Light Shower: A Japanese Cherry Birch Petrifies in the Middle of a Monsoon

February 24, 2024

I’ve always thought of myself as someone who possessed enough wisdom to discern when to let someone in, when to burn the bridge down completely before one can even smell the first traces of smoke. Regardless if they knocked consistently; not even if they stayed put on the same spot years later, and the house has all but rotted. Abandoned to decay, to fade into a memory hazed around the edges. Something lost to remember when the rain visits, and washes out the filter I’ve poured over parts of my life to hide the fissures, the hardened scabs that permanently reside somewhere in between the lines.

It was an afterthought, the way I opened a window for you to climb into if you wanted to. And you did, enthusiastically so. You had been at the door, for days, but you seemed too uninteresting, too strayed off from what I wanted that I could not give you the satisfaction of entering with ease. This was my space after all, and despite how I want to assume you to be clueless, you understood. You entered through the most inconvenient opening, took off your shoes properly, arranged them at the entrance, and asked if you could stay for an hour or two. Maybe even a day. I told you I could only let you in for an hour, if I could even do that. I’m preoccupied, I’ve told you, but if you’re willing I can accommodate you during these hours. You accepted my conditions, and yet patiently asked me to reconsider, that it would make a difference if I could at least give you a day rather than a hundred minutes. You said I could reject you if I wanted to, and you wouldn’t be hurt — that you were tiptoeing around, devising, fixing things, just so I would consider you gentle. I didn’t say anything, but my answer came to you days later, in an envelope cleanly folded, with no name. Still, you understood who it was from. I was not sorry for the delay. It was intentional after all.

I didn’t understand why you were so persistent, so polite. I still do not. I don’t understand why you planted flowers in my backyard, why you promised me cherry blossoms in May. As an afterthought, I played along. I answered your questions, neatly, kindly. You acted kinder, and as an afterthought, I acted interested. I was aware you could sense my hesitation, my boredom, the last minute dismissal awaiting your ears — but you masked it off with a grin, with a list of things to do together, as a memory. As friends. You offered me friendship, something I couldn’t refuse. Something I’m not cruel enough to leave out in the rain like the flowers you left that I couldn’t water. There are things we don’t dare tolerate when life is so fleeting, when the nameless faces that we come across all but floods our vision one day after another, and yet you mustered up to meet me in the middle of the rain despite my flickering presence caked by an unknown exhaustion. A challenge. Like an unrelenting winter, that you proclaimed you hated so much, and yet still headed out to meet. To play with its sharp edges, and lay in its snow.

I was surprised at how well you handled something so cold to the touch. How you exuded warmth to compensate the bite.

You held up the umbrella, the conversation, held up everything just as you’ve always done. I only observed, as friends don’t poise off the drawn lines like you do. As a friend, I could only agree or disagree. My hands have no space; my words as well. We had agreed, and I thought we had come to a conclusion. There’s a boundary, a line we’ve both drawn before I even let you in. I don’t dare cross over it, nor step outside the house. You said you’d climb in, so I don’t have to. That you do it all for my sake.

I don’t say unnecessary flattery that have no room for something so clean cut. A brittle stone that can only be cut one way. Unpolished, blunt edged, a gypsum fragile enough to only stay intact when untouched. You, on the other hand, skipped over those lines to offer things so out of proportion, to overextend yourself, to climb in until your feet throb, catch splinters, to charr your own hands and then point your fingers at anyone but yourself.

You once said that you were terrified of the thought of me. You also could not look me in the eye, even if you wanted to. You stared when you thought I wasn’t looking, your hands ghosting over my shoulder. Long, longing fingers always clinging onto my sleeve, as if you’re scared I’d disappear at any moment. How unusual. I assumed I knew what you meant when you proclaimed you felt scared, on your toes, but now as I try to recall, I don’t think I do.

I’ve been wondering if that was what prompted you to pursue what’s easier? More familiar, like an old blanket you can never let go of? An open door, always ready to welcome you back anytime? A warmer autumn with its familiar colors, more beautiful than some cold, grey winter night that only seems nice in idealistic, soft filtered lenses. Is that why you burned the bridge before I could, just like I predicted you to?

I’m never one to blame myself for others’ actions. I hold myself firmly enough to know where I stand when asked what I desire, what I think, what I’d suggest. But am I to blame for your games? Do I have to pay for your lack of sincerity when it comes to yourself? You arranged the path for me to walk on, on your own volition, so why should I be punished for getting your hands all cut and dirty?

I’m not sorry for being so upfront, and I’m no longer expecting an apology from people I can recognize more juvenile versions of myself in. If I know you enough from the time we had acquainted and played pretend, I know well that’s far beyond what someone like you is capable of. You’re not the first, and most evidently not the last. There is just a part of me that wishes I could’ve made a wiser choice on who to let in, regardless of their persistence, their shallow intentions to build a garden with sheered off flowers with no roots, to promise seasons months too late.

Regret is more bitter than the truth. I could stomach you burning the house while I am inside of it, but I heave at the fact that I even welcomed someone like you inside in the first place. How unusual for me to not listen to my own gut.

So now, I burn, with only myself to blame.

Light Shower: A Japanese Cherry Birch Petrifies in the Middle of a Monsoon

2024

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