The One That Got Away


On a busy Putra-LRT station, two people met.

"So how've you been?"
"Good, good."

The awkward silence that always accompanies such meetings ensues.
They smiled, taking each other in, assessing what's different, what's the same, reliving conversations they had in the past, real or imagined.

"I see you're wearing a ring?"
"Oh, this." Why am I embarrassed?
"Yes. Recently married, you know."
"Do I know this lucky person?"
"No, no. Just someone I met in college. "
Just? Just? Like just the postman, just the delivery boy? A person of no consequence?
"Well. Congratulations."
"Thank you."

They both listened to an announcement.

"He's an older than me, you know."
He nodded. A little too vigorously, perhaps.
"Very serious, he is. But funny too. Sometimes."
"Uh-huh."
"I don't think his mother likes me very much."
Oh my God! Why the hell did I say that?
"You'll change her mind," he said, simply. "You changed mine".
Eyes challenging, she had a hint of smile curving her lips. "Didn't change yours."
Come on. Let's talk about it. Let's talk about that day.

This guy, this guy, this guy. This girl, this girl, this girl.

A train arrives and the crowd jostles around them. They stood two feet from each other.

I can't believe you're so tall. Were you this tall then?

I can't believe you're married. What happened to taking over the world before you're 28?

"I google you sometimes."
"Wow. Really? "
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah, only when I'm bored at the computer. Just to read your articles on the Net."
"Oh. Those." Why am I embarrassed?
"Yes, I would read your piece story or comments about some stupid thing or other. And I would imagine you standing in a crowd of people, your eyes open, holding your laptop, listening to others."
Snicker.
"That's a happy thought."
"..and I would wonder. I would wonder if you believe in what you’ve seen and listened to or you're just trying to fight off the urge to stuff what you have in your mind down, by writing out your feelings and those stories, which some of them are lies."
"They're not all like that. I don’t write everything I’ve seen or listened to. Most importantly, they’re not all lies" he almost growled.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that, yeah?"
"No." he weighed his next words and went on.
"No, you've always said your mind. So it's ok. It's how I choose to respond to the question that matters, eh?"
Blinking up at him, she didn't say anything.

"You're still the same."He said it so softly, she almost didn't hear him.
She tilted her head and asked "What do you mean?"
He wanted to laugh. Always suspicious. Always mistrustful.
"You still. Look at me the same way. Like I'm someone you've met before, just can't place where."

She looked down at her shoes, at a piece of candy-wrapper tucked behind the legs of a nearby bench. Then she looked up. She opened her mouth to say something, but closed it again and continued her shoe-inspection.

Then she mumbled to her shoe, "Well, I'm not. Not the same," and here she looked up at him, at his eyes, and spoke slowly, so he won't misunderstand, "I'm not 17 anymore."

He smiled, a tinge of regret clouding his eyes."No. No you're not."
She expected him to say more. To say now that she's in her twenties, the gap between them isn't so significant anymore, that perhaps something could begin again out of all this, that he thinks about her too sometimes, when he's in the car or on the train.
When he's alone.

Instead he just said, "I have to go."Those same words. The last conversation they had.
She shook away the memory.
Forcing a smile, she said "Yes. I have to go too."
She turned to leave but he wouldn't have it.
"Listen. We didn't really say a proper goodbye the last time. The last time we. Met."
He held out his hand.
She looked at it, then up at him.

On a busy metro station, two people went their separate ways.