The Thinker, The Poet, and Pollyanna

20h00: Blunt force trauma to the head. Immediate brain activity ceases.

— We have all heard the saying that the heart wants what the heart wants, but it is not entirely true. I never wanted to be like this; I tried to fight it. I tried to resist the pull, to silence the pulse, to convince myself that desire was not destiny. But—

— It is in your blood. If you do not feel, life is meaningless, dull, and filled with emptiness. I can understand. An apology. There was always an apology.

— He was the one gifted with intelligence. He always knew best, but when he spoke, it was always cold-blooded, void of sentiment. He was made of reason, built from caution, and sharpened by restraint.

We were complementary dualities. He always warned me. He said not to trust easily, not to take words for what they are; actions are trustworthy, but not always sufficient. He said a promise could sound beautiful and still rot beneath the tongue. He said that people wear kindness like a mask and call it truth.

I constantly responded with a condescending tone: you have too many rules. It is better to trust me, because I am the symbol of human passion and the seat of the soul. I am the part that feels. I am the part that reaches. I am the part that still believes warmth can defeat ruin.

— It’s nothing but illusion, is it not?

— I am nothing but a lonely hunter. Like a lone wolf in search of a mate, I wander from land to land, leaving a little of myself behind. Some places bear my mark more clearly; in most, it has been washed out, replaced, and forgotten. But still, I hoped. Still, I kept searching for something that might answer the ache in me.

— You speak like a poet.

— You make me smile. I am no poet; he is, although they dubbed him The Thinker. For he towers over the body, looking down upon everything, though it is an exhaustive and strenuous task. He saw the world for what it really is and warned me against the storm before I ever saw the clouds. However, I called him a batty belfry, for every sound thought he voiced to me, I interpreted as unsound and absurd. My eyes were in darkness, and my ears were in the abyss.

— He analyzes and creates beauty.

— You know beauty is similar to love in some aspect. It’s not merely a sentiment, as many describe it. It is an ideal chased by many yet obtained by few. The poet obsesses over it, while The Thinker is wary of it. Beauty can be gentle, and beauty can be dangerous. It can appear soft enough to hold and sharp enough to wound.

When love is acquired, it often results in damnation. The pain is agonizing, and the melancholia of what once was is torturous. But still, I hoped.

— For what?

— I hoped for the kiss we share to create visceral feelings of pleasure, craving, and intense want for my consort. I hoped for the rivers of red to transform into rapids, transmuting the fluttering rhythm into an intense pulse radiating through the soul. I hoped for the gentle collisions of a thousand monarchs trapped beneath my ribs, for I am in awe of my paramour. I wanted love to be something living, something luminous, something that could survive being touched.

I wanted the body to answer what the heart could not explain. I wanted the stare, the breath, the closeness, the trembling certainty that I had been chosen. I wanted the kind of love that would make a person feel seen rather than consumed. I wanted the world to narrow into one glowing point and call it destiny.

Once upon a time, I hoped for a poem, each stanza describing the sentiments. Instead, I received The Beasts of the Dark Wood, each path I took seemed to split into warning and desire. Each promise looked like a door, and every door led deeper into the same forest. Thus, prohibiting the retrieval of my light, keeping me in an eternal shadow.

— The shades give a warning, you know: Abandon All Hope.

— I am aware. But I would rather live through the spleen of heartbreak, for I get to experience heaven before hell. I would rather be injured by longing than numb to it. I would rather be broken and awake than safe and empty.

Once upon a time, I hoped to taste heaven, to be transported to cloud nine, and never descend back to the path of loneliness that is the search for love. I imagined that love would arrive like mercy, and that mercy would be gentle. I imagined that it would not ask me to bleed for it. I imagined that it would not wear sweetness over violence like perfume over sweat.

I have been broken many times, but I still hoped. I do not wish to be locked away. I do not wish to refrain my being from love. For I do not wish to become a beating dead heart. I do not wish to live as a shell that remembers how to ache but forgets how to feel. Better to suffer, I thought, than to become unreachable.

It is a curse that transports one to the deepest part of The Locker, drowning them in agony, anguish, and darkness. There, the hours stretch like bruises. There, every light becomes a warning. There, even tenderness feels borrowed. It is a part of the world that is deathly quiet, eerie, and forsaken. The only sound is a ponderous rhythm.

I do not wish for this pain, so I hoped. I hoped because hope was the only thing that made the hunger bearable. I hoped because the alternative was silence, and silence felt too much like death.

But it was all in vain.

— After all, hope is often delusion.

20h02: Hypoxia. Paralysis of the cardiac muscle.

— People always follow me blindly, but I have no reason, no logic. He always knew what was better. He warned me. He told me the truth. But I could not accept it. I mistook warning for distance, and distance for cruelty. I mistook fear for exaggeration. I mistook concern for control.

— Wouldn’t is the better term. The signs were clear: the anger, the hatred, the violence, the obsession.

— Underneath all of it, there was love, true love. Those green eyes promised me change. Those lips delivered kisses laced with passion. Touches that guaranteed security and—

— And each strike? Did they make you forget? Every glance in the mirror showed you a hideous canvas painted with colors of the rainbow. Did those eyes, those lips, make you forget that each touch is not always secure? Did you forget how quickly affection can turn into a weapon?

— You seem to know awfully much about me. Have we met before?

— Our paths have crossed many times. The first encounter was on a quiet night; that was marked by laughter, then tears. You could have left, but you still hoped. You told yourself it was only a phase, only stress, only pain that would one day soften into regret and apology.

Then it was at the hospital. I also met your family and friends. They told you to leave, but still you hoped. They spoke in careful voices. They named the bruises without naming the cause. They looked at you with that terrible mixture of pity and fear, and still you returned to what hurt you most.

I often came during the sleepless nights, when fear gave way to a calmness so daunting and fragile. I have become accustomed to the coldness of your eyes. I have never seen a genuine smile, nor love. All I saw was hope. Delusion.

The last time I came, you were thinking of me deeply, but it was never because you needed me. You wanted the pain to stop. But still, you stayed. You stayed because leaving felt like failure. You stayed because the version of love you wanted was still craved by you, even when the truth was begging to be seen.

We have encountered each other many times; however, I never introduced myself.

You know, it is inconsolable grief when the brain is heartless and the heart is thoughtless. For neither truly understands the other. One calculates survival, the other pleads for meaning. One sees the blade before it falls. The other insists that warmth can survive the wound.

— I know exactly who you are. I wish I had left. I wish I had not hoped. I wish we had met when my beauty was gone and my love was found. I wish that I had listened to him. I wish I had listened when he said this is how it starts, this is how it ends, this is how pain teaches itself to look like devotion.

Now I can only wish. I can only wish to hear a sincere “I love you.” I can only wish for a moment untainted by fear, for a touch that does not bruise, for a voice that does not threaten, for a night that does not end in apology or blood.

I can only wish.

20h05: Cardiac arrest. Definitive death.

Perpetrator: The significant other.

Case closed.