Creative nonfiction
By Ignatius Chew
You were six, holding your mother’s hand in the train station with a Geronimo Stilton book in hand, on the way to the movies with your brothers. You didn’t particularly enjoy reading, but mother always said to not waste your time while waiting and do something productive instead. You let go of her hand for a second because something shiny caught your eye, but when you reached for mother again, she is suddenly shorter than you and her face is wrinkled. Did she shrink? No, you simply grew. You look at your hand and there’s a ring on your finger, and the theatre has suddenly become a polyclinic. You wait in line with a queue number in hand, and mother is reading the newspapers beside you. Her hair has turned into a scanting patch of snow, fluttering through the air as the fan blows across her wrinkled face. You told your mother to do something productive, so she kept her papers and started talking to you instead.
*
You were eleven, hiding in the attic of your friend’s landed property during the June holidays. He was squatting under the oak cabinet sheepishly, and you were lying on the floor across the narrow walkway, half covered by a pile of old clothes. The game of hide and seek has been going on for about thirty minutes now, and you have been trying to palm a volleyball to pass time. You heard the sound of the others getting caught, leaving only the two of you in the attic as survivors. You made eye contact with him, and the door to the attic opened and light poured in. Suddenly, you're in his bedroom, the place where you stayed for many sleepovers. It was just the two of you; none of your other friends were there. You're the two lone survivors. Something happened to your friend: he grew bigger, has more acne on his face, his hair longer. You can palm the volleyball now.
“We’re selling the house,” he said.
“What? Why? When?” I replied, face distorted.
“Yea. Dad’s construction business isn’t doing so well. We’re moving out next month.”
You looked at him in shock, images of your childhood flooding in like the dam just broke. It wasn’t even your house, but the pain of separation still stung. You grew up in these walls; every new year party, every Chinese New Year, every school holidays, every after-training respite because your parents were busy to pick you up; gone. Why didn’t anyone tell you houses were to be sold, and that they weren’t just monumental structures but the dreams and joys of little children? Why didn’t anyone tell you the places you loved, the places you grew into the person you are today will soon be destroyed? Why didn’t anyone tell you all you will have left are the memories of who you were; everything else that made you you would inevitably fade away. Why?
*
You were eighteen, lying on the grass patch with your partner in your arms. You had just become an item, after months of navigating seemingly insurmountable situations. You fiddled with her hair mindlessly, thinking about all the wonderful things you want to do together. She’s breathing softly, leaning fully into your body. Her skin was warm and soft.
“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
You softly pecked her head, but suddenly she’s gone and there’s nothing in your arms. You called out her name but only ash comes out. You don’t have the faintest idea what is happening. Where are you? Where is she? Questions inextricably linked, the losing of one leading to the loss of the other. You check the date—it’s her birthday. But you don’t wish her happy birthday, not directly at least. You haven't seen her in almost a year and the last time you talked things ended on a sour note. You don’t think she ever wants to talk to you or see you again. So the most you can do is to leave crumbs on your Instagram bio, hoping she’ll stumble upon it by the guiding hand of God. A link to a song—Last Birthday by Valley, the concert you went to together, the night of your first kiss, the night where everything started. But the band has split up, and so have you; all that’s left are old songs sung to old lovers. You can’t love her directly, but you can’t stop loving her as well—so you throw your heart into the wind, hoping it will land with the seeds; but it dissolves into dust.
If only someone told you to hold her a little tighter, to love her a little harder, right? No, you already gave all that you had. It just wasn’t enough. It never has been enough.
*
You are twenty, lying on the couch of your Airbnb in Tokyo. You just came back from the club with your high school friends, friends you’ve known for the past decade. One of them is lying on the floor, smiling to himself for whatever strange reason; one of them is still dancing to an illusory soundtrack of his youth; one is taking a shower; one is already asleep; and there you are, suddenly consumed by a gust of sobriety and an acute awareness of how everything is going to end. No, no, you think to yourself, it’s happening again.
Is this the first and last time we will be together on an overseas trip? Is the bond we now share the strongest it will ever be, the peak of which would only be destined to decline after? How will we ever stay in touch when university begins, some flung to the other side of the world, when the responsibilities of life come crashing into our dorm rooms and we have no choice but to trudge ahead carelessly, to the best of our abilities? Is this the end?
Everything does, as will this. So you send yourself forward in time, a distant Chinese New Year reunion perhaps, each with their new families. Streaks of grey painted over some of your heads, glasses of lassitude planted on wrinkled noses, folds of fatigue stretched across each of your once lively faces. You sigh a sigh of relief at the reunion, but ache at its rarity.
So this time, you tell yourself: love more. Before it’s too late. Love.
Ignatius Chew currently studies English Literature at the National University of Singapore. He enjoys putting words on a page to capture a moment in time and hopes that his doing so would inspire others to do the same. He believes in gentleness as strength.