
I wondered what exactly they did in Kota Tua, what Hendra meant to her, what she meant to Hendra that she was chosen as the one to go together with when there were me and her boyfriend. I wondered what had occurred to her, especially, that she did not tell her boyfriend.
I asked Aya these, and she said that she had forgotten to tell her boyfriend. That it was accidental.
"Huh," I had laughed at that reason.
"As if I would believe," I had whispered.
Be it the truth, it would only upset me more. What on earth did they do that they even forget others?
* * *
The questions would remain unanswered. I really hate myself for going back to this memory, but I just can't help it.
I go out with my mother today. I go to the market that sells Arabic traditional medicine, to a bookstore that sells Islamic books... My father is having a birthday this Sunday. He's a very conservative and religious person, I could only think of Islamic gifts. Koko dress, the Koran, books about the Prophet, and anything that resembles Islam. The funny thing is that Hendra is also like that. He's much more religious than I do, and since the store and market are near his house, a part of me hopes to meet him there.
My mom and I also go to McDonald's. It is still in the area, and a part of me, again, expects to see him there. I don't know if it happens since the events in 2009, I have been expecting to meet him with a girl in one of the places near his house that I visited. Since our house is actually close, truthfully, I have been expecting to meet him with a girl in any diner around my house.
But he is not in McDonald's- moreover, not with a girl- and the thought of him leaves my head for a moment.
It was nothing as bad as a disaster, nor it was something as good as he's only going crazy.
"What was it, you said?" I confirmed what I just heard.
"Told ya, I went to Kota Tua with Tri," he said, again, cheerfully. I was not sure what had make him think he could be so happy telling me all of these.
"So, what was your exact problem?" I tried to go back to the focus of my wonder.
"It doesn't matter. I went to Kota Tua with Tri and that's enough," he said.
For your information, Tri is a girl. A girl I had known as long as I know him. One of our best friends. One I did not think would keep this information from me. Furthermore, one I did not think would go out with him.
* * *
I blink my eyes. It is so despicable of me to think about the past this way. It is awful that I even remember it. The memory of that night is something that hurts me more than I had thought it would be. I didn't think the memory would last this long, even after years of many conflicts. Yes, even after a thousand conflicts occurred in our relationship, this one is still the one that tortures me.
I try calling him again.
Still out of reach.
Inhale. Exhale.
Deep sigh.
I told you I can't recall the exact date, but let me tell you, even the events that followed are now sculpted in my head. I remember how I learned the truth that Tri had wanted to keep it a secret a year after the event had passed. And, it was not from Tri I had learned. It was from others.
Aya told me back then that Tri sensed I was upset with her. I agreed. I had told Aya the reason and I thought it was sufficient as an explanation. She lowered her voice and told me then that actually Tri was also in trouble for going out with Hendra. The statement made me raise my eyebrows. How could it be? I thought to myself. And there went the explanation.
She said that Tri, having a boyfriend at the time of going, had forgotten to tell her boyfriend she's going out. Moreover, it was with another boy, Hendra, and they were really just by the two of them.
I couldn't tell if Aya was trying to make me show mercy to Tri, which I know I couldn't because even until now a part of me has been trying to erase her from my circle of friends- as long as I remember, I have never even mentioned her whenever I went out with Aya- or if Aya was trying to provoke me even more.
Well, whichever it might be, it provoked me.
I wondered what exactly they did in Kota Tua, what Hendra meant to her, what she meant to Hendra that she was chosen as the one to go together with when there were me and her boyfriend. I wondered what had occurred to her, especially, that she did not tell her boyfriend.
I asked Aya these, and she said that she had forgotten to tell her boyfriend. That it was accidental.
"Huh," I had laughed at that reason.
"As if I would believe," I had whispered.
Be it the truth, it would only upset me more. What on earth did they do that they even forget others?
* * *
The questions would remain unanswered. I really hate myself for going back to this memory, but I just can't help it.
I go out with my mother today. I go to the market that sells Arabic traditional medicine, to a bookstore that sells Islamic books... My father is having a birthday this Sunday. He's a very conservative and religious person, I could only think of Islamic gifts. Koko dress, the Koran, books about the Prophet, and anything that resembles Islam. The funny thing is that Hendra is also like that. He's much more religious than I do, and since the store and market are near his house, a part of me hopes to meet him there.
My mom and I also go to McDonald's. It is still in the area, and a part of me, again, expects to see him there. I don't know if it happens since the events in 2009, I have been expecting to meet him with a girl in one of the places near his house that I visited. Since our house is actually close, truthfully, I have been expecting to meet him with a girl in any diner around my house.
But he is not in McDonald's- moreover, not with a girl- and the thought of him leaves my head for a moment.
A Phone Call part 2
I wake up (again) confusedly. A part of me fully aware that his mother really has called me. I try calling him, too, but me, too, can't reach him. Even the signal can't reach him, the operator says.
Where the hell is he? I thought to myself.
I suppress my overreacting worry that happens to pop out in times like this. The last time my brother couldn't be contacted, I went as far as mentioning two of his friends in Twitter. Embarrassing myself, I know, especially when none of his contacted friends reply my mention. But my brother is my responsibility as the older sister. Hendra?
Still, the thought of him can't seem to let myself fully at ease. What possibly happens that made his mom call me? I told mine and she said that it means his mother needs him. It doesn't mean he's missing, I know. But before my mom told me this, I couldn't stop myself from thinking he went missing. Instantly, I feel the urgent need to know his whereabouts.
He was once like this, you know.
He left without noticing anyone for a night, but this was not so much worrying as his mother did not bother to call me. Turned out he went out for a walk with his so-called best friend, also one of my own. This had made things rather messy between us.
* * *
It was a night in 2009.
I couldn't recall when it was exactly, but I remember the scenes. He was having a trouble. Something he wouldn't tell me or anyone. But it was clear to me that he thought Facebook was his diary. He had never missed a single day to update his status, basically telling everyone on Facebook how upset he was, how he would- if it were not a sin- attempt a suicide.
I remember people kept bothering me with questions. Why is he doing this? What happens? and the most troublesome question for me was Of all people, you should know, right? Things between me and him was something the public had learned the truth about. We couldn't hide the spark well enough....
...or at least, I couldn't.
I asked him several times about what was going on. I cried at nights, hating myself from not knowing. I was tired answering people's questions. I was tired being the one who should know.
He finally gave in and told me that he wanted to run away. So I asked, "Why? Why would you want something like that?" and he managed to avoid answering that. It seemed to me that he did not want me to know the core of his problem. It was devastating.
Then, the day after, it all stopped.
His Facebook status are all bright and cheered up, and it seemed that nothing had happened days before. I was relieved. I was so sure that he felt relieved after talking to me. I told my friends about how we talked and what he had told me. I assured them everything was in its place.
Next time I asked him again what exactly happened. He told me cheerfully that it was okay then. He was finally freed from his hopeless feeling. I remember holding myself back from asking why because he was so cheerful in telling me and I didn't want to cut his talk. But, what he told me was something that put a space between us. A space successfully maintained even up 'til now.
A Phone Call part 1
A phone call can lead you to anywhere.
It's a saying I might have heard before. I'm not quite sure. One thing for sure is that it is, indeed, true.
I received a phone call this morning. It was when I was half asleep- or maybe I was in a deep sleep? I couldn't recall- I couldn't even distinguish the ringtone. I thought it was from a my fixed phone outside my room... a fixed phone shared by the whole family members. I picked it up instantly, knowing only the fact that the sound bothered me. I read the caller's ID. It was very unexpected, causing me to sit up and give my very best to focus.
"Hello?"
I forgot to mention that I tried my best, too, to make my voice sound like I had been woken up much earlier.
"Hello, Minah?" the caller sounded rather worriedly high-pitched.
"Yes?"
"This is Hendra's mother," she said, though I had known from the caller's ID that it was from his house.
"Yes, Aunt," I replied as smart as my mind would let me.
"Do you happen to know Hendra's whereabouts? I couldn't reach him."
Again, I tried my best to focus. I almost blurted out, very likely to mumble, about me stop calling him after he did not confirm our supposedly reunion. About the upsetting behavior of her son who hasn't changed a bit even after more than a year breaking up... that, if it can be called breaking-up.
"I... haven't contacted him since Sunday," was what I thought I had said. I thought to myself.
"Yes, Sunday's the last day we talked," I reassured her and myself, making sure I said the correct sentence.
Yes, Sunday's the last day we talked. The first day after weeks and days of not contacting each other. Not even via social medias in this digital era. Sunday's the last day we talked. The first day we talked like nothing had happened between us. The first day we talked like best friends. Like we were coming back to the second semester of our first year in high school... our first day to be tied with an unexplainable relationship.
Sunday's the last day we talked.
The first and last time a thought of being best friends again occurred to me.
I held myself back and successfully avoided saying these surprisingly much thoughts that popped out during that instant period. Fortunately, his mother cut off her call by saying thank-you. I went back to sleep without fully realizing it wasn't a dream.
It's a saying I might have heard before. I'm not quite sure. One thing for sure is that it is, indeed, true.
I received a phone call this morning. It was when I was half asleep- or maybe I was in a deep sleep? I couldn't recall- I couldn't even distinguish the ringtone. I thought it was from a my fixed phone outside my room... a fixed phone shared by the whole family members. I picked it up instantly, knowing only the fact that the sound bothered me. I read the caller's ID. It was very unexpected, causing me to sit up and give my very best to focus.
"Hello?"
I forgot to mention that I tried my best, too, to make my voice sound like I had been woken up much earlier.
"Hello, Minah?" the caller sounded rather worriedly high-pitched.
"Yes?"
"This is Hendra's mother," she said, though I had known from the caller's ID that it was from his house.
"Yes, Aunt," I replied as smart as my mind would let me.
"Do you happen to know Hendra's whereabouts? I couldn't reach him."
Again, I tried my best to focus. I almost blurted out, very likely to mumble, about me stop calling him after he did not confirm our supposedly reunion. About the upsetting behavior of her son who hasn't changed a bit even after more than a year breaking up... that, if it can be called breaking-up.
"I... haven't contacted him since Sunday," was what I thought I had said. I thought to myself.
"Yes, Sunday's the last day we talked," I reassured her and myself, making sure I said the correct sentence.
Yes, Sunday's the last day we talked. The first day after weeks and days of not contacting each other. Not even via social medias in this digital era. Sunday's the last day we talked. The first day we talked like nothing had happened between us. The first day we talked like best friends. Like we were coming back to the second semester of our first year in high school... our first day to be tied with an unexplainable relationship.
Sunday's the last day we talked.
The first and last time a thought of being best friends again occurred to me.
I held myself back and successfully avoided saying these surprisingly much thoughts that popped out during that instant period. Fortunately, his mother cut off her call by saying thank-you. I went back to sleep without fully realizing it wasn't a dream.
Monday, January 14, 2013
...
Some people are good to talk to, not because they give great advice nor do they solve your problems... but because simply by talking to them, you get strength, courage, and cheered up. One of these people is you.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
