Broken Codes

The confession “I want you, with a hint of uncertainty. I need you, with a hint of ingratitude.  I love you, with a hint of sarcasm.” I said the words, watched her face change and then turned around and walked away- Away from her life, in search of new beginnings. I hadn’t decided where I was going to go, but I wouldn’t stay here, it was unbecoming of me. I would not stay behind to be ridiculed, or unloved. It was never my mistake to have fallen in love, it was tragic loss: a loss of dignity, a loss of pride, I had fallen from my high horse, to become a quivering mass of thoughtless being under someone else’s feet. But that was so much less than my potential, so much more than I ever thought would become of me. I did not want to feel that magnetic draw, how I wanted to turn around and gaze into those hypnotic eyes. I had met that man she loved. The way she had held his hand and had introduced me, it had caused the pit of my stomach to turn and coil. We had sworn to be...

Beauty   The city is crowded.  The navigation system amazing, so well connected, the transportation system beyond me. New job, new life, new heart. I have left my broken heart behind me. I have left my old life behind me, old friends, family.   I have created a routine here; I wake at 6, leave at   7:30 , office by 9. An almost 9 to 5 job, but I don't mind extra hours. It's my new life; I want to leave my old habits behind. Evenings I spend near the sea, because it's perfect. Then I take the train back home, normally with someone's smelly armpit directly aimed at my face. Every jerking stop of the train, sending a nauseatingly strong smell into my nose. I didn't mind.   Today, no different from normal,  I breathe in the crowd at the station,  mixture of smells, jasmine being sold, sweat, mixed perfumes, fried food, I could get used to this, forever. I close my eyes for a second. Someone rams into me really hard and I nearly drop everythin...

The writer   It was the words that came to me in free flow. Every sentence well articulated, well written. The words forming thoughts that I have never really understood. I wrote of love, hatred, anger, hunger, pain, regret; without truly knowing what it meant. People laughed, cried, smiled, smirked; on reading what I wrote. But my mother, she never understood. "Think," she'd say, "use your brain." I would be pushed a math paper toward me and would be asked to solve it. That was my life growing up. But words, words were my friends. They brought me pleasure.   I had woken up to the smell of paper burning. There in my room my waste paper basket had been on fire. My mother, standing near it, in her night gown, tears flowing down her face, had been feeding the flames with papers from my desk: my stories, my poetry. The flames had licked them all, tasting my precious words before deciding to swallow them whole. I had watched them burn, and I had let out an inaudibl...

The other woman  Passion intolerable irrevocable suffering.   I fell asleep with my eyes wide open and I refused to see the world unfold. He loves me... I wake up... He loves me not. I spend most days waking up to his absence. Wishing he would wake up next to me. He tells me how it happened, his love for his wife next minute he tells me how she destroyed his life. I knew he loved me. At the end of the day, I was the one to whom he came with his problems. The woman who lived in his apartment in the city. I was a nobody but with him I was someone else. He loved me in his own ways. I was not just a physical toy for him.   Passion intolerable irrevocable, passion did not just stem from lust. This I knew. He needed me as much as I needed him.   I asked him last night about his wife, he said that he would leave her for me. I fall asleep...He loves me... I wake up... He loves me not.   The wife   Passion intolerable irrevocable suffering.   I fell asl...

Sunrise I watched the sun turn the sky an orange of brilliance. I should have heard her voice. I never did because she never spoke the words. She didn't tell me the three words that I didn't know I wanted to hear.   I watched the dew on the leaves reflect a torrid red with hues of yellow,  an ode to the rising sun. She knew how far I would go for her, cross the ends of the universe. She knew. I never said those three words, because I never realised it. But I knew how she felt. I knew if she told me then, I would have belittled her due to my confusion, but I would have realised sooner what it meant to me and for me. How sunrise makes it feel like time is standing still, only to lead to an explosion of light- reminding you that your day has begun. I turn and walk slowly to my car. I understood myself, too late. I drove home slowly, dreading the wedding music that i would hear upon entering. Early morning weddings. I looked up at my bride's face, wishing she were someone e...

Father I held the gun in my hand. Stared at it for a few minutes. It was either me, or him. He was not my son. How could he be? To see what he had grown up to be? He was not my son. I had loved him every day, for 17 years. When he was a baby, I had fed him, changed his diapers, woke up in the middle of the night to make him feel comfortable. We had done it together, my wife and I. But he was not my son. I could feel it now when I looked at him. He resembled me in many ways, his eyes were dark and deep, they looked like they had a lot of depth and wisdom but they were empty pits. Had I raised him wrong? Given him too much attention? Given him too little? Had I spoiled him beyond hope? Or had I given him nothing that he wanted? What had made him this way? Nothing of the man I had hoped he would become. We had fought today again, about how he was not in the right place in life. I argued that the way things are going, he would never be. He argued that it wasn't his time yet. 17 ...

The liar   People are idiots. You tell them what they want to hear. You use them, you lie to them, you manipulate them, easy, pliable. And you... You get what you want. Isn't that what life is about? Getting what you want? I always manage. I don't have friends, I mean there are people, I guess, they consider me close to them. But how much do you need from them really. I walk toward one of them. She is sweet, easily manipulated, a little clingy and one world class idiot. She is everything I hate about people, pliable. But I am good at what I do, can't blame her completely for her ignorance. She hugs me. She smells like papaya. It's the darn shampoo she uses. She has already started talking, a mile a minute. Irritated by people in her life, going on about how she hates people. I want to shout at her, if she hates people, why get around them, why be close to them. But no she needs them. Stupid girl. But she is easy, she helps me out with everything.  She does my work for...