by Jesus C. Deytiquez
new wine
I was in an airport. I was holding with my shaking right hand, a
ticket to another country. I waited for so long for that moment. I worked very
hard to earn enough money to follow her in that country. Everything was like a
dream, and like a sleepwalker, I walked and managed to get inside the airplane.
I sat and waited. And soon we were off the ground, among and then above the
clouds.
The day was just dawning when we landed. As soon as I got out of the airport, I sent her a message, telling her that I already arrived. She replied that she will wait for me by the fountain of a particular park. I hailed a taxi and told the driver to take me to that place.
It was not that hard for me to meet her right after that flight. The trip was short, and my luggage was light, for even if I want to spend more time with her, I saw that my money will not be enough. The joy of meeting her once again is greater than any burden. A moment with her, no matter how short, will be always enough.
I was carried by the taxi through the city. Everything was new to me. I imagined her walking through those streets alone for countless of time. At length, the taxi reached the park. I started to walk towards its center. My heart was pounding. For four years I never met the girl waiting for me by the fountain in the middle of that park.
There she was, like an angel of beauty dressed in white. I cannot help but smile when I saw her again. She still has the eyes as starry as the night sky, the hair as black as the darkest evening, the skin as white as snow, and lips as red as a delicate mountain rose.
She was the only one I saw. Everything and everyone seemed to disappear from my sight during that moment. She smiled at me. She stood up and then slowly walked towards me. She then hugged me like a long-lost friend, and I thought my heart would break with happiness. I held back the tears of unspeakable joy welling up in my eyes.
We sat on one of the numerous benches of that park. We talked about many things. And after some time, I asked her to go with me to a mall, and maybe grab some coffee there. She said yes and showed me the way.
We continued our conversation in a coffee shop inside that mall she led me to. She was still as funny, innocent, mild, and smart as before. At length, I took a book out of my bag. It contained the stories and poems that I wrote. They are about the moments we shared in a mountain city of the land of my birth, while we were still students in a university there. Some of those stories and poems won or was published, and the prizes or money that I got from them was added to the fund that I saved in order to meet her. I gave the book to her, but told her not to open it until she returned home. She did not know that I love her. She did not know what I went through for us to meet again. She thanked me and took the book. And after we finished our coffee, I then asked her to walk with me through that mall.
I saw a shop selling musical instruments. It was what I was looking for during that time. I asked her to accompany me inside it, and in it I saw and took a ukulele. I found that it was tuned well. And I started to produce a song from it along with my voice; it was the song “Kiss me Slowly” by Parachute, a song that I longed to serenade her with when we meet once more.
All the time, I was looking at her twinkling eyes.
“Can you still remember my beloved?” I thought back then. “How we used to sing a different song about longing and cold summer nights before? Now, after a thousand of those cold summer nights, let me speak to your heart with these borrowed words and melodies, with my borrowed time.”
She was smiling at me the whole time.
After that, we returned and walked again through the park. But this time, we were both silent. It was as if words were not needed anymore. Speech was silver, and silence was gold. And soon came the moment that we needed to say farewell already for the sun was already dying.
“Can you promise me, that you will read that book?” I asked her.
“I will,” she replied with the sweetest of smiles.
“Thank you.”
A dead, yellow leaf from a tree that overshadows us fluttered and descended between us. A light rain poured and drowned the tragic silence.
“Until we meet again.”
“Yeah, until we meet again.”
And I started to walk away. I looked back and saw her standing still, looking at me with a twinkle and a tear in her eye.
I felt a warm, wet fluid flow from my eye to my cheek.
It woke me.
I found out that everything was a dream. But that could not make me sad. Instead, I smiled as I saw the dawn breaking. A sunset may be the morning of another place. A fall may raise the other. A dream may lead to wakefulness. I know that I shall meet her again, someday, somewhere, somehow. I have that mysterious hope inside my heart. And I know also, as true as a promise made by someone who cannot and will never lie nor betray, that everything, will be alright in the end.
About the author
Jesus or Jessie is a youth from a rustic province in the
Philippines. He enjoys the beauty of nature and literature there but still he
longs for something or someone beyond. He now writes stories in order to meet
his beloved.
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