Frankly Told: Unsung Song
The tension between them was palpable. The rain pelted the window of the small student’s accommodation room. He glanced out as lighting brightened the dim room momentarily.
Thunder rumbled enough to shake the room but he planted his weight onto the cheap plastic bucket chair across from the bed. When he looked back at her, he could see in her eyes a look, a cocktail of emotions. Her mouth was partially open but not a single word found the courage to slip out.
“Tell me,” he commanded, in a tone sprinkled with desperation.
She sat in silence, staring at him but he could tell that her eyes not once looked directly into his. He thought to himself, what are you staring at, look into my eyes and tell me or at least bloody lie to me.
“Fine,” he gave in. “If you won’t tell me…”
He stood from the chair, collected his keys off the table that stood adjacent to him and began to walk out. Before he could get to the door, she rushed him and stood between him and the door. Nestling herself into him with her head on his chest, she could hear his breathing, heavy and controlled, it was.
“What now?” he bellowed, without so much as a raised finger. “I would like to leave.”
“Don’t,” was all she whimpered out.
“No,” he affirmed. “I am not doing this again. Please, get out of the way.”
Anger began to boil in his belly and if it was possible, steam would have begun to blow out of his ears. He adamantly stood his ground waiting for her to move out of the way. The lack of reciprocated affection made it feel like she was leaning against a wall.
“Listen, it’s not like that,” she started to explain but was hushed with a hand up.
“No. The time for explanations ended,” he said curtly. “I sat here for the past nearly one hour, trying to get you to say something. Now you want to try and tell me something. I’m sorry but I think I am past the point of hearing you out.”
“No but aki just listen,” she protested.
His hand fell and he fell silent. His eyes did not fall from the door. His mind was already out of the door but his heart wished otherwise.
“I don’t think that everything that you did for me was nothing,” she spoke softly. “Look, sometimes I may forget to be ungrateful and I am sorry about that.”
He inhaled deeply and exhaled as if to cool the heating engine inside him. Maybe he actually didn’t want her to lie.
“You mean a lot to me. I have always seen you and everything you do for me,” she continued her siren song.
His heart cracked a little but his resolve plastered the crack as quickly as it formed.
“Those other guys are just friends to me,” she took his hand. “Si you know that it is only you and me. It’s always been. Aki babe.”
“Don’t,” he spat, withdrawing his hand.
She looked up at him, his towering frame like an immovable wall. She ran through the cycles of reeling him back in like she had many many times before. A catch too easy to prey on, she thought.
“Babe,” she pleaded.
He breathed in and shut his eyes before letting the air all leave his body in a deep sigh.
“Stop,” he said in a deadpan tone. “I am not some switch you can turn off and on whenever you like.”
He stepped back from her touch.
“I’m not some pocket you can stick your hand in whenever you need something. I am not some emotional punching bag you can lunge at whenever you want to let out whatever is buzzing inside your chest,” he let off.
Her eyes remained on him, searching for the weakness that had since expired from the man. His hands clenched into a fist, the keys in his left hand threatening to puncture his palm.
“You know how I feel about you but you string me along like this … this fanboy. I’m done,” he finally looked away from the door and into her eyes.
“I’m not your lapdog,” he cut with his words. “I did all those things for you out of how much I enjoyed them but you just get to a point and it becomes draining. I liked going out for lunch, I never minded paying but God you drove me to avoid meetups because I just became free food.”
“I loved our phone calls until whatever time,” he pushed. “But when it got to a point where I was constantly listening to your problems while carrying my own in my back pockets, I started wishing my phone wouldn’t ring. Yet it did and I would still pick up. Why? Because it’s you.”
“This…” he admitted. “This is not healthy. It’s not helping me. Allow me to be selfish and tend to me.”
Tears welled up in her eyes.
“Perhaps you can find it in the next guy who so easily falls into your arms,” he suggested. “Not me. I’m through. I am not going to keep running on this wheel to give you everything you want at the expense of me.”
“I am not a bottomless well,” he said. “Too bad your water has run dry. Maybe you can now miss the water. I am not this ever-flowing river of love. Your season is done. I’m leaving.”
He pushed his way passed her squeezing in the little space she left between her and the wall. She grabbed his hand and he paused.
“It’s always the same song and dance with you,” he sighed, almost stumbling to her touch. “I’m tired of this dance because my song never comes on.”
“Allow me to carry this unsung song with me. Please.”
