A Story Worth RM80 Plus a Good Depression

I've been idle lately. Remembering what I did, what I should've done.

I remembered stuff. Stuff that I forgotten. Though I wasn't really trying. But I guess as the tide of time and space ebbs and flows, situation changes, it just kinda slipped from my mind.

I remembered that day, when I packed whatever stuff I owned at that time, destroyed everything else, put the RM80 (the money that I had at that time) into my pocket and left for Penang.

That night, things happened. I remembered way way back before that night I said to someone that it'll never happened again. It did. So I lied.

I wished I could stay, but then again, it was a hard time. Crushed from top, below, front, back, side to side, all around. If I stayed, there's a good chance that I wont be alive today. I'm glad I stayed away. But I kept on thinking, if I stayed, where would life take me?

I changed my name, I changed my looks so many times, inventing make-belief facade with a hope that it'll change my perspective towards life. I guess that doesn't work.

Somehow, no matter how I act, who I become, it always goes back to where I'm trying hard to avoid going to. Which is here and now.

From island to island. Crowded places, isolated places, being good, being bad, being very good and being very bad, I'll always be me. A person only I know. If I were to describe myself as I know myself today, I'd say- Someone very much like the moon. It changes it's shape, yet, it stays the same.

Some people just grow up and be what they're supposed to be. I'm still searching for who I am. Still looking for the person I'm supposed to be. Some people say that i should have a plan for my life. I do. I'm still planning for a plan.

How do I describe the feeling of blood rushing to the head, when waking up to be someone else. But the memories that came with the many different names is overwhelming. Now I'm running out of space in my head.

So as I was saying, the day after that night in Penang, my friend left me by the road side, somewhere secluded. I wanted it to be that way. I just wanted to be by the sea.

There and then, it occured to me, my circle of friends at that time were like dinosaurs at the end of the Cretaceous, I'm one of the last. Some of us got drunk while driving, got into an accident, end up dead. Some took a bold step for wrong reasons and took their own life, one got murdered, quite a few disappeared to some distant land never to be seen again, some got married, some married and divorced and I am here. Going places, ruining someone else's life. Mostly mine.

I remembered, the text messages I sent on the ferry. I remembered the moment I stepped out of the ferry, the strap on my bag just broke off. I remembered the two cans of Zapple I bought, drank 1 and still have the other one with me right now. I remembered that long wait at the jetty. I remembered very well the break-ups, meeting new people, being used and abused. Using and abusing people. Saying things that I really meant. False hopes and empty promises.

Would you risk a gallon of bile for a teaspoon of honey? It could be worth it but I was cheated, it was not real honey at all that was offered, but the bile was real enough.

I burned every single thing I wrote back then. I just don't want to remember them and I don't want to be reminded of them. But still from time to time, some of it came back to haunt me.

Someone asked... Are you sure about this? To which the reply was... I don't know, but if I don't do it, I'll never find out- said a fictional character, trying hard to be real.