Music in the Waters of Paradise
He took me to an old, cheap, and ramshackle-type motel along Aurora Blvd. I didn't complain. The smell of bleach and cockroaches reminded me of home anyway.
The room was small and cramped. It was more or less five square meters but it fitted all necessities—restroom, tv, vanity table, queen size bed, and led lights flashing dim yellow or red.
It was a dark den infected with gonorrhea and syphilis—a place far from paradise. But with him, it felt more like a refuge for two lonely people searching for the love we've lost under the ocean of moist, cold, and thin bed covers.
He looked at me longingly; searched for answers in my eyes, skin, lips.
Finally, he gave up and asked, "Do you like me?"
I trembled with fear. Suddenly, some shadow quelled all my passions and desires. It took a minute or an eternity for me to respond. It was impossible to answer with a straight 'yes' or 'no'. In that short span of time, endless thoughts became chasms that separated him from me...
I thought, "Do I like him? Did I ever like him? Why should I like him?"...
[He was a boy. A silly boy I met at the beach ten years ago or so. He was always shy. He often avoided my eyes. We only really started talking when I hit his head with a wooden paddle. From then on, he never stopped babbling.
He always amused me. Besides his outdated fashion and that tacky fedora he used to wear, he never seemed strange to me. He was really sweet. He always cheered for me whenever I went diving. He'd yell, "Idol! Idol!" When we were both underwater, he would hold my hand and I would hold his. And it would feel like the most natural thing in the world. Like, my hands finally knew where she belonged, where she fitted. On the beach, under the pale blue moonlight, we talked about everything. He talked about his dreams—mostly about music and sometimes about George Harrison. He said he looks like him. He said, someday he'd like to play as good as him.
I didn't know then that memories like those were more intimate than sex. These were one of the few fondest childhood memories I wanted to hold onto for as long as I can. They were like tiny portals of our past and future. He gave me music and I gave him the entire ocean.
But I didn't like him like him. Not like that. Not at all romantically. More like, the like rooted in dirt and sprouted flowers. Comfortable and innocent kind of like. Almost familial-type. The like that stood the test of all those years we spent apart. The like that almost lasted forever. The kind of like that made me want to scream, "I want to try to be with you even though I know I can't because we're
almost the same person. And if I say 'yes' to your question, I'm sure you'll misunderstand my intentions. I'm sure you'll be gone by tomorrow."]
Suddenly, I was out of my head again. No more music, no more ocean.
Back in our filthy, wet, dark, hellhole.
Our refuge.
His wide eyes stared, searched, waited.
I forced an apprehensive nod.
My thoughts didn't matter.