fish

and why are you out when you should be in the city of blinding lights, the city where no one sleeps, the city with restless hearts and loud music to drown out the words in your head? and why were you at the city of blinding lights that very day when she was probably miles, millions of miles away from you, sailing above the clouds with brightly manicured nails and a plastic smile in tow?

we take trips all the time, and i can't remember the last time i went to the airport though. nothing much has changed, not the bright blue contrast of the sky against the green leaves waving in the breeze, not the winding road that leads downwards and then upwards again, with the familiar landmark right in front of you, the throngs of people who all look the same despite your differences, simply because you've seen enough of the world.

***

when i got home i opened the tube of moisturiser and realised with a start that whatever i'd placed inside in a bid to forget its' existence, had tarnished, was now blackened with age, and i realised that by the simple act of just placing it there without thinking further was already the start of the end. i'll not forget that day when i rejected the ride and took a bus to the infamous sultan road and simply drank. i can't remember which floor i was on though, or perhaps that was simply the start of a few drinking sessions. either way it was the beginning of the end and a welcome end.

***

i went back to the church that i went to on a weekly basis ten years ago and it's fucking changed. however, i've realised that i'm able to sieve out changes and to simply remember places as they once were, not because change is bad, but simply because i've become resistant to changes in some ways. i can't figure out the reason. perhaps time has passed me by so fast and ignored my desires for it to still, for it to slow.
and i'm amazed that the bunch of us have known each other for seven years. it seems like only yesterday that we were in chaos over studying for the dreaded As, the day of my first A level paper when i went to mac donalds and chanced upon a suicide and a dead body in a mud pit on the way home, the hours of writing essays, and then the wait and dread for the papers to end and looking forward to prom-time when the papers finally ended. and the excitement of supposedly beginning a new life with uni life when you find out that nothing really changes, because by 18, you've almost seen enough of the world to get sick of it.
and it's seven years now.

***

i also remembered how i reared turtles in primary school and let them go in the pond one day, the same pond into which i dropped my specs one fine day in march perhaps, those lazy bright hazy days when i didn't want to go home and those days when an extra outing to church meant a brighter day. those days when i could still count my age by the fingers on my hands and that time when you wadded into the pond to reach into the water, fishes swimming around your ankles.

***

and sunday tomorrow.