11_Too Much, Too Little

“So? Is it done? Is it finally over?”

Aisha and I were shopping for a colleague’s wedding, and I had just told her about my break-up with Dex. Aisha didn’t even look up at me when I told her, but simply continued perusing through the clothes rack. I watched her part the hangers with decisive precision– rifling through them as though she was looking for a sign.

“Hmm? Oh… ” I was scrunching a particularly textured sequined dress, relishing in how the sequins scratched against my palms. Upon watching several fall to the ground, I quickly retracted my hands, clenching my fists– guilty for my destruction, and the overwhelming urge to pull and rip at the remaining intact sequins and beads. “I guess so– it seemed pretty final.”

“Mmm okay– although,” Aisha had picked out a dress to hold it against herself, taking a moment to assess it before putting it back on the rack, “you do seem to get back together every time you break up so– we’ll see how long this will last.”

I had completely stopped browsing and was simply following Aisha as she shopped, growing increasingly frustrated with my lack of interest and overwhelmed by the sheer number of choices. Everything around me looked garish and alien, and any decision I made was always too much or too little all at the same time. In the changing room, things that looked good on the hanger looked contorted and disfigured on me. I sighed, maybe I was simply not in the mindset for shopping at the moment.

“Anyways, I’m glad it’s all over. You were miserable with Dex anyways,” Aisha sighed as she continued to flick through the various garments, many of which clung desperately to the hangers, holding on for their dear lives. She didn’t seem particularly affected by my lack of enthusiasm, or maybe she hadn’t noticed. Who knows.

“Oh stop doing that,” scolded Aisha, “you don’t work here.”

In an attempt to relieve my boredom, I’d started to rescue the precarious garments, adjusting the hanger straps and shoulders to avoid any more of them tumbling to the ground. “But I like it when things are tidy,” I whined quietly.

But I stopped anyway, my fingers once again tracing over all the details and materials as I quietly contemplated whether or not I was truly happier now that my relationship with Dex was over. Sure, it was a pitiful excuse for a relationship – the constant breaking up and making up – but that was who we were. The very exhausting Dex and Miyu everyone knew. That I knew.

“Was I really that miserable with Dex?”

“Are you really going to ask me that?” Aisha sounded incredulous and her face was scrunched with something I could only discern as disdain. “You were miserable, admit it. You broke up every other, what– week? Month? You’re better off without him.” She picked a dress from the rack, holding it towards me, “How about this one?”

“Maybe,” I said weakly with a smile, but I couldn’t tell if I was answering her about the dress or about being miserable with Dex.

“Definitely,” said Aisha as she added it to the pile for the changing rooms. I also couldn't tell if that was for our conversation earlier or for the dress.

--

We took refuge in a Starbucks, her with a new dress, two pairs of shoes (she said she’d return the one she wasn’t keeping), and various bits of skincare and cosmetics whilst I had nothing. We ordered our drinks and seated ourselves by the window– watching the world go by.

“Forget boyfriends–,” offered Aisha as she sipped her coffee, “maybe what you need is a pet.”

“I’d love to but–” I took a sip from my own drink, shuddering at how burnt the coffee tasted and how hot it was. “I live with my parents and they hate animals.”

“Unfortunate,” Aisha’s tone was almost dismissive, and I looked down at her coffee cup, at the dark lipstick stain on the top of the disposable lid. “It would probably be good for you though– it would give you something to love instead. Maybe your parents could learn to love animals.”

“Yeah but like –” I took another sip of my drink and winced a little, it was still too hot, “what if my pet doesn’t like me? Like– say if I got a cat and they didn’t love me? Cats do that right? I would actually be devastated.” I shuddered at the thought of being rejected by my own pet.

Aisha shook her head, a laugh escaping from her darkened lips, “you are so clingy.”

I laughed and shrugged when Aisha said this, unable to decide whether or not it was true. Dex and I had often argued about how much space and time we gave each other; neither of us able to agree on how much to give, and most critically, when.

The more time I spent with Dex, the more space he needed– social interactions exhausted him and he often needed to retreat to recuperate. So whenever Dex called me clingy, I would withhold and withdraw– reactively giving him the space he requested despite desperately wanting his company. The duration of these withdrawals could last days, weeks, sometimes months; in which case I would start bargaining and offer compromises on when we could spend time. It was an ugly ritual which landed us the reputation of being a volatile and unstable couple. What sort of relationship has week long or sometimes month long spells of silence? Ours.

It was during these withdrawals that I would desperately claw at myself for answers: why didn’t Dex want to spend time with me? What was I doing wrong? I would scour through our messages, trying to decipher and pinpoint exactly when things started going wrong. I would pick at surface level things– maybe it was the way I said good morning that day, maybe I do want his company too often, maybe it is unreasonable for wanting to talk everyday. Seemingly mundane and ordinary decisions suddenly needed to be vivisected and scrutinised. How dare I ask for this? Was this too much to ask for? My moods depended on his and swung wildly; I could not like myself when he didn’t.

While I questioned his affections for me when he asked for space, he would question mine when I complied. My withdrawal from him meant that I did not love him, that I did not prioritise him though when I was present, he seemingly did not want me there. It was a constant back-and-forth, and dating Dex was like trying to dance with someone who would spontaneously change songs and then accuse you of making mistakes on purpose. I was simply not able to grasp what he wanted from me, so I always gave too much or too little, too early or too late.

But deep down, both of us knew there was a looming presence in the relationship– the ghost of Will dragged up swirling clouds of insecurity and uncertainty. Both Dex and I had agreed we would move forward from Will; we buried him somewhere where neither of us spoke to him or about him. He had been quietly erased from our lives despite him having been Dex’s best friends for the last half a decade. Sometimes during arguments and particularly lonely nights, I would be reminded of what a destructive person I was, sometimes by Dex or sometimes by me.

The three of us were confronted by the choice of what to do moving forward, Will chose to remove himself, leaving Dex and I the choices of each other. Dex has always accused me that I would have picked Will while I desperately tried to convince him that I was always going to pick him. In the end, it was just the two of us, Dex and Miyu– two people who were desperate to seek comfort and solace in each other but seemingly could not. We were always either too clingy or too distant, never quite just what we needed from each other.

The greatest tragedy here was not from malice but from constant misalignment. And why we continued to seek each other out despite the pain we were causing each other remains a mystery. Loneliness truly makes people do wild things.

But of course I never told Aisha this; this wasn’t something you should tell people. What sort of person destroys friendships wherever she goes? Destroys everything she touches? Aisha would be disgusted by me, many were when I told them– I had tried and tested this story on many patrons at the pub when I went drinking alone. Poor lonely individuals who were simply looking for conversation would suddenly be bombarded with accounts of my stupidity and lack of foresight. Many laughed, shaking their heads with disbelief saying, surely you’re not like that, while others pulled back– unsure of how to react. I have always trusted that reaction more, why would anyone want to be acquainted with someone like me? Someone so indecisive, destructive and volatile.

So I often spared my friends the inner machinations of my mind and we talked about everything else instead. Work, our applications for our Postgraduate Diplomas, her family, and the upcoming wedding. I watched her reapply her lipstick almost after every other sip, it had been five so far and the stain on the cup only gets darker. I wondered if lipstick changes the taste of the coffee. I noted the name of the colour, “Sinful Provocation" in matte.

“You’ll be okay–” said Aisha as she nodded knowingly, “you won’t die from the break up.”

I nodded in agreement, “I guess not.”

But unbeknownst to her, the person I was when I was with Dex had already died.

So now I wondered, what sort of person would I be now without Dex?