Chaotic Silence / My Funny Valentines

After 3 hours in MBA school, a late dinner, and then a sip of coffee (Mocha Froccino), we called it a night and headed for home. The streets were damp from the rain and the air was cool. It was the perfect weather for a good night sleep. But it wasn’t time to do so yet, the coming days were full of exciting promises to come and I have yet to do my preparations. At the strike of midnight, I uploaded the pictures to my webpage and then sent the same pictures through MMS hoping they would be seen first thing in the morning. “Ahhh! Finally, everything is set for now, I can go to sleep. The rest I can follow up tomorrow”, I thought before dozing off to sleep.

I woke up around 9:30 ready to face the day! Today’s gonna be something special, much more the days to come with a planned trip to the most famous beach destination in the phils., Boracay. I grabbed my phone and typed the words “Happy Valentine’s Day!” pressed sent and then rose up to get ready for breakfast. “Bip” goes my phone as the screen illuminated to show a new message. “wala kang kwenta (you’re worthless).” “Huh?” body slumping as I sport a puzzling look on my face. I replied with something like ‘what’s with you?’. No decent reply came except more of the puzzling mystery. I hurriedly ate my breakfast and took a bath all the while trying to solve this puzzle. I got ready to leave the house in order to book reservations for a resort which my visiting friends and I will be going to at the end of the month. Before getting ready to drive, I sent another message saying something like let’s continue later when your head has cooled off already.

Drove all the way to the reservation office with a blank expression on my face, noticing only the car directly in front and the turns where I’m supposed to turn. The SMS kept coming and the puzzle started unravelling. “Didn’t you receive my MMS?” and so I checked my phone, MMS messages on the sent folder, everything looked fine, then I remembered the delivery reports! Shit! One look and I knew, everything was on pending status, the files must have been too large. “Oh well”, I thought, “but still not enough reason, considering also the fact that it was only around 10:30 in the morning.”

I booked the reservations and headed back to where my car was parked. Next stop was to report to work. The SMS exchanges continue until on one final beep my phone lights up and another message popped. A name of a girl whom I courted in the past, 3 years past to be exact, flashes through the screen. “What the *@#$!? How did she get involved?”. Something in my head snapped, accompanied by a feeling of worthlessness swept through me. Did I do anything to deserve this?, Have I not done enough for you all this time …?, This isn’t healthy anymore., were some of the questions and thoughts in my mind. After relaying them, all I got was more of the cold and provoking replies like ‘what have you done beh?’ and ‘And so, if it’s not healthy what would you like do to now?’.

I stopped replying right there and then but in my mind I already knew what I wanted to do. It was going to be a very long drive back to the office, one of chaotic silence, where every sound around you is muffled by the thoughts running through your mind.

First stop was to text E, one of my trusted friends who happens to sideline as a florist during special occasions, and inquire on how the flowers were doing. The flowers weren’t set to be delivered until 3pm, “okay”, I replied “cancel them please.”

Next stop was the airlines office where the service was really bad and after a long wait all they could tell me was to call or come back on Monday for an update. Surprisingly, I didn’t mind the long wait, the place was airconditioned, I didn’t have to do anything but sit down and wait, and people were walking pass me minding their own business. My hopes were low on getting my money back as my tickets were one of those promotional fares and it had been rebooked previously.

After all of which, later in the day, I broke the news.

I gave up, yes.

I stopped BELIEVING, I never pretended.

I’m a hopeless romantic but a simple “Happy Heart’s Day” maybe even followed by a smiley “=)” to show a little more endearment would have been enough for me, something that I never got on that day.

I’d had my share of drama and get more than enough of it from the television and cinemas. And so, I goof off and laugh things off when I’m down. It is my way of coping up with things, I hope nobody misunderstands that.

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