CHAPTER THIRTEEN

I HAVE KILLED BEFORE. Not in cold-blood and definitely not a human being, but I have, with a gun however I almost did kill a person today. Just pull the trigger and then boom...blood, and pain, and death, and silence, and if I had a gun, I feared I might have.

Nevertheless, I had killed him a thousand times in my head already, and picturesquely, a bloodied him lying helplessly on the floor gasping and grasping for dear life stood redundant on my mind, playing over and over again like a scene in a noir movie.

I was no murderer nevertheless and Aman was definitely not worth risking hell and so I settled on ignoring him completely instead.

However I was pissed. How can he say something like that and yet not care to elaborate? What does he mean by we've met before? Where? When? How? Damn him and his clipped responses. If he knew he wasn't going to tell the whole story why'd he even begin? And that was why I did what I did.

It was simple; pick up a stone and throw it at his back with as much force as my anger permits, he deserves it only I hadn't calculated the risk of him turning towards me and the stone hitting his forehead nor the scarlet liquid suddenly raining down his face. I wasn't sorry though, he had it coming.

And so we stood glaring at each other; Me with my arms crossed against my chest and him with his bloodied face captured in a deep scowl.

His lips moved but no sound passed through and for a moment there, his eyes flickered with something bordering on admiration, but it disappeared almost immediately replaced by his inscrutable, unnerving expression that I almost thought I had imagined it.

"What was that for?" He asked as he kneeled, opened his backpack and began scrambling for something. Water? Cotton Wool? Spirit? Or all three? Turns out it was all three.

I watched unrepentant as he used the water first on his face and then he'd dipped the cotton wool with the alcoholic liquid and cleaned the wound. He cleaned it twice before he'd used a bandage on it, sealing the wound behind its brown sticky cover. I, however,  still maintained my silence. I was too angry to feel sorry even though the stone had left a ghastly cut.  He stood and without a word, resumed his walk as if I hadn't just injured him and wasn't apologising.

It takes two to tango, I hissed as I followed him. If he wants to pretend everything was okay, then it was fine by me. I hold a gold medal in arrogance too.

However something made me stop in track; it was a trail of blood. I looked up at him, shocked. His gait seem a bit labored now and sluggish. And so for the first time today I felt something other than disdain for him, I felt sad for him. I wonder what kind of life he'd lived so far that he couldn't ask someone for help. He sure is pathetic!

And before I can stop myself I find myself calling him.

He stopped but he didn't turn. I covered the distance between us and stood in front of him.

"My feet hurts, I'll like to rest,"

"Oh...okay?" his gaze wandered away as he took in our immediate surrounding. Thankfully,  we were still in a clearing; surrounded by tall trees and shrubs.

Perhaps thinking what I was thinking; about how great this location was, he handed me the mat we'd used in praying earlier and he'd laid back on the forest's floor, his head rested on his arm as he stared at the peeking fading sun. Maybe that was why he was startled when he felt my arms peeling off his shirt. His hand held mine prisoner.

"What do you think you're doing?" He hadn't  move but his eyes rests on my face now.

I ignored his question and break free my hand as I continued what I was doing. He grabbed them again and this time, he pinned me down, his whole body holding mine captive.

"Let me go!" I shrieked as I struggled to get free.

"Not until you tell me what you were doing?"

"Let...me...go...you...psychotic pervert," I struggled hard but he wasn't bulging. I kept on struggling nevertheless but he was far stronger than me and in the end, I stopped struggling. Perhaps he felt that I was calmer now, his hold loosened a bit.

"Are you going to answer me now?"

I nodded slowly. He let me go and sat. I did the same. However after seconds of hesitation, he coerced softly

"I'm still waiting,"

I shut my eyes and let go of a breath, "you were bleeding -"

"And? "

"I just wanted to dress your wound."

"And you want me to believe that after you broke my head?" He scoffed.

I stood and began walking back to the mat, "You can believe whatever you want,  I don't care," I laid back down, my back turned at him and shut my eyes. He can die for all I care. I hissed softly.  But much to my chagrin, I realise quickly that I cared and I really want to see his wound.

Frustrated and angry,  I kept on shifting until finally I faced the instrument of my discomfort but he wasn't looking at me. More angry and frustrated,  I looked away.  However his voice had me turning again. He was talking to me, I realized, surprised. I listened, quietly, shutting my other senses and instincts.

"There was this girl I crushed on when I was in secondary school." He began, "She was nice to everyone all the time, and seem genuinely interested in me-not my billionaire heir status." He chuckled. I scoffed softly. Classic rich guy love cliché.

"However she was also kind of shy and rarely said more than a few sentence whenever we were together and I liked that about her. She was like a breath of fresh air in an infested world." I stared at him and our eyes met. He smiled at me as if savoring the memory but his eyes hoarded a naked sadness. This wasn't a happy story.

I looked away. I don't know, but I didn't like that he was looking at me.

He went on.

"And finally, I asked her out and she readily accepted." He let go of a deep breath and I huffed.

Typical!

"But after a while, something didn't feel right. I don't know how to describe it. It's like watching a much anticipated movie only to find out there was nothing special, no magic and to top it all, she became possessive and would call me all the time and ask me where I was, even if we were together just minutes ago."

I stared at him. He was still sitting relaxed against the tree with his eyes shut. I didn't know why he was telling me this and a part of me didn’t want to hear. Nevertheless, I was also curious.  Not about the story but the reason why he was telling me. I was very much so.

"I tried, you know," he opened his eyes suddenly and held mine captive. This time, I didn't look away. He did. Moments later.

"-but it became real hard to say anything to her, because the truth was, I didn't know what to say. I try most times to describe whatever I was doing whenever she calls, but it is usually not much but I describe it anyway. And then whenever we are together and she starts talking, it's like tuning on a radio, she doesn't stop for a very long time. And at one point, she was talking about her past boyfriends and then got mad at me for not being jealous. I just didn't know how to behave with her, because nothing I seem to do impresses her. It was as if she was trying to control me, like she was really afraid that if she didn't, nothing will work out the way she wanted them to. I don't know if this is right or not, but it made me sad regardless. The girl I had liked was gone completely. It was just too sad." He blabbered on as if he couldn't keep the words away, as if he couldn't keep the pain away.

He opened his eyes and stared unflinchingly at me again. I glanced away first seconds later. It had felt as if I was under an imaginary moral knife. He continued 

"I started to think that maybe I didn't know who she was after all. For it seemed like I was meeting a different person than the one I knew. She was suddenly someone I didn't know-"

I looked at him. His eyes were shut again.

"-Slowly, all her effort to make me happy evoked no gratitude from me. I know I should have been grateful whenever she did a nice thing for me. But I wasn't grateful. I wasn't grateful at all. Don't get me wrong. I acted like I was. But I wasn't. To tell you the truth, I was. starting to get mad. And although I felt kind of guilty, I know I don't want her anymore. Maybe I should have been honest then, but it didn't feel like the right time. The right time didn't quite present itself either and I ended up messing things up." He let go of a deep breath. "I began avoiding her, almost like you would a plague. The lies breeding more lies as endless excuses were made until she'd finally caught on. She had looked at me all sinister and serious and asked if I don't want her anymore."

He paused, letting go of a deep breath before he went on.

It was the look on her face when she said it and how much it must have hurt her pride that did me in. It suddenly made everything seem like it really was. I felt terrible, very terrible. I knew I should say something, apologize even, but I couldn't. I simply couldn't. I simply let her walk out of my life. I should have stopped her, but I didn't. And my heart kept slamming painfully against its cage. It was unlike anything I've ever felt. I guess I liked her more than I cared to admit, even to myself.

So why didn't you stop her? I scoffed softly

"I wanted to say "Stop" and "Don't leave me" I even wanted to tell her how much I really liked her but I just froze. And even though a voice in my head kept yelling, "Stop her!" to me,  I didn't. And finally, I also walked away. That was the first time I realised that something was really wrong with me. And truth was, I don't know what it is." He concluded with his voice laced with sadness.

"Why are you telling me all this, Aman?" I asked after an intermittent silence. I couldn't understand why he had. It certainly had nothing to do with her nor the reason I was here. Or does it?

He looked up at me and our eyes locked.

"Because I like you."

"And that's a bad thing how?" I asked still staring at him. I didn't know why I was asking him that. I was simply curious. Besides my head didn't want to process the fact that he has just confessed to liking me.

"No," He ran his hands over his hair, "I'm afraid it is much worse,"

"And why is that so? Was it because I don't fit into your illusion of a perfect relationship like she didn't?" I asked with each word my voice rang with anger. And I don't know why I was getting mad in the first place. My emotions were just all over the place.

He looked as if he was at a loss, like he didn't know what to do but those were the first words that came out of my mind. I couldn't get the question out of my mind. I didn't say it mean or accusingly. I just wanted to know why liking me was such a bad idea. I guess it wasn't fair of me to ask him that, but I really needed to know.

At first, I thought his hurt expression was the result of something I must have said, but after it didn't go away for a long while, I knew that it wasn't. It suddenly dawned on me that his kind of demons aren't the type I should carelessly dabble with. His wounds ran deep, deeper than I could maybe even understand and he isn't a bad person or shallow or mean but he was scared of change and because things change, emotions cease, family leave and yet life doesn't stop makes it much more harder for him. No he doesn't need me, he needed something more..

Are you a doctor, Reima? Take ahold of yourself. How dare you assume you know anything when your life is as uncertain as uncertain can ever get?

Yet I couldn't help the sadness I felt for him though I didn't know the reason why but knowing that I was somehow helpless and incapacitated by an unknown enemy. I wanted to laugh. Or maybe get angry. Or maybe just scream at the top of my voice. But I knew it wouldn't change anything. I still wouldn't know how to help him even though I really want to and the fact that I was here on a deception train makes it much harder. The thing was I felt drawn by a lot of ropes of emotions and yet none was strong enough to really do..

I, however, at that moment,  felt drawn by a carnal need to simply look at him and so I did wondering what the heck was wrong with me.

He was staring at me, smiling, relaxed, happy even. There was no trace of the impregnable wall he'd had up since we met nor the pain littering his eyes. He look different,  if I daresay, good different and for a moment there, he looked like someone I have been hoping to meet in the last seven years.

Someone definitely...unforgettable.

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