sugarcoated memories

I met a man, a foreigner to our shores. He had the most gorgeous pair of eyes anyone could wish for. In videos as he was filmed, those eyes were kind; and sad. In real-life, they bore testimony to a steel-hearted determination only seen in the most high caliber of people.

After meeting him, I felt upset for some time. In fact, I'm still upset. It takes a lot for me to really like someone and as of now, I'm still undecided. He isn't half bad; the ability I have to get people to really open up to me is a blessing and a curse. The second time we met, I could sense his undercurrent of unhappiness despite his powerful presence. I could sense that this country was only a temporary stop for him; and he told me so, more or less. He was hoping to ramp up the business here as fast as possible, and go back to the country where he had left a girl behind, the love of his life. Although he did not describe it in this way, I felt so when he referred to her as if she was in the present tense, and not the past. I could feel her right beside him, as if he had never had to leave. And the country in which he had spent 5 years, the country he referred to as 'not as civilised' as this country, where the people have never seen so many blue-eyed, white skinned, tall beings, where little kids point at him and call him 'godzilla' and he could never, would never be able to understand the language, that was the country in his heart.

And in his eyes I could see what he had left behind.

For a moment, triggered perhaps by my cheerful foreign language greeting, I caught a glimpse of that sad-eyed look I used to have, the haunting, vulnerable, young boy irrepressibly in love, replaced after a few seconds by a hard, almost calculating look. And I've always said that I like people to be honest with me; but perhaps honesty is not always the best policy. He referred to some of his staff as lackeys; saying with a knowing look that they thought highly of themselves but in reality they have a long way to go. He was hard on them and I thought a bit too mean. I dislike people who only have negative things to say about all their employees. Of course, he was just honest with me, too honest. Maybe he regretted saying too much after. In an instant I knew he only valued the people who could bring in the dollars and not see the hard work behind it, the hearts of the people like myself, who were also efficient, who were also performing, just that we were not in the role of the moneymakers. And I knew I would never be able to see eye-to-eye with him, as much as I pitied him in the glimpse of the young man in love I had seen in the reflection of his sad eyes.

And it makes me so upset that I'm almost tearful at the thought of being the girl who was left behind, by a young man who loved her but he had to choose to go, and leave a dream behind in the country that he loved, leaving behind the love. I don't want to be like her, waiting, wishing, for a dream that would never be realized - and then what happens next? I dearly hope that there will be a happy ending at the end of this story, but it's dreadful to think that life, as monotonous as it is, goes on, and every day in her soul, she whispers, I miss you.

I miss you so much.