Awakening

Howling winds and shattering window panes caused a momentary lull in my sleep. I woke up heavy headed that morning at 6 o clock. The sky outside was pitch dark and the clouds were thundering as if they were holding so much they hadn’t let go. I stood up and made my way downstairs to fetch a glass of water. My throat was rugged and my intestines were clenching together as I gasped in thirst.

After devouring those sweet sips of water, I hurried my way upstairs to enjoy those last few moments of comfort in the sequestration of my bed. Honestly, I hadn’t slept properly in ages. Every time I shut my eyes, I only seemed to look at what my mind showed me. It felt miserable. Feeling free, yet in distress; feeling complete, yet incomplete.

Nonetheless, I made my way upstairs and snuggled in the solace of my bed sheets. It was a Sunday and the last day before work would start again. As much as I liked being fast paced, it was the only thing that I perhaps did every day. Around me was a cloak that pushed me farther from all the fancies of life. In this shell were me, my existence and my constant breathing—which I could not foresee an end to.

Over the last few days, I had thought a lot about Blue. This morning was no different. I opened my eyes to tweeting of birds in the nests. The sun shone right on my eyes and impinged on my retina, narrowing my view. I confidently walked towards the window to draw the curtains apart. The next moment, I found myself juggling with the coffee machine for my morning buzz. It was 10 o clock and I had awakened to a disturbed mind. 

All my cognition could think about was Blue. About Blue, there is so much to say that just describing her outward appearance was not enough. Before her, I hadn’t seen a woman as ambitious, smart, intelligent and selfless. All these years that we spent together passed in a flick. Sometimes, when I began to articulate, I don’t know if that was the happiest time of my life or not. But now, when she has left me, I do know that my subconscious mind was so dependent on her that achieving little goals without her by my side has become heart wrenching.  

If I begin to admit the truth beyond the canvas of my own shortcomings, I was not ever happiest when Blue came into my life. But now, the way she deserted me and everything we had paved together has left me awestruck. With Blue’s exit came so much rejection towards me from life and it all changed into black and white. Perhaps, that is what Blue wanted me to realize. But unfortunately, I learned the hard way. I only wish that she could stay in my life longer and not take a leave to help me accomplish the true meaning of relationships within their own sanctity and boundary. 

The day had almost come to an end. The clouds had poured enough all day, bringing a rather dull yet serene aftermath forward. The city appeared clean and washed from the height I currently stood at, absorbing a bird’s eye view of Praha, just from my apartment in Prague. I spent most of my day going through Blue’s memories and how they all beautifully bridged to my journey so far in life. Undoubtedly enough, I owe her almost everything. Every passing moment, I only wished that she had given another chance to this relationship—one that I almost neglected while she conquered lengths for it to flourish.

Crudely, I snapped the photo album I was going through on the table and went out for a smoke. It was -4 degrees and I felt culpable. When I stared at the moon and the stars, I felt I stood in a witness box—for all that I did to Blue, for all that went wrong. Would she forgive me? Would she not? Her love for me was true—would that love fight the oceans and screaming winds for us to unite again?

As I walked past the streets, I strolled down St. Nicholas Church. Every time Blue and I traveled across this street, her eyes lit with glow as she softly spoke all those words of goodness and talked of her dreams of us tying the knot in this very church. Over the course of our journey in Prague during the last five years, Blue had intuitively developed a bonding to this very church, its glory, lights and architecture. 

I walked a good few miles from home to the church and back. On my way, I grabbed a quick bite from Café Pacci—one of Blue’s most favorite places for a quick bite. 

Soon, my day was over. I lay in my bed and prepared myself for the next day. My first day to work after parting with Blue—just the thought made me uneasy. Amidst my thoughts and realizations, I drifted to kip and negotiated with my lady love in my dreams to come back home.

The next morning seemed pale. I left home hurriedly and drove to work. It was the same, just the same as Blue had left. But Prague felt incomplete without her. Blue originated from North America and had always dreamed of painting her life in a city like this—full of culture, colors and an aura of its own. Six years ago, I met Blue in a subway from Boston to New York. Back then, I was completing my university education in a reputed business school in Boston.

I lost my father to a car accident on Paris’s most famous street, Shanzey Lezay, when I was only 4. He was a wine distributor but his business was seized by the Government of France after his death as he operated partly illegally. When I was 6, I began to realize how financially disabled my mother had become. She started working as a waitress in Alcazar, a pub in Paris. There, she was exposed to all sorts of unpleasant experiences one can imagine. There were times she didn’t return home for nights and randomly called me from a hotel reception to ensure if I was doing alright. Soon, I was transferred to a boarding school in Monte Carlo as a tool to stay away from mother’s unlawful practices and the dark side. When I was 12, I decided to visit mother on a surprise note. To my horror, I opened the door of my very house to the most displeasing sight ever. What had she turned into? 

I took the first train back to Monte Carlo. That night, my soul burned down to ashes and dissolved to wreckage, if nothing more. The next morning, I was disoriented in my hostel room and missed attending school for a week. For over two months, my mother kept calling and sending me letters but I had disappeared as if we were never related, or as if I had lost her too with my father. 

A year later, when I finished school, I started working in a money exchange. The prime and perhaps the only motive of my life now was to raise money. My spirits were bruised beyond repair. I had become so isolated that slowly all my friends drifted apart. The few that were left did not seem to comprehend my silence. Just one person who did that in my life was Blue. 

Thinking about all this felt surreal—a shame and disgrace. Suddenly, I hit the brakes. I stood outside my office. It took me a while to harvest my energy and climb upstairs. With the New Year unfolded a new beginning. Some hundred meetings and appointments had already been scheduled for coming months. Apart from this were some tough deadlines I was required to meet. Time almost flew by as I looked at my watch. Soon, it was time for lunch. I wrapped the longwinded files on my computer screen and rushed down to grab Blue’s most favorite Turkey Breast sandwich.

Suddenly, a chill ran down my spine. I could smell Blue in the air. Dismayed, I moved my steps downstairs. Rare as it was, I felt the urge to be with her, eat lunch with her. I was taken aback by this thought as I normally didn’t welcome her company for lunch or even at dinner time. As much as Blue strived to spend time together, I rebelled every time she proposed a plan. During working hours, I routinely shunned her from my company. There were times when I lied to her about my whereabouts so she does not walk into my office. Really, what was I thinking?

Blue and I soon adjusted to this groove. However, as unwilling as she was, she kept patient and hoped that maybe one day I will return home earlier and spend time in the aroma of our bedroom. Most of the times, when I stepped in the house, Blue had fallen asleep just waiting for me—sometimes on the couch, down on the rug or simply on the bed, exhausted and disgruntled. To me, it was a mindless activity—waiting for someone to return home, look in their eyes or expect your partner to get you a bouquet. Blue, however, did not understand this. One of the primary reasons we fought every time was her immature, childish behavior; which she didn’t understand was a hindrance to a practical man’s life. 

In a jiffy, I snapped out of my fantasies and rushed to work. The latter half of the day swung. I managed to grip my nerves and focus on work somehow, with Blue’s memories fading into the background.

This was becoming unbelievable—almost unbelievable. In her presence, there was hardly a time when I expressed an intimate emotion. Now that she has gone, all I could think about was Blue. The more I did, her face evanesced out of my mind. And the more I tried to create distance, the closer I felt to her scent and existence.

Despite everything, I cornered these thoughts to a quite impasse of my soul. I moved forward with whatever this very day had to bring forth.

After work, I entered to an empty house followed by a queue of silence which felt unnatural. Precisely, it didn’t exist when Blue was there. The sound of her laughter, the way she chuckled was no less than a baby. Blue metamorphosed the daunting shadows of my past to bright light. 

There was a post in Blue’s name, lying just above the fireplace. It was a letter by her best friend, Amanda, who lived in Berlin and got hitched just two months ago. I immediately recalled how eager Blue was to attend her wedding reception but my work schedule and engagements couldn’t let the plan materialize.

Amanda and Blue were friends since high school. She was one of the most reliable people in Blue’s life. Missing her wedding was a bummer and Blue was upset with me over this for weeks. I tore the envelope open and read the letter.

Dearest best friend,

Married life is just as amazing as I had thought. Now that I am done, it’s your turn to tie the knot. Olive must be ready, I guess? The last time we met, he told me that he is quite settled in his job and would like to chalk a sketch for future very soon. 

You are undoubtedly a part of Olive’s future. 

Further, losing your job can be a tiresome experience and I think I know how you would be feeling at the moment. But I am attaching the contact details of a very famous fashion photographer called Jamie Tire who is looking to hire makeup artists for her shoots for spring 2014. She has already seen your work and quite liked it.

I hope something paves out once you and Jamie shake hands.

All the best,

Amanda Fernandez

Jamie’s contact details were attached on the next page. Blue was extensively hunting herself a new job ever since she broke ties with her previous employer over a payment fraud for which he held Blue accountable. I wasn’t sure whether responding to Amanda’s letter was a wise idea or not. But well, sooner or later, she would have known that Blue left this place and no longer belongs here.

I left the letter unattended by the fireplace. Reading everything Amanda wrote somehow implied that Blue and I appeared to be a closely knit couple before the eyes of the world. Why did Blue have to go like this? Why did she leave everything and part her ways? After all, Amanda was her friend and likewise, would only what Blue would tell her. If Blue had so many great things about me to tell the world despite my indifference, what was it that went so wrong?

I was hurt. Ever since I read the post, I felt tainted. The unbreakable and strong-headed Olive Rome was stained by the blemishes left by his girlfriend. It is easy to carry an affirmative and decisive man’s repute, but hard to play around it when the storm hits you. As much as rejection was unbearable for a man like me, the ache of Blue departing from my life seemed unacceptable, not because of the high monument of ego within me, but because of an emotion that had genuinely tarnished when Blue left.

With a heavy heart and moist eyes, I headed to bed. That night took me three months in the past. I dreamt of Blue. It was her birthday for which I promised her a week’s trip to Spain to celebrate her day and also pamper her craze of the Read Madrid. Just when Blue reached the airport and I was on my way, something at work came up. A massive proposal by an IT giant was offered to our company and being able to devise a competitive master plan for it was a road to my promotion as the Regional Head of Emerging Markets across Europe. The least I expected of Blue was to understand how crucial my job had been at that point in time. But what is the most you can expect of a woman—a stream of crocodile tears and soul rooting dialogues that make you nothing but vulnerable. As we had experienced before, Blue’s irrationality concluded to nothing resolute but an exchange of hard talks and expression of hurtful sentiments.

The dream ended. I woke up with a sudden jerk and was immersed in sweat. I felt embittered. 

Was did I feel so guilty when she had finally gone now? She was the one to choose to do so—it wasn’t me. Why wasn’t there peace around me now that Blue had gone? How did that woman manage to leave behind so much love despite the silence that stemmed across my house? Over the past five years that I spent with her in this house, I exactly knew and understood that whatever I may do to make Blue happy, would not suffice. Towards the end, it all did feel like a fruitless exercise. While I considered Blue my family, the least she could do was to understand how essential it was for me to earn and support my handicapped mother back in Paris—who had damaged her life with her very hands. Every time Blue’s company sickened me, I only thought how peaceful it would have been if she wasn’t a part of my everyday life. After all, what was it that she did except ruining my business contracts worth a billion Euros over a stupid birthday trip or an evening we could tentatively spend together. Something that has always gone over my head is the extent to which a woman can become unreasonable and drive a man up the wall—a man who wants to earn to save his family from any inconsequence that may occur. 

I didn’t remember the last time Blue rejoiced over my success. Now when I think of it, it all makes sense. It is easy to be a magistrate’s daughter and travel in a limo. But hard to attain is what my family had to bear. Every single day that I lived as a child, I only knew that life is a loan that can’t be paid back; yet all I saw was my mother struggle to become self-sufficient. Blue had something strange against a man wanting to earn money to be labeled as vehement in this world that saw no emotions? Clearly, emotions never earned us a morsel of bread; neither would they. So what was it for, if it all wasn’t for money? “My dear Blue, I wish you had understood”, I whispered in the confines of my mouth.

I dispatched these smudges thoughts to overlooked whereabouts of my mind and fell on the fluffy comfort on my pillow. As I tried to fall asleep again, tears pooled in my eyes and slowly escaped from the sides. I could go on blaming Blue for being a nut headed woman, yet she made a significant place in my life that I had started believing belonged to me. I thought of her as my possession—something that was mine. Even though I didn’t really care whether it was right or wrong; but that is how it felt. It felt like losing a treasure that I thought will be mine, until the end of time.

A disturbing sense of guilt took me over. I blamed no one but myself for all that had happened. There were times when I wanted Blue to go away—but I guess, not the way she did. As soon as this heartbreaking thought struck my brain, I stood up and started walking downstairs to the basement. Ever since Blue had left, I hadn’t dared to step in there. All it had was her sweet scent and bitter taste of her blood that had drenched the rugs there. It now had become a place that would haunt me for the rest of my life—or at least for as long as I would live in this house. The basement—where Blue decided to bade goodbye to a life she painted for herself and me, shot a bullet down her skull and died.

On my way to the basement, I stumbled upon the couch in the living room. I had no strength to walk or I would just fall. The recollection of this fateful series of incidents made every hair follicle on my body stand to attention. A mild ache in my chest arose and I gasped to the core as I fought it. There was so much remorse—Blue gave her life to the atrocities that were unbeknownst to me. Why though? I simply didn’t have time for her. As close we were physically, the emotional strength of our bond seemed to dwindle overtime. Blue and I lived a separate life although we lived under one roof.

As I sat down on the couch, my toes ran over a piece of paper that had apparently fallen off the table in the centre of the living room. I hadn’t seen this before. I opened it up and switched the lamp on to read it.

Beloved Olive,

I don’t know when you will see this. Or you may not see this at all. There is so much my heart is holding. I don’t know where to begin from. I still don’t know what has brought me here. But I guess every wave in the ocean needs a shore to resort to. My shore, I thought, was with you. Over the last few years I have realized, that a shore isn’t determined by physical support always. It is the miraculous understanding that overpowers silence—is what we haven’t been able to attain. I don’t know whether another five years of togetherness will enable us to come past this breakthrough. All I know is that I don’t want to be disloyal to you. 

I realize that my comprehension towards your hardships hasn’t been up to your expectations. Now is a time when I finally negotiated in my head that another five decades may not be able to provide you the sense of belonging that you are expecting from my end. Every day that we are together has no destination. Even though we have spent five years living together, you still do not know the tiniest of fears in my heart. I am a professional, working woman, Olive. I am not all about flowers and dinners by the beach. There is far more depth to my soul; but sadly, you have never made the effort to know me inside out. Olive, this isn’t one of our usual fights. Here, I am not demanding anything out of you. All this little letter demands is a few minutes of your time. Here, I am only stating things I wish you had done, I wish had happened, I wish we had shared. 

I don’t want you to spend the rest of your life contemplating over things that aren’t in your hands. I just wish that you find another dimension to your already well-constructed lifestyle and someone who tends to flow in the events as you will. 

I don’t remember the last time we had a moment to ourselves. What I remember is, your birthday, Halloween weekend and Christmas—all these events that we spent apart. For your birthday, I had booked a resort about 10 miles from Prague. For Halloween, the only thought that came to mind was spending some time together; of course if your tough schedule would permit. 

Olive, no, just being a magistrate’s daughter isn’t a door to life’s riches—as you thought. Let me correct you. Along with it comes a lot of undesired pressure to meet expectations you think are void and pointless. Two years ago, my so-called rich magistrate father got his hands into a murder of a policeman. Ever since, he has been involved in some felonious gang to rid himself from the crime he has committed. I know you value money over everything else because of how you have grown up; my family needs a ridiculous amount of money to get him off the hook. But since this colossal an amount is impossible to pay, the only solution is that I marry the policeman's son and bless my father with his life.

I may come across as irrational and unreasonable, as you feel, but I don’t want to live to do something that makes me insincere towards you. Neither have I wanted to die with someone else’s name attached to mine.

I know none of this will make sense to you. But I only wish that we had devoted more time to each other. Right now, all I am taking with me is the sense of satisfaction in knowing that I will die to remain yours until the end of time; but I am being ruthless towards my family and you simultaneously.

However, the only thing I wish I could carry along is the feeling of being with you. A feeling that is eternal—yet has faded out overtime. 

To conclude this chapter of your life, I request you to bring all associations with my family and friends (including Amanda) to a halt.

About all those ladies who you met in bars and thought I don’t know of them, are very much in my knowledge as most of them would call you at home while you would be meeting some forth lady outside the house every day at 2 o clock in the night. Their contact details are noted in your blue diary which is clustered among the other many documents on your writing table. The wine bottles that you hid under the kitchen counter and thought I wouldn’t know are in the giant closet in the backyard. I trash them every second week or so. Also, last week, I shifted your stack of movies from the writing table to the drawer in your closet—movies that you watched while you told me you’re working night after night. I can’t help but let a little laugh off my lips, Olive. 

Lastly, please value that one woman who killed her own existence in raising you: your mother. A woman may use any means to earn bread for her child. The only thing she will still need is her child’s embrace and acceptance.

I don’t have reasons to your answers. But all I have is answers alone.

When love dies, it isn’t ever more alive. For when it does, a whole new emotion comes to life.

Till death did us apart,

Blue

When love sleeps, it is never more awake. For when it does, a whole new emotion comes to life.