“The moon is beautiful, isn’t it?”
I saw a child with her hopeful eyes, uttering a phrase that she just learned on a book.
“….”
The silence is louder when it came from her mother who was too busy to focus on her phone.
The little kid doesn’t know why her mother’s still working despite being already coming home from work but she just shrugged. Not even looking at her, with the phone now on her ears and hands available to lift the pages of paperworks on top of her desk, she heard the woman say,
“Not now, Athena. Don’t bother me. I’ve got way too many things on my plate.”
Maybe next time.
With eyes trying not to lose its spark, she said those in her mind.
— —
“The moon is beautiful, isn’t it?,” with panic and anxiety drawn to her whole system and palpitating heart, I see a teenage girl confessing her love for a random guy she’s been crushing on in the baseball team.
She was hopeful and giddy and nervous. On her uniform with her heavy backpack that she carry, along with both arms stretched and her hands holding a letter towards the guy that she likes. He was charming and was so cool that she risked one dare to finally confessed right in the middle of the baseball field with people seeing the actual scene.
“I don’t like you. I already have someone else.” As easy as those words been said by him, pain is now felt all over aching chest as he saw her crush face the bleachers and meet the eyes of one of his cheerleaders.
Maybe next time.
With lips shaking and eyes trying not to cry, she convinced herself as walked out of that field.
— —
“The moon is beautiful, isn’t it?” after six months in a talking stage and two months in a situationship, she finally had the courage to ask the person she wanted to spend her life with. She sees the person in the future that she looked forward to and wants that person present with building and reaching dreams together to supporting each other’s happiness as they aged.
“It’s not you, it’s me. Maybe we are really not meant for each other”, the same person said as she watched them walk away like the least she expected them to when they first came to her life with confidence.
Maybe next time.
With wretched heart and eyes that won’t stop crying, she begged the gods hoping that this will be the last time that she cries.
— — — —
“The moon is beautiful, isn’t it?,” with tears flowing down from her eyes, she asked her boyfriend of five years. Hoping he still love her the same despite being cold and somewhat changed in energy on consecutive days and months with having less time together.
Work ain’t it? He’s just way too busy earning.
At the end of the day, I don’t own him still.
That’s how she reassured herself each passing days, weeks, and months she was ignored and tend on to. But with that small hope she still has, she fearfully asked for an answer.
“I’m so sorry, Tina. I really am…B-But let’s stop this” the fiancé now uttered with guilt seen in his eyes as he said those words.
It broke her to pieces as the future that they dreamt of together went crashing down just like that because of a simple decision driven by the cursed phrase, “I just fell out of love.”
Maybe next time.
With a tired soul and a broken heart which she doesn’t know if will be fixed any sooner, with not much hope left, she convinced herself one last time.
____
It was never easy to be loved the same way you can readily do for the other person.
Sabi pa nila, suntok sa buwan ma-reciprocate ang nararamdaman.
What more to maintain being someone’s love?
Yung nasa iyo na sa wakas, tapos mawawala at babawiin lang din pala ulit.
Although it was so easy to give and to love.
Like what I once did, pouring all of myself to people hanggang sa maubos ako.
Much more for the pain that is felt in the end.
Kapag narealize kong ako lang ulit maiiwan sa huli.
All this time, I have been waiting to be loved the same extremity of the way I do.
I have been waiting to receive the love that I readily give to each person that I have loved.
I have been waiting for the time of reciprocation that I never knew that it will be enough with just me and myself.
And that I don’t have to work hard to prove to people that I’m deserving of the love that I give.
It’s enough with just me looking out, caring, tending, and loving my self.
I can now love someone and receive the same love at the same time.
— — — -
“The moon is beautiful, isn’t it?”, I took the small picture out of my wallet and caressed it’s old photopaper on the surface.
It was my baby picture. More like a baby-toddler since I was aged four that time when it was taken.
Before I even know it, smile is now slowly and involuntarily forming in my lips as I looked at the kid smiling at the camera as she sat on a fluffy pink chair.
It was the one who existed even before the kid who got dismissed by her mother. The one who existed even before the high school girl who got rejected by her crush. The one who was already here before she even met the one she thought was the love of her life in first year college. The life that was already present even before the existence of the woman who thought she would die the moment her fiancé cancelled their engagement.
It was I.
I then looked at the skies this time of the night. Despite the darkness overcoming the whole heavens, the appearance of the stars and the moon in it’s full shape is what makes this evening seem bright.
“I could die happy”
I whispered to myself as I stared at the beauty the vast skies stretching from all ways possible that my eyes could reach. The moon is glowing beautifully and the ocean of stars shone the brightest. That even when the sun is not present, the visible celestial objects proved that their light was enough brighten each darkest of nights.
Like the latter phrase I just uttered, I felt nothing but fulfillment. I love myself to the point that I could die with no regrets. I could die finally loved.
With I, no longer in pain, no longer trying hard to be enough for someone, no longer longing for something that will never happen, and no longer hurting for constantly trying to go back and beg things to stay as they are.
I have long let those burdens go.
Because this time, I never needed anyone’s love. I’m happy by myself and I’ll always be enough for me.
— — —
Writer’s note:
We become powerful the moment we realize that we don’t need to prove anyone that we too are deserving of love.