生命之旅 - Life as a journey....

9:30 PM ( written in 2002 )

It is a special time to me, 9:30 PM.

It was the exact time I walked passing his post, after another long night non-stop studying.

I know, as a fact, they always watch us from their post, in the dark.
I can sense their eyes 10 meters away from the spot they stand.
They are just like the beast in the dark, watching us as their prey.
We seem to be the helpless prey.

Then, one night, just like every other normal night, I decided to turn my head and say to one of them, "Good-night".

The table turned from that moment.

It was 9:30PM.

I walked passing that post every night, like a clock works, to catch last bus home.

For a whole year, 9:30, every night, I would turn my head and say "good-night" to one of them.
They thought I saw their faces, but in fact, I never really did.

I recognize people by sound, not by sight.

Then another night, a voice responded my routine "good-night". He said good-night back to me. I smiled, to the darkness.

So he said, afterward, he fell in love with me, and tried to be on duty for the post, the shift that could say good-night to me.

He drew the cute comic MP strips for my birthday, at Christmas eve.

In return, I invited him to join me,  visited the observatory to see the summer stars.

Then, I graduated; he retired from his military service.
I began to get the special daily phone call at 9:30PM, from him.
He called, just to say "good-night" to me, like a clock works.

Then, he broke up with me, for whatever stupid mistake he made, so he said.

In between the lines, I am apparently not good enough for him for I can not speak Taiwaness as one of many reasons..

Ripped my heart right out and stepped on it, the last piece of memory he left me with.

9:30PM turns to be a curse, a torture moment every night from that point forward.

When phone rings at 9:30PM, I shake, subconsciously, helplessly.

For the past 6,000 9:30PM, I suffer, every single one of them.

I do everything humanly possible, not to walk passing that point at 9:30PM.
Not to look at the phone at 9:30PM.

I was relatively successful to some extend....
But no matter where I am, what I do, at 9:30PM, I am still shaking, more or less.

I reviewed the wound, attempted to resolve this unexplainable trauma.
Day after day, year after year, it still hurts as if all just happened yesterday....

I summoned all courage and walked passing by that exact spot at 9:30PM one more time.
It doesn't seem to be that dark as I remember.
The tree was trimmed poorly.
The magic has gone.

He is not the exact same perfect one as I remember, come to think about it.

Did I love him ? Oh, yes, I did, still do, and will be forever no matter what.

Did he every love me ? I am not sure about it any more.
He perhaps never did.

It would be nice to know the answer once for all.

But again, what good can come out of it by finding out if he never loved me ?

I can no longer tell whether he lies or not because I love him so much, he can almost do no wrong....

Between endless torture and clean fatal truth, how one should choose ?

I struggle to over-ride the 9:30PM.
Not sure how I could succeed ever, perhaps I never could, but at least I have to try.

Perhaps, in a distant land, when he looks up the sky, he might remember the one that said good night to him... At 9:30PM....

Maybe, out of blue, he would remember the one that he once called chocolate...

9:30PM, the haunting moment....