This woman, can be such a struggling sentimentalist at heart.

Even one as cynical as this one, proclaiming herself "over and done with" matters of the heart for a good long while to come while concentrating on other more pressing issues on hand to satisfy her capitalist demands.

And as if to fully illustrate that there can be a reconciliation between capitalist needs and sentimentality, she kept 2 separate pieces of ten-dollar notes to commemorate the two men who left her reminiscing long after they were gone.

The first one left her a little more - a carrot pouch and a laminated neocard of them both so dazzling in their laughter. His face shone with mischief in that checkered suit he insisted on wearing just because the woman asked him to wear a little nicer on their first date out and the woman's with a somewhat worriesome smile, getting cold feet that the un-photogenic her will not turn out as nicely as she wished for it to be and it would not be a perfect picture. So as she sent him to the airport, face streakened with tears and clutching the note he demanded her to take as a final present to ever send her home safely for the last time, she chose instead to defy his order to enlist private comfort, took the public transportation and kept the note.

The second one - the woman hastily decided to keep that note because he gave her that note to supplement the cabfare home and a nagging feeling of impulse as she sped across the expressway told her that he would not stay and she was so desperate for something tangible to hold onto. Coupled with her practical nature, the ten dollar note, she did not use and is now a 'lucky charm' of sorts, upholding her belief in all things good and pure and serves a reminder if she should ever get too cynical. And the woman was right, he did not stay, the man she still saw occasionally but the rift too wide apart and she sent him leaving from her heart.

Two ten-dollar notes. Two tales of a woman's heart turned round and round, ended similarly by speeding away from the final destination of the men she once hold dear.

Fondness for a person cannot be fully explained sometimes. The reason i like a person may be attributed to several factors and could even be contradictory to my original belief. But at that moment in time, time stands still and i would have done anything just to see you smile.

You do not see me.
For I am human, I need your reciprocation as some mark of receipt to feel wanted. A sign of insecurity you may say, but having been overlooked for prettier and slimmer counterparts and jeered for bodily magnitude when i was much younger made me apprehensive, wary and cynical. I looked at you looking at her and i wonder if she is perfect for you. You try to understand your emotions, you seek to be free but yet yearning to be tied. You are confused. You look around for your muse, someone who truly relates to you. I stand by your side. Yet i know i know, you do not see me.

I did not even dare to look into your eyes.
For fear you will dissect me for the weak-willed person i am with your probing and intense gaze. See the insecurities in my eyes when i am trying my damn hardest to conceal it, discover the bits and pieces about me that are unpleasant. In short, i want to be good enough for you. I wanted to be the one you kissed so i may hold this memory close to my heart and allow my heart to ache in loveliness once in a while. But i could not bring myself to look straight at you.

I want you.
For your melancholic expression, the way you smile, the way you think, the way you write, the way you wear the blue, the way you hugged me, the way your smell infused my senses, the way you walk, the way you ... are you.

......

In life we have to accept that not all goodwill will be remembered. Not all the concern you have for another party will necessarily be appreciated. Not all good feelings you feel for another person will be understood, or reciprocated.

And i used to think it matters a lot.

Not until i see you smile.

Then i know i am meant to let you go.

To let you soar.

Others have sung that Love, is a many splendored thing.

The radio croons its neverending, evergreen, silky spidery menagerie of late night love songs always with "Forever love, forever love ...." And it could have a very devastating effect on lonely people who have not found their other halves in the night, especially nights with piercing silence.

...

Apparently four years of knowledge about each other were not enough for us to want to stay together.

Perhaps we have known all that is left to know and there is no mystery in being together anymore. Or perhaps we were in fact, too overwrought by the things we do not intend the other party to know about each other.

Being friends, rather than lovers, would be a much kinder dedication to the term "Memories" and a preservation of sanctity of the word "Relationship".

The day we laid our hearts bare, it felt like our souls were reprieved. When the hearts were constrained, there has always been an ominous silence lurking in the air we tried to conceal and ignore, followed by a desperate attempt to talk incoherently just to ease the unnatural silence. But now, our hearts just poured out tentatively, gradually and then in all full splendor and finality.

It was a sudden moment, there and then. We asked each other a simple question. The replies we gave were so unpretentious and unanimous. A decision instantaneously and instinctively concluded the outcome of us. Even using 'us' sounds a little sacrilegious because we left 'us' behind a long long time ago when he first went in search of his dreams and ideals and i, in pursuit of a common, monotonous pattern of lifestyle. Our souls had communicated and departed amicably then, just that we did not realise it. A reformed alliance afterwards was a weak attempt to feel wanted and regain any form of stringent wanting we might have left for each other.

I breathed a little easily when the episode announced its impending end.

I teared a little at how time spared us no consideration.

I wondered if he would invite me to his future wedding and if i would still feel my heart throb when he kisses his bride.

I closed my eyes and remembered the fresh sunflowers he sent me which all withered and decayed in due time.

I kept a sprig of dried forget-me-not as memory.

I am convinced that this is the wisest choice we could have made.

This one time, i learn a little more about love. Love cannot be attained by two people forcing themselves to be together for poignancy and old time's sake.