October 29th 2025

8 years ago, it was barely 4 years since the last time I saw her face with my eyes but her smile never left my mind, and that day was just another normal day that happened to be my birthday. I was a type of a person who didn't care about that so-called a sacred day ordinary people would celebrate every year, and that 'make a wish' ritual...

... it's just a waste of carbon dioxide. make a wish by blowing the candle is completely useless.

I mean...

A wish would still be a wish, no matter how hard you blow that candle.

but that day...

... was the fourth time I make a wish and blow a candle on my birthday.

Every birthday after she left, I'd bought a small cake and a little candle, at home I would lit that candle, and then make a wish...

I hinged my hope on something I used to ridicule.

Pathetic, right?

That shows how desperate I was.

A looner who bought a cake and blow a candle on her birthday, so she could breathe the same wish every year.

And that night, I was about to do the same thing. I bought the exact same cake, and the exact same candle at the exact same cakeshop every year.

Everything was the same, except for one thing, that year I didn't celebrate alone.

The previous year, a week after my birthday, I happened to buy a cup coffee near the university I attend, at that time I overheard the conversation of the people next to me, they were a group of volunteer at an animal shelter, they talk about how people still prefer buying their pet from pet shop rather than adopt one from an animal shelter, how packed the shelter was because many ignorant pet owners bought their pets when it was still a toddler and then abandoned their pets after they got bigger and doesn't look cute anymore.

I listened to their conversation for a good 15 to 20 minutes while contemplating...

... Should I adopt one?...
... What if I become as ignorant as others who abandoned their pets?...

I think I should lessen to ask "what if" on every single thing and questioning every outcome of something that yet happened.

Overthin