Lightning

I did some housekeeping today. First, some backstory, although the main story happened in less than an hour.

Yesterday (Monday) (The OP day), after my OP, I didn't go watch the movie with the class, as usual. It's not that I am boycotting Hui Yao, but it's not that I'm not boycotting him, either. Everything I do seems to become a habit over time.

Instead, I went to gym. (A habit.) And then I went to run. After which I showered, changed into my usual hang-around-with-nothing-to-do outfit. (If you must know, it's a sleeveless shirt that doesn't count as a singlet, and my trusty green jacket for modesty. And shorts, of course. I think I'm just filling in details to make my life sound more real.) When I got out of the showers, I met Bryan, who told me about the meeting he was going to have with his parents and the VP, about his results. I didn't have much to say. I didn't even wished him luck. Sometimes there isn't much to do about reality: you could wish and hope; scream and curse; but regardless how postmodern your world is, some facts don't budge. Stuff happens, and your frustration is independent of the causes of those stuff. If I've walked this road once, I've tripped a thousand times.

I texted Jia Han and Jerome, asking what they were doing. (At least I'm trying.) Jia Han replied much later, saying the class was watching a movie. He didn't say what. I didn't ask. Jerome (who represented the LAN-playing side of the class, aka, the guys) had training. I asked him out for dinner, because I haven't talked to him for a while, because I wasn't going to spend my post-OP day empty. He said okay (later he would grudge that I tricked him, he assumed there was other people going, and he would imply it was gay, but this is what I do, I ask people out and if they were stupid enough to say yes I would be happy to live with the accusations - ) so I waited for the afternoon to be over. I was tired, so I laid down on my island class bench. I was bored, so I read my comic. I was irritated by neighbouring people rehearsing for OP, so I listened to the radio. So there was I, listening to acoustic pop that I didn't mind but didn't like, reading Sandman which I liked, but have read at least three times, and lying down in the afternoon sun, a particular luxury that I rarely could afford, when a shadow loomed over me, and I hear a voice call my name through the music.

I knew that voice; it wasn't unique, just familiar, because I've listened it through the phone, face-to-face for four years, all the variations of it - soft, like when he speaks normally; strained, when he addressed a band; raised, as on the field. I also knew the voice because of the way it handled my name - it had the same quality of timidness that I noticed with alternating pride and regret in those four years. He wasn't the main people I hated for what they've done; he was part of the people I hated for what they've not done. Not sure which was worse, I had hated them all. I was healing, slowly yes, but I was healing, and I wondered what I deserved to have my bubble broken by this soft-spoken person, he who is on The Other Side. But I was also curious why he dared to call my name, to summon my stare. I sat up, took off my earphones, and said, "Yes?"

"Do you have the original score of The Pink Pather?"

(More backstory: He's asking for a euphonium/trombone/tuba quartet score I've bought in Japan some years back - a score that was too technical to be played by sixteen year olds. I guess one year makes all the difference.)

I was slightly taken aback by the triviality of the request. Curtly, I replied, "The juniors should have it." That much is true - I've heard it being played at HIC a week ago, and I know my juniors were there. I've taken care to avoid them as much as possible, and when they had said hi, I nodded and waved but never smiled. I regretted that, blaming children, but it was either that or pretend not being hurt, which is worse.

"Um, but I checked, it's not at high school side..." On hindsight, it probably meant he rummaged through their library, and didn't find it there. He couldn't have just asked the juniors? I wonder.

"They should have it," I said, but my tone very much said, "Get lost."

"Um, but is the original score with you...?"

I was frustrated. I knew it was a bad idea. But I sighed, and I said, "Will you be in school tomorrow?" 

He quickly said yes. I said, "Alright. I'll pass it to you tomorrow."

He said thank you. I went back to my comic. But I wasn't reading anymore, I was annoyed with myself for getting involved. With nothing to do, I played Pokemon. I watched the sky grow dark, and the air cold, and finally Jerome came around, and since we were both not hungry, we had ice-cream. Not important, but after he went home, I took a bus to town, wandered the streets, and then I went home, feeling alone as usual.

I woke up late today. But when it was near 12noon, I opened my cupboard, and started taking out all the scores and files I have accumulated over the four years. I asked my mom for a box. I threw everything in - gifts from exchanges, notebooks scrawled with band admin, birthday presents (including underwear, bears, cards, the like), mouthpieces (one dented gold-plated SM3.5, one painfully-looking, personally-smashed silver-plated SM4.0), souveniers I've accumulated from Japan and Hawaii, conductors' scores, adjudicators' comment sheets, the wishlist of the band during one particular band camp, ties and stuff. My hands lingered on the NCO badge; I could have kissed it, but I simply let it fall into the box. I could have fixed my gaze on it as it fell between the clutter, but I didn't notice where it went. Everything that I could have said or done or written in poems, I have tried, and now it's time to put things away.

It amounted to a box, and a carrier. These things that used to haunt my room. I don't know whether they were too little, or too much. Too little because I thought these things were bigger, but now they're just bits of paper and plastic and metal, and perhaps I gave too much meaning to them. Too big because as I carried these to the bus stop, the string on the bag broke from my shoulder, and I knew from experience how heavy paper and cloth can be, when stacked through the years. Unfazed, I just put the bag on the box, and carried them both. 

I waited at my island class bench. 10 minutes passed. I didn't think it was too long, and I wasn't worried if I was too late. I felt a sense of providence. Then, an anonymous number asked: Hi, are you in school? (I don't memorize numbers, and I lost my band contacts a while back, mercifully by accident.) But I knew, or I guessed as much, and before I could reply, he appeared behind me. I stood up from the bench, and fished out the score he wanted. And I said, "Here it is. But I need you to do something. Since you were so shameless to ask me for the score, I want you to take all my band stuff. Keep what you want, and you can throw the rest away."

(It differed slightly from the speech I've rehearsed on the way. But the gist was there.)

He asked uncertainly, "Including this score?"

I waved over the box, and the bag, and said, "It's all yours. Do what you want." Then, as I had rehearsed in my mind, I left. I didn't bother with the stride and the speed and the pace and the goddamned tempo, I walked. On the way to the bus stop, I met Jerome. I said hi, told him I was going home, and I walked. I didn't feel special or liberated or having a weight lifted off me, literally or figuratively. It was an ordinary Tuesday afternoon, I was still Jiasheng with a Past, but at least I'm not kidding myself, telling myself it's over. It may never be. If there's anything I've learned about myself, over these tragedies, it's that I have a fatal flaw, and that is the inability to forgive. Like that made me less human. 

I can forgive someone who hurts, then apologizes. I can forgive the ones who can tell I am completely broken on the inside, and ask if I'm okay, even if they can do nothing to fix me. But for the people who hurt me, and never saw who they've hurt, I can't think of excuses for them. Don't they dare say they don't know, that I've always been the strong one, that they don't read my language - pain is universal, and if they can't recognize it, I doubt they can recognize anything.

So I took the bus home. I liked the fact that I felt nothing, besides a certain lightness. Like I have space for other things, other stories. After all, music, in its original meaning, merely meant a quality unique to the Muses. Song was one of them; there are others. And so with more bravery than I've felt for ages, I ask for another great adventure.