the morning of the day he died, i woke to the sound of rumbling thunder.
it was a cool morning and there were clear skies. for a moment, i doubted if i had actually heard that. i remember that i woke feeling more refreshed than i had felt in weeks. i stretched and decided to go out for a jog. i changed and tied my hair up in a ponytail while looking at myself in the mirror. i scrutinised my features - it had been so long that i had really looked at myself, as opposed to the occasional glance to check my make-up. i looked paler than i remembered myself to be. my eyebrows needed tweezing. my complexion was sallow. fine lines were beginning to creep around my eyes. yes, i was ageing.
i shook myself out of my temporary reverie and went to the door to put on my running shoes. a tag containing a microchip which i'd attached to my shoes for a marathon last year was still tied to my laces. even my shoes looked tired and grey. i hadn't been running for so long, most days were spent visiting him, going to the office and lying in bed before ten, but not actually sleeping. grief is a funny thing. it takes a grasp on your life such that you cannot muster any interest in doing anything else other than brooding on what makes you sad.
it was a beautiful morning, really. i can't say the birds were chirping, because i don't remember that, but i remember a burst of joy as i started running. i remember thinking that it was a wonderful start to a day. traffic was heavy and i had to stop and wait for cars when i jogged across a few streets. at one point, ahead of me, i saw two elderly people and a cherubic-looking toddler. he couldn't have been more than three and was tottering ahead of the two, presumably his grandparents. i smile at him and catch his eye and he looks at me in wonderment. he yells a "Hello!" at me. i smile and wave at him in return, and i jog on.
i reached the path along a canal where i used to jog. it looked the same. i gazed up at the skies and i saw swirls of white in the infinite blue. the swirls reminded me of how i used to paint as a child. i would have watercolours and a cup of water to soak my brushes in when i wanted to use the same brush to paint a different colour. i would immerse the brush slowly in the water and watch as swirls of paint diffused into the water. yes, that was what the swirls of white in the skies reminded me of that morning. it's strange to think back now and have all those thoughts come back to me in all clarity. yet in all, it's been a few months since that day.
then suddenly, it began to rain. before it rained, i had abandoned thoughts of paint and swirls and was looking across the water in the canal. i saw ripples, but it didn't register to me at first that it could be raining. then i felt tiny droplets of rain on my skin, which surprised me and then the rain got heavier. in a span of a few minutes, they started pelting hard against me, and i realised that i was the only one left jogging along that path. i didn't think of seeking refuge anywhere. the pelting of the raindrops surprised me and somehow spurred me to run even faster, and as i did, a strange thing happened - i suddenly felt alive. it didn't matter that i would be soaked, that it was now raining heavily, that i might slip and fall and get hurt, that i might jog into a puddle and see my shins matted with dirt. i was alive and i was happy and it was still a beautiful morning, never mind the rain. i began to laugh out loud as i ran and tasted the raindrops as i did. i felt free-er than i had in months. for that moment, i had abandoned all grief and sadness.
then as suddenly as the rain had begun, it stopped. i looked up in amazement, stunned that the shower had gone as quickly as it had arrived. the swirls in the skies were gone and the sky was a washed-out blue. the damp concrete was the sole testimony that it had rained. i couldn't even start to tell if my running shirt was damp with perspiration or rainwater. something had changed. everything looked the same, but something had changed. my burst of joy had evaporated. i took a deep breath. i felt something settle over me. it was a heaviness of things to come. i felt the weight of regret settle over me. and then i knew. everything was the same but he had gone. he was gone. it was so natural a thought that i couldn't put a finger on why i knew what i did.
and then i thought of the past - a friday night after a day of work and worry when i'd taken a train to town and walked to one of the massive bookstores. i wanted to run my fingers along the spines of books lined up neatly on the shelves. i wanted to tilt my head and read the titles of books at random. i wanted to pick out a book and turn to the ending and read the last paragraph of the book, any book, be it happy or sad. i especially liked endings that lead nowhere, that leaves you with a sense that life will go on despite the bouts of sadness and joy. on that day, i remember striding to the bookstore and stopping in my tracks as i see him at one of the shelves near the entrance, reaching for a book. i notice the white that tinges his sideburns. it seems so natural a thing that we should meet that i am hardly surprised. thinking back, i could have missed the train and decided to head home instead. or i could have been distracted by the numerous sales in the shops, just like any typical girl would be. but i wasn't.
i spy a bench in the distance and sit down. it is only then that the tears begin to fall. tears of sadness at us having so little time together. tears of regret at not being able to be by his side for more than three times a week. tears of gratitude at having had a year to spend together. tears of guilt for what we had that can never be shared.
at first sight, there was much to admire about him - much to emulate, even. his poise, his air of natural detachment, his silent and calm demeanor, which meant that little could ever faze him. the years have blurred my memory and for the life of me, i cannot think of any particular incident in which he exhibited such qualities, but i cannot, i cannot think of any. which is a shame. i can, however, pick out the exact moment i witnessed his vulnerability and let pity slip out of me unwittingly. it was a hot weekday afternoon, and we had just exited the building which we had a midday meeting in. we walked across the tiled ground, him with his coat already slung over the arm he was carrying his briefcase with. my court shoes clicked against the tiles and one tile must have been loose, for i heard a different click from what i was accustomed to hearing, so often did we go for meetings at that particular building. i must have stopped short, for he was walking quickly and stopped some distance ahead of me and turned back impatiently. at that moment, i saw him looking at something behind me and i turned to look at what had caught his attention. the building was next to a busy road, on which was travelling a yellow minibus. it must have been some sort of a school outing for they were all pointing excitedly at the hideous-looking structure of what was meant to be a bird along the street. they must have seen us turn to look at them too, for they suddenly all started waving at us. i didn't wave back at first, it must have been the heat and thought of work that was waiting to be done, and then i turned and looked at him, but there he was waving for all he was worth. strangely, it wasn't an expression of joy on his face, but a strangely grateful look at what chance had presented him with and an unwillingness to let go of the moment. he waved till they were out of sight, and then he waved some more.no, he wasn't being silly, he didn't want to let go of the moment lest drudgery emerge and swallow it whole. but it did, and we walked back in silence. that afternoon, i pitied how the years had taken so much out of him, that it left him an empty shell bereft of the promise of youth.
i do not remember how i walked home that day. i do not remember what else went through my mind. my guess is that i must have gone through the motions - of opening the door to my home, storing my shoes in the shoe cabinet, peeling off my socks and then sitting blankly on the sofa for a while. then i must have taken a shower and sat on the sofa, waiting for my hair to dry, perhaps. the next thing i knew, i woke and it was dark.
i got up and i felt groggy. i saw that it was eight. my thoughts were disjointed, he was gone. i spied my mobile on the coffee table not far away. picking it up, i saw there were two missed calls and one text message. they were from his wife. "he passed on this morning, funeral's on thursday." i didn't cry. throughout, the only tears i shed were when i was on the bench after the sudden downpour.
i switched on the television and poured myself a glass of red wine. the inane blabber on some variety talkshow that was being aired annoyed me to no end. the voices were too shrill , the topic too frivolous, the glare of the television hurt my eyes. i scanned through my collection of old movies and selected a french movie, amelie. it was screened in 2001 and was an instant hit with its whimsical feel. it was one of my favourite movies, but he never understood why. "what's the appeal to it with such a child-like character?" he'd ask. of course, he never understood that like a child, i looked up to him and yet tried to repress that side of me, lest he find me too childish and clingy. so i built a wall around myself and my emotions - i had to be this person that he found he wanted to love. i could not let slip any semblance of desire that we could ever spend the rest of our lives together. i had to fully respect how he had to spend most evenings with his family. i was the outsider, who had to be the sacrificing one. i could never allow myself to demand anything more of what he was willing to provide. i could never ever let him feel even once that i was a liability to his marriage and family. and so, the walls i built. looking back, i might have prided myself unnecessarily. i might have conditioned myself to be the person he wanted to have, but it never meant that i was indispensable for who i was. it could so easily have been someone else in my shoes, in other words, i was just the right person in the right time and place. but displace those thoughts i try, for i want only beautiful memories to last me for now.
so amelie, a show too whimsical for him, but for me a dream. i can't say it uncovered my longing to just drop everything and live simply as a waitress in a non-descript Parisan cafe and to indulge in nothing but the moment. i suppose you could say he was the only one holding me back from pursuing my silly dreams. or perhaps i just want to pin the blame on something else other than my own cowardice that sees me staying here even here despite how it's been a few months to that day, the day when i woke to the sound of rumbling thunder.
i've lost many friends along the way. take for example two days ago when i was at the train station. i saw two ex-colleagues of mine walking towards me. i don't think they'd seen me yet, but i just averted my eyes, stared ahead and kept walking so as not to draw any attention to myself. we didn't part on a bad note. in fact they even held a farewell party and contributed towards the food, cake and my farewell gift. i couldn't make out why i didn't want to acknowledge them. perhaps i was too tired to stop and talk to them and answer all those usual questions thrown at someone you haven't seen for a long time. i guess i just didn't want to talk. and so i avoided the moment. and because of my reticence in part, people gradually sensed that about me and they've stopped contacting me.
i do not mind the solace that surrounds me. i went to town today after a long hiatus of cooping myself at home and there were too many people for my liking. i found too often that i was searching the faces of passers-by and thinking inane thoughts about them - her fringe is too short. are they in love? he's a worried businessman. she's off to watch a movie perhaps. the bag she's carrying makes her one of the typical girls who love to splurge on brands. and then without knowing, i'd walked on and on and was standing outside a hotel. The Hotel.
The Hotel was one of those with countless doormen standing in its midst waiting to open the doors for anyone who wanted to enter the place. The Hotel was one of those places where you checked yourself before you entered . The Hotel was one of those places which made you feel conspicuous and conscious of that tiny snag in your satin dress. i do not want to remember now the cool sheets and how my body felt heavenly just sinking into those sheets.
i want to remember how his skin had turned paper-thin. the wrinkles on his skin had become like tiny ridges and i used to run my fingers on them in his last weeks. his lips were dry and parched most of the time and i would dampen them with a piece of wet cotton wool, then wipe them and pat on some Vaseline.
It was an air ticket bought on a whim with the knowledge that I still had six painful months to go before the end of the school year. So, to Hong Kong it was, a country i had felt safe to head to alone, given the knowledge that i could speak halting Cantonese and passable Mandarin. i had booked a cheap hostel in Kowloon, putting in the dates over and over again on a hostel booking website as i mulled over what would be my first solo trip abroad. Three days later, i was on the plane, a notebook on the tray table and my pen hovering atop the lined paper, confounded by my sudden lack of ability to put words on paper for the first time in a long while.
The trip to the Dragon Hostel was a smooth one. I'd bought my ticket for bus A21 without much trouble at the airport. By the time the bus was passing through the Kowloon area, it was almost eight and the flashing billboards hurt my eyes. From where I was seated on the top-deck of the bus, I spied shoppers overflowing from the shopping malls,
