The sun particularly looks bright orange on the pebbly beach. I cannot deign to recollect when last I dipped my feet in its icy yet soothing waters. My decision to visit at this auspicious and monumental time in my life expresses and reaffirms what I had feared for so long: that what I have been looking for is a connection, any kind of connection. All it took was for this scenic view to drive home the point. Pretty ironic that it had to come from the one place I never envisioned I would see again, Home. Who knew I would find respite here? The joke writes itself, alright. Thank you and keep having the last laugh you cruel SOB
One week ago
Troy backs up in the beat-up Sedan from the car dealership with the rooster signage held up by one screw into the available slot in the parking space behind the Millers’ fruit shop. He peers through his windscreen and sees first the inscription “obshaus” etched onto the now-decayed wood board. “Won’t they change that wood board? It’s been so long,” he intones. He also sees the adjoining basketball court and gets his senses steamrolled by a wave of nostalgia.
He remembered how he used to cut school with a couple of the then-tagged troubled kids to smoke pot and talk about the annual midsummer town fair, which happened to always coincide with the close of the academic term back then.
He remembers again his first experience with heartache. Adriane, the eldest of the Miller kids, his butterfly, as he fondly recalled, albeit with a tinge of bittersweetness, was a thing of beauty. In his hormonal-fuelled mind, he was able to, without bias, appreciate her striking visage. She was the breathing definition of eye candy.
Troy often wondered how he was able to catch her eye. She was, as a matter of fact, four years his senior, and yet they could relate as equals. The very barrier of age did nothing to quench the blossoming tension between them back then. In hindsight, he should have seen the whole experience as nothing but a notch on the bedpost. Exactly like how Adriane did when he chanced on her kissing his replacement.
The confrontation, even recounting it now, still packs the exact gut-perforating wallop of the messiness it had. The confrontation’s aftermath? An even messier affair. It was resplendent with the sordid details of her trifling even while they were still together.
“How could you do this to me, butterfly?” he questions her, incensed.
Even in rage, he remembers to call her affectionately. This is not lost on her.
She looks at him dead straight in the eyes, hand interlocked with who appears to be his replacement, and makes a sound that conveys a frustration akin to dealing with a child. Dismissive would be an understatement. The verbal evisceration that follows tastes like bile in the back of the throat
“Troy, it has never been that serious. I didn’t know you would do something as childish as falling in love. Heck, I’ve been going on dates with other guys since we started doing whatever the hell you will call this,” she says, trying to catch her breath.
“I should have known when you were still lovey-dovey a week after. When you were still sending flowers and wanting me to come over with just the intention of hanging out. I thought boys only do that, the whole gentlemanly display of courtship, for three days and go straight to third base. Grow up.”
A sudden wave of boisterous laughter escapes her lips as soon as she ends.
A whole minute of laughter, music to her ears and pain to his, elapses. She lets go of the hand of the replacement who, by now, sympathises with Troy. A look of 'man-just-leave-it; it isn’t worth the humiliation' burns through his eyes, signalling to Troy to at least salvage whatever remnants of masculinity he has left.
Adriane walks up to Troy and says in his face what will be foundational for his character-building for subsequent love pursuits in the future.
“Listen, lover boy, you’re a nice guy despite your many shortcomings and home crises I had to sit through and listen to. Stop oversharing, wuss; be selfish and don’t make that mistake of going all out…”
Amid her harangue, Troy makes a mental note to take it all in and never make the error of forgetting.
“Burn this moment into memory. Make it indelible.” He returns to hear her move a level lower in her tirade.
“… You were so easy to manipulate, gosh. Like taking candy from a baby. So effing easy, my word! Naive little boy, now turn around and go h-“
Before she could finish, Troy utters a simple yet gratuitous ‘thank you’ and walks back home. He left her stranded mid-sentence and whisked from her the satisfaction of a final blow. A little victory in what can be considered a total wipeout.
Honking sounds from a car speeding past snap him out of his recollection.
Peering through the back mirror, something catches his attention.
In his daydream, he had not noticed the truck carrying unnamed products, tools and barrels turn into the lot. Then again, it was parked in the very far corner of the lot. That explained why he had heard nothing.
His eyes are drawn to a man who looks oddly familiar even with a Shenandoah beard. Still in the sedan whose mileage now has exceeded the hundred and eighty thousand mark last he checked, he notices the man’s apparent discomfort carrying the loaded barrel with a sticker of ‘Apfelschorle’ on its sides.
“Need a hand with that, my good man?”
“why… Ugh! Hmmm, yes! “I do, man,” screams the man whose face is flushed red now.
Quickly, Troy sets the car in park, opens his driver’s door, forgetting to shut it and makes a beeline for the show of the redneck and his barrel of Apfelschorle
Grey
Curator of moments, collector of whispers