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| Time, Not Yet |
| by Max San Vicente |
...I thought it was an ordinary day as a sms coming from a prankster. I thought it was a charade, a fiction...until it became real and obsession....
Thirteen years has passed and the tale of the unsharpened pencil still lingers on her. I can't recall how I did it nor recount the days how we got close to each other. After those years, a sms broke my concentration over my girlfriend that afternoon...(Intel, the name of my girlfriend was with me for the past three weeks burning all my energies to the limit in drafting house plans...she had no ires when I diverted my attention to that sms).
"Hey, can we be textmate again?'', the first sms broke down. No reply was given. I am that person whom I do not give time to reply unless an identity is being confirmed first.
"Owss, are you that busy? Did you really put aside our good times during high school days?", the sms went on. At this time, I gave a second thought. It might be that this is sms was coming from one of my long lost circle of friends! "May I know you please? Godspeed!", I replied.
And so it went that she identified herself. But I can not recall the days. She just came from a three-year contract from a semiconductor company in Taiwan and be back after a month's vacation. She saw me days before but I didn't noticed her. She painstakingly looked for my number from our common friends' friends.
At 24 she doesn't had a boyfriend. Maybe, as she told me, her parents are so strict. Maybe, because she had that inclination to be a nun. Yes, she did and still is! She had been to a convent before she left for Taiwan. Or maybe, after all those years, my name still being keep inside her heart.
On that very day, I asked her to meet me. I had arranged a spot for our meeting. But 24 hours later, I hadn't received any sms from her. Until I sent sms asking for an apology for whatever I did to make her upset...and I did received a reply, "No. I had a problem. Please call, my load is insufficient".
"Hello!", I said. On the other side I heared a heartfelt cry. I was shocked!
In the middle of her crying she went, "I am very excited to meet you yesterday...they told me to come for a visit, but I do not know where we are going...it was a shocked of my life! We went to the house of the guy whom they want me to marry...It is against my will...still I can't ignore the feelings I have over you".
I did my investigation. She was a freshman and I was in my senior. I did recall that my girlfriend, a junior, told me that a freshman got her eyes on me. And off it went that during a campus club officers' nomination, we were paired for a Muse and Escort positions. She cried. It was my gf who nominated us. We won.
She made me recall that one day, she ask for a pencil from me. I gave her my new unsharpened one. It was to her dismay that she further ask me how she could use the pencil because it was unsharpened. I gave her a philosophical answer, "Do still want me to help you how to sharpen that damn pencil?"
Four days after that Sunday incident, she escaped from their house. Her cellphone was confiscated on that same day and like a thief, used the cellphones of their maid and driver to keep me informed. I was shocked to know that she really followed her decisions...
Somewhere in the Philippines, I was able to go where she went. It was a disguise that a company emailed me to come for a personal appearance. We still had communications until recently. We decided to talk about her plight. She is leaving for Taiwan again or might enter the convent for the rest of her life.
Her last message was on her 25th birthday, August 6, 2007.
"God, I forgot, it is my birthday today. Thank you. You are the first person to greet me. Text you later, I need to prepare myself, I have to meet someone today for my urgent going back schedule for Taiwan. Thanks for waking me up." the message goes. It was 8:10 am. Minutes later, "What the hell!, I need to go back to my place, I'm wearing my slippers not the shoes!". That was the last sms I heard from her.
Fiction? Real? I don't know.
I called her Tea. My sweet call out from her name Althea. I wish all the best for her.
Tea, plz txtbk.... |
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