there’s just so much goodness in this picture.

whatever avva was in the middle of.

d & megan smiling so brightly.

the corner of the gauzy cotton white towels that south indian folks are so fond of.

the sundari silks bag that will inevitably only stop being used when we return again in a few years and replace with a newer one.

the courtyard in the middle of the house offering that brightness.

doors and windows being open all day.

greenery.

home.

For someone who prides herself on his, for someone who has this reputation, I find myself struggling to remember what you look like. It hasn’t even two months since I saw you last but already I find myself laying awake in vain to remember what your face looked like. I get snatches of it but they disappear before I can hold on. I’ve been reduced to picturing a certain actor’s face and then I start altering features until I can get to what I think you look like. This doesn’t always work. More often than not, I’m back to seeing his face again. With the exception of the scar. That scar less than half an inch long that sits across your right cheek. When I saw you, after we sat down and were facing each other – clearly, I remember looking at it and realizing that I had forgotten about it. My fingertips have grazed it’s grooves. It remains my favorite part of your body. I wanted to reach out and feel it again, but I didn’t. I should have. Maybe it would have helped me remember.

I remembered you once. On the cusp of jet-lagged sleep, it startled me awake. I sat upright in bed and covered my eyes with my hands because your face was just so real. It felt like you were there and all I had to do was reach out and there you’d be. I was so startled and for the briefest of minutes, I actually couldn’t forget. And then I did and I couldn’t get you back again. Nothing I could do or think of would conjure you up.

I convince myself that it’s better this way. That something larger than you or I is conspiring to make me forget your face because then it couldn’t hurt anymore. And maybe I’d slowly start forgetting you. But even as I think this now I know it’s not true. That no amount of trying on my part would ever make me forget you. I wouldn’t allow myself to.

So for now, I will resolve to keep trying. And keep imagining that scar on your right cheek in the hopes that it will bloom into your face.

I’ve had luck with “writing” about folks on this blog who have then contacted me, so it’s with that same hope that I’m writing about Karthi again…let’s hope he’s got a google alert set up in his name!

Not going to lie, I’m totally crushing on Karthi. And of course as luck would have it he happened to get married while I was in India. Not like I had a chance, but isn’t that the exact premise of most Tamil movies? That the actually impossible could happen at any given moment? While it was raining?

anytime i recount that story, i marvel at how much of a cinematic beginning it had.
“is this seat taken?”
those were your first words to me.
i don’t think i’ve ever admitted this to anyone & i certainly haven’t to you, but i remember noticing you at the bar before you made your way to me. i saw you standing by the door, eyeing the place. looking, searching. maybe not for me, but you found me.
that night, that infamous night when i ran out of the waldorf astoria, half-naked, thinking i’d never ever hear from you again.

and yet here we are. six years later. a lot closer than i thought possible given the distance. the ever present distance.

then it happened. then you told me why these distances existed. you told me about her. about the way she existed in your life. who she was to you.

we spoke a lot that night. a lot of what you said surprised me. a lot of what i said surprised me.
“i’m a cheater, but i can’t lie to you.” to me, you said. to. me.

like i mattered in your life. i know i matter. it wasn’t until you said it out loud that i realized i mattered to you. and you looked at me like you were terrified that you had fucked me up somehow. that you knew i hadn’t ever dealt with this and you didn’t want to be the one doing it to me.

and that’s when i realized why you kept my number, why you kept me in your life – because i was that person in your life. the one you saw hope in.
you were are to me the one who had his shit together. who was older, mature, had the type of life i wanted to grow into. and i said this to you, before your revelation. which i think added to your not wanting to lie to me. and i reminded you of that – how so very grateful i was that you didn’t lie to me. that you didn’t want to lie to me.

and despite that revelation, you are still all of those things to me.

i want you to know how close i came to running back upstairs to room 1208. to where you were. to you.

i didn’t. i stood by the elevator and looked down the hallway to your door. wanting to badly to see you standing there. i’d have run back if i saw you standing there. i told myself what i knew. i would have.
i didn’t because i knew that i couldn’t have a hand in someone else’s unhappiness. i couldn’t help you be unhappier in your life. i couldn’t mar what we had.

because to do that would be to damage this pristine image of us and our imaginary, non-existent existence.
my friends continuously ask why it is that i don’t speak up about what i want with you. how i’d so quickly agree to something, anything more substantial than this.
my only response is that i’d rather imagine and dream (and i do) about a future with you than a reality without you.

and yet, here we are. i’m facing a future without you. i’m dreading, what i was previously anxiously excited about, the 4 hours i know we will be in the same country.
you may see that as coincidence, but to me, it’s fate. that is life reminding me with it’s cruel, fickle hand at how close we were.

you will never read this.

you will never know more about how the last few days have so kept me awake and in turmoil. how i would take the long way to work so that i’d walk past your hotel on the off chance that i’d run into you. i stayed so many more hours, sitting at my desk in the hopes that you’d call me and i could run the 3 minute walk to you.

how badly i want to go back to sunday evening, when you so persistently kept me on the phone trying to get me out of pj’s and in a cab to you. to go back to that ignorant bliss. when i was just excited to see you and be with you. when she didn’t exist. all i had to think about was us.

and somehow, i’d be able to justify this as fate. life. some greater force moving us together despite her existence a world away. even though that isn’t the truth.

i meant every word i said to you. not only that night but for the past 6 years. but especially those last few sentences.

i hope, more than i think i’ve ever hope for anything else, that i will see you again.

Heart, we will forget him!
You an I, tonight!
You may forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light.

When you have done, pray tell me
That I my thoughts may dim;
Haste! lest while you’re lagging.
I may remember him!

Heart, we will forget him! – Emily Dickinson

Filing away for later…specifically the 4 hours that I will spend in Hong Kong (cloistered in the airport – but to be in the same country!), knowing that you’re actually out there.

Closer than you’ve been for the past few years.

Cosmo has a wicked sense of humor.

i dreamt about you last night.

i haven’t thought about you since last july – independence day weekend, in fact -  when d and i walked into cafe habana and i noticed you through the open windows but pretended like i didn’t. when i waited for you to call out my name, more than once through the din of crowd just so i could savor how it sounded.

and you did.

i acted surprised (i wasn’t) and elated (i was) and we hugged in that narrow walkway between the bar and tables. wedged between people as they came in and left, did you hold on for a few seconds more?

no, i must’ve imagined that.

you abandoned your meal and friend and stood outside with me. leaning in closer than you should have. making stronger eye contact than you needed to.

reminding me.

reminding me of all of those things that i’m no longer privy to but want to be.

we went and got the obligatory drinks a week later. where i sat and listened to you share your heartbreak. and joy and sadness over losing her. i listened, like the friend you needed me to be. i listened still as you promised me that you’d call and we’d do this again, more regularly this time.

you walked me to the subway and i came back up the steps to watch you turn the corner.

and that was that.

but, i dreamt about you last night.