Three Roses and a Kiss

My boyfriend left me two years ago without explanation as to why he broke up with me. We were together for three years and nowadays, three years is a really, really long time to be in a relationship. If you ask me if losing him was painful, I honestly say that it was. But I’m not about crying barrels of tears because of mourning about that loss; anyway, it would be a complete waste of time if I did. I don’t completely hate Valentine’s Day but I don’t expect myself to like it either.
Tonight, the Eve of Valentines, I felt more alone than ever. Well, at least there’s someone to confide with me and to spend the night even if to me it seemed Halloween- my younger sister.
She was pacing at the living room where the two of us usually bonded. I was lucky that I had Sharina for the last seventeen years of my existence. I was twenty-one, older than her by four years. It was completely relieving to know that she really cared.
Sharina looked uneasy as she stared at the clock which showed exactly seven.
The doorbell rang and she begged me to open the door as she hurriedly sat on the sofa and pretended to open a magazine.
I smiled at Sharina and answered the door. I did not expect a small boy which looked a little older than nine. He had brown hair, and freckly face, and he looked neat.
He was wearing a polo shirt, a suspender and matching black slacks. On his other hand was a bowler hat he put on his chest as he greeted me.
“Are you Miss Sabina? Someone wants to give this to you,” he said with a cute voice and a sweet smile.
“Who, Why-" I tried to ask him as I accepted the flower, but he just shook his head and ran away as quickly as he can, ruining the beautiful charade.
I glanced at Sharina. She raised both her shoulders. She was just as puzzled as I am.
The stem of the flower had an attached note which said, “Sorry.” I thought to myself that the person who gave it must have been crazy for he asked to be forgiven, yet he didn’t tell me who he was. But I had a feeling that the person assumed that I knew him.
Anyhow, I stayed at the door, admiring the rose when another boy (with the same “uniform” as the first one) came, holding another rose. A white one. As soon as the rose reached my grip, he ran as fast as he can.
The stem held another message.
“Forgive me”.
The two annoying words displayed in my mind as if I was seeing it with blinking twinkle lights. The flowers must have come from the same person.
I shut (more like slammed) the door. I sat on the living room sofa, and closed my eyes, trying to calm myself. There was another door bell and I ignored it. Sharina, sitting just opposite me, managed to walk and get the door. When she came back, she held a note. She handed it to me as she giggled.
“No Valentine… huh!” she teased. I rolled my eyes as I grabbed the note from her.
“What’s this?” Someone must have been playing a prank on me, knowing that I was lonely and without a date tomorrow for Valentines. That was it.
I opened the envelope which held my name.
The note contained two lines:
Two for each year I’ve been away…
One for the day, we’ll meet again.
I stared at the note. Now, I felt my suspicions were correct. After leaving me without an explanation, he was going to reconcile with me and our relationship would be okay as if nothing happened.
The day we’ll meet again. What does he mean?
I placed the two roses on a vase I positioned carefully on a table inside the room. (I couldn’t refuse the lovely flowers.) I was still thinking why he gave them, and I was hyperventilating in the living room, not knowing if I’ll cry or not.
I often let my mind rule over my heart. My heart says I want him back, and let’s just say, my mind wouldn’t want to. Oftentimes, I feel like I’m following a script called what I should feel when this happens and the director was my mind.
The door bell rang for the third time. Again, I did not answer it, but my sister hurried to open it anyway.
She barked at the person outside, “What do you want?”
I turned to look at the person. It was Jeremy, my sister’s best-friend-turned-worst-enemy just because he tried to tell his real feelings towards her, and by the looks of it, hasn’t given up on her yet.
“Sharina, I-“
“I told you, Jeremy. I don’t want to be more than what we are. If you don’t want that, then get lost.”
And she slammed the door and took the seat opposite me.
“Strike three,” she whispered and a grin was forming on her face.
“You know what? I think you should give him a chance,” I told her, sympathizing with the boy I knew so much by the number of hours he has been with my sister.
“Impossible!” she exclaimed, as she smiled at me.
“What?”
“That my only sister would think the same.”
“What?” I said again, completely at a loss.
She just ignored me.
The door bell rang for the fourth -and I hoped the last- time tonight. My sister whirled toward the door and I now understood what she meant.
Of course, she was just giving Jeremy some test. She loves him too and she wants to prove how serious he was by rejecting him… like tonight… and by how many times he would try to win her again. But I just hoped Jeremy wouldn’t give up yet. It might just hurt my sister.
I looked at Sharina and her face said that I was right.
She cheerfully opened the door but her expression changed when she realized it was not Jeremy.
Not Jeremy but…
“Taylor,” I gasped.
“Taylor! Come in! Come in!” my sister shrieked. I never saw her look that excited for days. Not even with the I hate you Jeremy pretenses.
Taylor took a step and was “in” when I shouted, “Stay where you are!”
The sound of my voice made him back away.
My sister was shocked. She pulled my right hand which was useless because I felt my two feet dragging me towards the door anyway.
When I was officially “out”, Sharina closed the door and locked me outside with the man whom I’m not so sure what my heart feels for.
But I’m quite sure with the mind thing. It kept telling me that I should hate Taylor because he hurt me when he left me two years ago, without explanation, and without warning.
I don’t even know if he still treated me as his girlfriend while he was away. For all we know, he may have hundreds of girls while I was left here thinking about him. Though, I don’t love him anymore. To me, he is an ex-boyfriend. A past I don’t want to relive. My mind says so.
“One for the day we meet again,” Taylor quoted, removing me from my trance as he handed me a large, long-stemmed, red, Californian rose.
He smiled his signature smile and his dimples showed on his right cheek. I stared at the floor mat just so he couldn’t see my face redden. I have a feeling it was as red as it was warm.
He held my chin with his hand and looked at me with his smoky green eyes placed on a perfectly chiseled face which took my breath away…
Stop!
I’m not supposed to tell that.
“So it was really you, wasn’t it? What made you come back?” I casually asked him, with a streak of sarcasm in my voice.
“Ouch,” he said as he put his balled fist on his chest. He was teasing and it wasn’t funny to me.
“Or better yet, why did you leave?” I wanted this question to be answered first.
“What kind of a lunatic man-“
“Oh, I don’t know. Men like you, perhaps?” I interrupted.
“Yes, I admit I was crazy, by leaving you. But please, let me explain,” he said with pleading eyes.
I remained quiet.
“You know I have amnesia that I couldn’t remember who I was or what I did before I met you. But that night- the night I left, everything came back to me-“
“So that’s why, you seemed different that night. You weren’t my Taylor,” I interrupted again.
“No, I didn’t forget you. I didn’t forget me. But some other memory tampered with my memories of you. I felt confused. I didn’t know if you really existed. I thought you were just a dream. But something told me that you’re more than that. But I didn’t want to hurt you when the time comes I wouldn’t recognize you anymore. It’s coming, Sabina, my condition could get worse. I left without explaining. I was selfish. I’m sorry.
“I know I belong here, with you. I don’t know if you’ll ever forgive me for leaving like that, but I kept battling with myself because part of me still believed that you should live a normal life. I want you to forget me because I don’t know how stable this mind would be. Dream or not, someday, soon, this mind may not recognize you any longer, though my heart really battled to never forget you.” I felt the pain in his voice as it trailed away.
“You want me to forget you? How would forgetting you make me live a normal life?” I felt a lump on my throat.
“Can’t you understand? I don’t want you to see me like this. I don’t want you to let me remember time and again that I should love you. I want you to love and be loved in return, normally. I love you, Sabina, this” –he clutched at his heart- “wouldn’t forget that, but I don’t know until when my mind would recognize you. I came here selfishly Sabina because I want to see you, even if it’s the last time I would. Forgive me. Forgive me for this.”
And he crushed his lips against mine. I wanted to pull away from him but I couldn’t. Instead, I just kissed him back as I felt his soft lips I missed for a very long time.
It felt like forever before our lips parted.
I looked at Taylor and cried. “I need you forever, even if it would end today. I forgive you, Taylor. I love you!” I embraced him tightly as tears continued to well down my cheeks.
A realization came over me. I let my mind rule over my heart, a principle I’ve quite developed. Yet here he is in front of me, trying to fight his mind with his heart. - A heart that says that there’s no one else but me. Now I know, that my heart also screamed for him.
“I didn’t know some romantics still existed today,” I smiled at him as I admired the rose. It was the third rose tonight.
We were about to kiss again when Jeremy appeared.
“Oops… Sorry,” he apologized, seeing what his wrong timing had caused.
“Don’t be. Sharina’s inside the house,” I winked at him as I pressed the door bell button, knowing that four hearts would never be the same tonight, at the eve of Valentine’s Day.




~anamellie, 012709