I have never looked at someone and said to myself, "He's the one." At least, not until I met you.
It was scary. The thought dawned to me in an unprecedented manner. There were no precautions. But I remember sitting in a slightly crammed convenience store on a hot Thursday afternoon. My mood was a bit tipped over, what with the lack of sleep and the surge of patients at the Emergency Room the night prior. But I waited for you there. Because we both wanted to fill our stomachs with something it could churn on. And when you sat there in front of me, no my heart didn't skip a beat. Instead, even more frightening is that, I felt time slow down.
I can still remember clearly to this day how your eyes glowed as you watched the cars pass by from the window. And when you were about to meet my gaze, I pretended to be exhausted, so I threw myself across the table for a quick nap. There our elbows touched. And it was that moment that I felt anxious of your presence near me. Why am I afraid of you, I asked myself. I mean, I just met you.
But I was careless at that time. I had forgotten how affection towards another can bloom fast. I became easily comfortable, of talking to you, of being undeniably haggard, and of being grumpy. You allowed me some space in your heart, so I opened mine as well. For no definite reason or intent, I let my guard down.
Our conversation went smoothly for ten minutes now. I looked at my watch and saw you didn't have one, so I made a comment, that I get attracted to guys with a sleeky wristwatch. I recall now, I made a few more comments about your hair, your body, and even your uniform. But I was just throwing off my opinion for the sake of keeping the conversation going.
As we reached the fifteen-minute mark of being together for the first time, I did something that will probably haunt me for the rest of my life. Because without thought or hesitation, I held your face. Briefly. Just trying to remove a debris. Just looking straight at that debris, not thinking of the consequences of my little touchy gesture.
However...
Right after this moment, I felt a wave inside my chest. I was having palpitations, and not the pathological kind. I just felt my heart beat faster, and faster, until I knew for sure, that the feeling was how the novels called it --- love at first sight.
I thought to myself, "He's the one." It was the kind that came unexpectedly, that's why I hoped the feeling would beam bright. I was excited of course, yet equally frightened, knowing that a candle that burns twice as bright dies twice as fast.
Indeed, our story unfolded in that manner. It was no fairytale after all. It wasn't scripted by Nicholas Sparks. It was the kind of love that didn't thrive. The kind that avid fans of happy endings will ache for. And so in the days that followed, I found myself fading from the euphoria, which happened right after you told me that we just didn't fit right.. I figured that I cannot force us to be together because it was becoming unrequited. It was, after all, only love at the first sight. The spark in seeing you again just sputtered out, and faded. There was not enough fuel to make a flame.
And now, I am sitting in a slightly crammed convenience store on a hot Thursday afternoon. With my mood a bit tipped over, what with the lack of sleep and the surge of patients at the Emergency Room the night prior. But I am not waiting for someone anymore. I just want to fill my stomach with something to churn on, before I find myself falling for the wrong trapdoor of that thing called love at first illusion.
But I have no regrets with how we started, and how we ended.
Aside of course, the fact that we ended.
