[[He]]

A week’s passed and I decide to open the bon bon wrapped present that Ella made Selina give me. I took a week ignoring the package, fighting against myself to open it. I just felt like if I open it, just like the quote for collection’s, I’d lose 50% of its value and I’ve also been thinking that it may be possible that this is the last thing I’d receive from Ella, the one last thing I could keep unwrapped from her. It took me some courage to open it and when I finally had a chance to look at it… I knew I did the right thing.

It had on an embossed ‘Fancy Capsule’ on its outer covering. It looked like a telescope and it had a lens. Surely, this has got to have something inside so I looked through the lens and thousands of memories encrypted to it did I see. I felt a little melodramatic and emotional, I kept biting my lips. I didn’t know whether I should feel sad or happy, so I only looked up at the ceiling as I lay down my bed, still looking at it. At the last slide, it said: ‘Aku benci kamu’. I bet it’s Indonesian, it sounded like Malay though. I had some clues too and I think it meant: ‘I hate you’ in English.

--

[[She]]

Every now and then, after two weeks… all I could do is to pet with Tie Dan almost every day and every night. I’ve been feeling nostalgic and true is it, I’m missing a part of me.

Last last week, I met Jerry Yan…

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……………….{
“Um, hey,” he had said, trying as hard to strike a conversation slouched in the chair he sat on with his head leaning on one hand.

I had tried so hard to smile, it reached my ears. It was too fake, and I thought he’d notice and so he did.

“You don’t have to force out a smile like that at me,” he politely suggested as I let out a crazy laugh. I hadn’t known why I felt like I just had to crazy at that time, yet he liked it when I see a deep dimple carved drawn on his face that instant.

“You realized that, eh?” I smirked as I rolled my eyes and rolled a Bordeaux glass on its heel.

“I have someone else,” he said this rather irritated, crossing his arms as I watched him at the corner of my eyes. I had instantly strained my neck up high due to much happiness, my ears clapping in join literally this time.

It was like a wave of energy running through me that I had felt. I was too happy, and I didn’t need two eyes to prove that.

“But if our parents insist that we push through with this,” he heaved out a deep sigh. “I wouldn’t object as well.”

“But I have someone else as well!” I stood right up from my seat in exclaim, my palms hitting the table as hard as I could.

“Figures,” he scoffed, an eyebrow of mine rose up in agitation.

“I’ll tell my dad,” I had turned around with my arms crossed as I had said this.

“You should,” and I walked away.
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Last week, my mom helped me to expose my real motives of staying here resulting to a talk I had with my dad…

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………………..{
“Do you have an idea, Jia Hua, how much sales stock we’d miss rejecting Mr. Yan’s son?”

I listened to my dad as he’d ask me that, while I looked as bored seated on the couch right in front of him as he walked back and fro and back and fro and then again.

‘Well, do you have an idea what great deal of a love life your daughter’s missing by bringing her to L.A.?’ I had wanted to say, yet would never. I had much respect for my dad and I was only just about ready to hear him respect me as well.

“Dad, I—”

“Halt!”

And if I hadn’t known better, I would have had asked my father whether or not he’d read a Shakespearean book recently just like… just like last Christmas’ memory with Chun. It felt bitter enough recalling that piece of memory between him and me and my dad just didn’t make matters any better, so I stood up, with my arms crossed, my feet flat on the ground and I looked as fierce as I could piercing a harsh gaze on his orbs as our eyes locked in a heated staring game.

“Dad!” I said this as I shook with the greatest fear I could ever possess. I had never imagined myself in that position I was in neither had I imagined myself talking back at my dad and all for Chun… all for Wu Chun I’m doing it now. “Do you know what big part of me I left in Taiwan?”

“Yes, you‘re mom had mentioned it,” he had said this as soft as possible with his eyes shut tightly. “That… that Wu guy! Do you think he could make you as happy as we had made you?”

“Happy?” my eyes had squinted and I had shut it as tight feeling that tears would be coming any minute now. “You make me feel the total opposite, dad!” and I felt a sharp pain shot through my cheeks. “The Wu guy that you’re talking about fortunately has a name. Chun. Chun who made me feel the total opposite of what you had made me feel. Chun who made me feel on top of the world. Chun who lived a simple life, not showing off what riches he really had. Chun who had made lo—” and instead of feeling more emotional than I could, I ran to the front door and wiped my tears away as fast as I could and I looked back with the hardest laugh I could as I continued, “Dad, I love you, you have to know that. It’s mutual, I guess, but you have to know that I could never love you or Jerry Yan or any other man just like how I love Chun. And before my flight next week, I’d like to tell you: thank you for bringing me to this world, thank you for taking care of me, thank you for the love you gave me and most of all, thank you for giving me the choice to live my life the way I want to because I know… I just know… that with that look you’re giving me that you’ve permitted me to. Thank you, dad.”

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And just this week… I had thought of things through and through. I would often hug myself, asking myself just how much strength it took me to say all that in one go with my dad. Until now, I could never get over it and until now, he refuses to talk to me. It’s either he had an OT at work or he just simply did that on purpose to avoid me and the conscious part of me of whether or not he’d still forgive me.

--

[[Nobody’s POV, a week after the second]]

She was on her way to the airport to board her flight back to Taipei. Reaching the airport took her longer than expected as the cab she took a ride on for the second time of the day had a hard time opening its loader at the back of the car.

Her flight was actually destined to fly to Taipei at exactly 11:15 AM, yet it was already 10:45 AM. Normally, a passenger would register or come in 3 hours before the flight as much as possible, but this was a rushed booking she did that’s why late last night, she needed to still pack her things up.

Earlier, at about 8:00 AM, she made sure nothing else was amiss as she checked her luggage for the 3rd time. Riding on cab on the way to the airport at about 9:00 AM though, an hour ago that she left, she had to retreat back home, finally realizing that she left her passport at the living room in their L.A. residence. Going back home to pick it up, she didn’t know why, but she felt a feeling coming that something was making her drop and stop everything. Truth be told, her premonitions actually came true as her mother caught her in the living room picking her passport by the living room, trying to talk her daughter out of leaving L.A. It took Ella minutes, or maybe even an hour or so even before she could convince her mother of stopping her from leaving. Convincing her to stay and to beg her father to take her back in after the argument that they had that she took things rashly and decided she live independently on her own and if God permits, with Chun. Successfully, she left the house at about 9:45 AM. She even went through the trouble of fetching a cab for 15 minutes as she reached the highway.

9:30 AM. The traffic didn’t even help her at all, so half a kilometer from the airport, she asked the driver of the cab to stop at the sidewalk and fetch her luggage from the back loader of the cab. She was getting really pissed then. She was really getting itchy, swearing that she could kill anyone she sees the first if only it weren’t a crime to do so. She cursed in Mandarin Chinese loudly, finding out that the back part loader of the car wouldn’t even open for Pete’s sake! And it took the driver and her about 5 minutes or so kicking their way to the loader just to open it. And she swore, she can be the topic of L.A.’s Breaking News for tomorrow that would be entitled: “Taiwanese Woman Kicking A Cab’s Loader Madly”.

From that point on, she brisk-walked going to the airport, sliding her luggage in the process so and with her hand-carry items she had on her sling bag that she donned over her clothing. She was exhausted, yes. Even panting as she reached the premises of the airport. She could faint in any second, she just hopes she won’t.

“Last call for Ms. Ella Chen, flight 168 to Taipei, Taiwan.”

The minute she heard it, she panicked. She even forgot the basic familiarities an airport visualization could provide her. She was on a roll, yes. And it was an extreme one at that. She didn’t even feel her cell phone drop until she heard a slight thud on the tiled floor she was rooted upon at this point. So, she came to pick it up and crouched down.

“Again, I repeat, last call for Ms. Ella Chen, flight 1—”

The moment she regained composure and stood up yet again, all other elements around her seemed blurred and muted. Looking in front of her, was the time all hell broke loose that she dropped her cell phone yet again and all the other things she had as hand carry. It may sound a bit exaggerated, but her trolley luggage fell backwards as well as she hurriedly picked up her pace and ran to something…or rather…someone a couple of meters away from her.

That someone welcomed her with arms wide open, hugging her tightly as she initiated so with much intensity that it did right back to her as well.

“Chun,” she muttered, as Chun now lifted her up a little from the ground and swayed with her in a circular motion.

She then cried. Much to her happiness, of course, with both her hands right on top of his shoulders.

The time he lifted her down, she was as though still tightly knitted to him as she held his hand as tight as she could, trying as hard to make herself realize that it was true and that she wasn‘t dreaming.

“Tell me you’re not a dream,” she pat his cheek, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Aku cinta kamu,” was all he said, a cheeks of hers as he tilted her head and pressed his lips fully to hers.

“I know now, alright?” she softly started, breaking free. “You mean the world to me. I couldn’t live a day not thinking of you. I missed you. Oh, heck, more than you could ever imagine. But apart from those all, I love you too.”

He wished right there and then, hoping that time would stop. That this sweet Ella tightly hugging him would be forever and always treating him like this. He knows he’s asking too much, but it’s all about Ella now, alright? Who could blame him? He loves her just as well that she does. Maybe even more. At the last thing she said then, he pressed his lips fully again unto hers with a kiss full of so much elation and passion. He didn’t care whether they were being watched by a crowd or anything in relation to that. They could only think of their tale of love story, ‘cause starting from now, everything changes…