It had already been 10 months since I first saw Aika. I didn’t realize then but at first sight, I had fallen for her. The image of her resonated with me for days. The journey immediately following my settlement became another one to find her. When I noticed her in a street market near the seashore, browsing the shells that she would prepare for dinner, I grabbed her and asked her if she wanted to be friends. Just friends, at first, I didn’t know the difference between levels of attraction. After a month, she had to tell me what I was feeling. And she told me she felt the same.
We never spoke of the future, we both understood how it would proceed. She was a solo-traveler like me which meant that for us, there were two choices. Neither was a
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Any decision that we make would inflict pain. But she had slowly grown onto me that the separation now felt unnatural. It was not right to be without her, alone. I wanted to go against the possibilities that denied our fate, to prove them wrong. And sometimes I even wished I had not noticed her at the dock. It would spear me the heartache I felt at the thought of our separation. It would not have proven me wrong, a consideration of myself as a solitary individual, impossible to derive more satisfaction of being with others than being by myself. Aika was another me, almost like a real projection of myself that I could speak to with spoken words. Sometimes we argued because we were too similar. We both feared each other’s independence that sometimes grew to become egocentrism. But that only made me love her more. Knowing that there was someone like me, I was not all …show more content…
Fifth month into the year, this season is the most welcoming, filling excitement to our new surroundings. It only lasts a year but that doesn’t matter. I sat peacefully in wait for a voice that I had long waited for. A voice that I lusted for the past five years.
“Iris, go on and say hi to daddy.”
Five years had gone by of hearing this voice only through phone calls but I recognized it instantly to turn around. Behind the woman that I love, I saw a little girl hiding shyly, browsing me with curios eyes. She had Aika’s soft and gentle eyes and my thinly shaped lips.
“She’s so familiar with you on the phone I didn’t expect her to be this way,” said Aika with an embarrassed face.
“That’s fine,” I said as I hugged her.
I held her in my arms for as long as I felt I could. Still not enough. I stroke her hair, grabbed her more closely, and listened to her heartbeat against my chest. I looked into her eyes, saw again the soul I had fallen in love with. I let her go and crouched down to look at my daughter. Five years was a luck. The wait could have been longer and I may have had to see her after she had grown into a woman. I thanked that I could be in her