I remember how we first met. It felt like walking into an enchanted park with pretty, pink and pale cherry blossom trees. The ambiance resembled of a love fantasy or sort. It was so bizarre, almost extremely dream-like. In fact, there are moments I feel that all that has happened between us occurred only as a dream. A dream I keep reliving, a dream that's changed me as a whole. I can no longer see the world as I used to, the numerous men that have swung by my life have only proven the monstrous impact you've laid on me. It felt like what we had was a summer fling, as much as I hate to admit it. I wasn't sure whether what I felt for you was love or mere infatuation. We never had any proper closure, and maybe that's why you keep haunting me. Even in my reality — even in my dreams.
It was summer when we first met. I was a student in an exchange program. I was so young, so delighted and so naive. I flew miles away from my homeland, ventured from Singapore all the way to South Korea. Our love almost seemed so carefully scripted, like those cliche, romance dramas you watch on TV. Initially it appeared to be that way. I still remember how you bold you were, to want to hold my hands. How you presented me a bouquet of flowers — fresh, as fresh as this first love I experienced with you, in front of the entire cohort of students. You made me feel something I've never experienced. For once in my life, I felt that someone accepted me for all the flaws I possessed. It was surreal. Everything felt so dreamy and I was in a constant state of delusion, to think you truly loved me, until — until I returned to Singapore.
You deleted your Facebook, the only platform for us to converse. You vanished without any note. I was so lost, so stunned. For awhile then, my world was enveloped with confusion and this constant nagging to know why. What wrong have I done till you believed I didn't even deserve any notice or any reasonable explanations? Was it because of our cultural differences? Our communication? Maybe it was, maybe that was why we ended. I so badly wanted to find you, to ask you, to make you explain what went so wrong with us. But I was terribly fearful. I never mustered enough guts to do what my heart urged me to do. It felt like finding a needle in a haystack. And even if I did find the needle, I was afraid that one hurtful prick from it would pain me more than the drop of blood I'd bleed. I kept checking on you, and one day I found out you made a new account, but never added me. I was so appalled, and my heart broke into two. Why would you do such a thing, I thought. I was only 19, and yet my first love has pained me more than I've expected.
I still check on you to see how you're doing now.
I am older now, and I have met many kinds of man ever since. Somewhere deep within me still hope for you to come back. I fail to find any man who satisfies me emotionally as much as you did. In every shadow of the other men I've met, I still hope to see traces of you within them. And I find none. None at all. I am told by my friends that perhaps I am too fussy, perhaps I should just drop this infinite hope and deep longing I harbour for you. Because of you, I've wasted no time with other men I saw no progress with. The need to find you in those men I've met have only made me ghost from them halfway, like you did. Just like you did. Poof, vanished. This, I did not even realize until my friend questioned me of my frequent rejections after getting to know those men halfway.
It was only a month back, when I met this boy on this dating app. This boy, this man who I feel, is the male doppelganger of me. I saw everything I yearned in a man in him. The connection we shared with each other was as surreal — it was amazing how much we connected. Like the constellations of the stars, joined together to reveal such a masterpiece. I felt that with you. I felt extremely great and empowered with you. You were like a musical box, the moment I opened the lid your stories flowed and I ached for you. The stories you have shared. You told me you were cheated of a 5 years relationship, and how it resulted you to be so clinically depressed. How, today, you still suffer from insomnia. How you keep awake all night battling your inner demons. My heart ached to be of security and comfort for you, even when my own heart still creaked from the past romance I had. You were different, so very different from all the other man I've met online. I remember how much I love how we could talk for hours and hours about everything and anything because we were so, very alike. It was getting dreamy again, as I thought about how I was finally able to open up to a person I could envision a future with. I was surrounded with the music that you played, those beautiful notes plucked from your circuit. How at home I felt around you. I was happy, I was overjoyed.
But just had to, you just had to leave. Just like how my dreamy Korean soulmate did, just like how I've abandoned my other contacts. You left me in drapes of pain and extreme disappointment.
The music stopped playing since you left. The beautiful sounds, the cheery notes I anticipated for each day stopped. But I am still reminded of you from the songs played on the radio, even though you're no longer here. Even though you no longer play for me. It has been awhile, but now, I wish for your return more than I wish for my Korean boy to return. I have missed you each day since you ghosted from my life, leaving me cold and lost once more. And yet that hasn't stopped me from wishing, deep down that we'd cross paths again in the future.
Second thoughts have held me at wondering whether it's karma? For me to be deserted by those I cherish, like how I've forsaken the rest of the men I crossed path with. Or am I just plain unlucky? I feel like I've never felt true love. But I still believe in God and His plans, for I know He knows better and what's truly best for me. I believe that one day, a man will stop at my direction and for once, will be the one I'm meant to share my life with. I wouldn't need to try hard to impress myself to fit into another person's liking. I shall be myself and promise to never settle for anything less just for the sake of having another shot at genuine love. Or just for the sake of being in a relationship again.
I don't know how love is, but I choose to wait and let God do His wonders on me.
Written for Anonymous, A.S
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