One More Game

PGM used to be a friend.

Then one day, I got bored and saw him in the corner of my eye, in a different light. I was at the time shaking the jake residue off my system; I should have known it was going to be another disaster.

For one (and the most important of all), PGM was (and still is) chained to Lavender. They both love each other. There was no way anyone could break the chain off. Unless I use black magic. Which, apparently I have no actual knowledge of. This said, what's the point of enumerating the other reasons?

Reasons aside, I missed the entire point of thinking about the effects of my actions and (inactions). So, here, I'm struggling with fingers and brain and heart to come up with anything to keep me busy (typing words to express my thoughts and feelings, to be clear). Not necessarily to forget but to remember the good, fun times, no matter how bleak those seem to be ending.

I remember the time when the game started. I went up to him and asked: "Does Lavender bite you ears? Or nibble at them?" He laughed. I continued, "They look yummy. And crispy. Can I take a bite?" he laughed even louder. Then I looked at his neck (oh, the neck!) and I said, matter-of-factly, "If I were a vampire- which i'd love to be- I'd lick the length of your neck before making use of my fangs on them." He laughed some more, his eyes disappearing every time he did. My subconscious must have been aching for such human delights because I went back the day after. And the next. And the day after the next. And so on and so forth.

I was having so much fun that I didn't notice how the deed (or misdeed) became a habit. It was addicting to hear the laughter and see the eyes disappearing. I couldn't get enough of them. I thirsted for his attention all the time. I began weaving dreams during the day- you know, the kind that makes you lose sleep over? Daydreaming wasn't so bad. Until I wanted the daydreams to be real.

The game began to take a more interesting turn then. I was on the verge of losing a friend, and gaining a more-than-just-a-friend, in my own version of things, at least.

I fell straight off that verge: PGM became someone other than just a friend to me.

...

episode

i would like to congratulate myself for being human.

i opened my heart to love; it got broken, just as i expected.

i bled. i shed tears. i almost died (an exaggeration). but this, too, shall pass. i have been through worse.

can one really go after a friend's man?

losing

i received one of the worst news in my life last saturday morning.

m&m- my family at work for three years- is meeting its demise sometime in august. before it was made known to everyone, i had been thinking about how easy it would be to leave if they decided to just hand all of their business to competition. boy, was i wrong!

that saturday, i slept with a heavy heart, not really understanding why. i was expecting the bad news anyway, so what was the drama all about?

i woke up with a heavier heart. it had by the time sunk in. we lost something important to competition not worth competing against. while i was consoled by the assurance that we were the better performers, i was also chagrined at the prospect of everyone getting scattered everywhere. it was just heart-rending to think that the friendships i have found and which have made me do the things i did (and vice-versa) are going to be harder to keep. distance, whatever people say of it, definitely has a say to such issues.

and to make matters worse, there are the gregg and jake connections...

almost

i am enjoying life, i think.

how can i not? things are looking up good with me and jake the barista. i flirt and he flirts back. he even offers himself up for me to try as he is "mas masarap" than this summer's dark mocha frappe! ha-ha! oh, the games we play... and the afterplay that we refuse to commit ourselves to doing...

then, there's chuck, looking as cute and boyish as ever, but less uptight and snobbish. he says, "nice to see you here." i feign surprise and ask, "oh, you have been transferred here?" he smiles and replies, "1st day of april, yes. i'm kinda' missing you regulars where i come from..." baby, he said "...you regulars..." hoo-haa.

and the most that gives me so much happiness- snobbing jake cuenca himself! haha. he sees me, thinks i'm falling for him the way i cast him a glazed, dreamy look, and smiles as he strolls by. i look him in the eye, unsmiling and turned my back on him. victory! haha! winning against my inner flirty, sl*tty self. haha!

and you ask why i'm smiling?

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

what boys don't know

i saw my face in the mirror earlier today.

i saw the lines lining the forehead and slowly creeping around the eyes. i saw the shimmer of oil on the surface of every single pore, disturbed only by a spot dried by the saltiness of tears- the kind that you shed upon waking up from a bad dream.

it was a nightmare- chased by my own people's ghosts. hugged tightly by my deceased loved ones- so tight that that i felt i was joining them shortly.

i woke up crying because i felt bad- running away from them, resisting their embrace.

but i was fighting to live. i wanted so hard to live. or so i felt.

then i woke up.

and i am alive.

but so are guilt and shame.

asterisks

i'm playing hard to get.

not (again).

i saw jake last night after what seemed like forever. our last interaction before last night's had been last saturday, so, forever, if we need to be mathematical about this is, about 5 days? maybe. i'm not so sure- i don't carry a calculator with me at all times, no?!

so anyways, i saw him last night. and i could not bring myself to face him and talk to him about anything, valid or not. valid would be ordering for a venti cup of espresso frappuccino; not would be saying something like, "you fooled me! you said last saturday that you were doing the night shift starting sunday, but you weren't here monday! and tuesday! and wednesday (i don't mean for this to sound like i go there every night for him, but if it does, maybe what you read is what you get?)!" the not would include beating his bumpy *ss cheeks flat. hihihi.

in the end, i didn't get to talk to him. he was not in the counter when i went for my coffee. i was both glad and disappointed. glad, because i didn't have to add one more scene to my 'awkward moments' list. disappointed, because the itchy b*tch (or wh*re) in me wanted to have a word (a sweet one) with him. and more words, if he wasn't too busy to join me (the friends i'm with don't matter when i talk to him; they just seem to disappear from my awareness).

a friend may have been right: i'm acting like a schoolgirl.

school. i love school!

dared

if there's any way for me to go back and reprogram my heart, i think i would.

not.

sure, it's distressing to always find something to love in some people who are not necesssarily free to find and acknowledge something lovable about me. but what's getting something without the excitement of the chase? it's all about the chase, you see. one who has loved me before i have even felt anything for him is definitely out of the running to becoming my heart's next top stalkee because obviously, you don't chase after something that is headed your way.

that is how i understand, and explain my obsession with the unobtainable.

i love it when people tell me i'm aiming for things far from reach. it's a challenge that i cannot let pass. i don't have illusions of having more power and clout needed to change the rules pertaining to the possible and the impossible, but the very idea of proving something is in itself a force to power even the weakest of weaklings.

and i am not a weakling, so what's to keep me from doing what i do?

turnaround

i'm finding myself buried- deeper than i thought i would ever be- in a game that i have invented.


it's that game where i pretend to love coffee so much that i have to get at least a cup every night, where i also pretend that it's alright for me to be up and present at least two hours before i'm actually needed to be up and present, and where i also pretend to be disinterested all the time to keep the game as interesting as it should be. while all these pretensions seem complex, the object of the game is simple: to catch j.


"simple" is subjective, of course, and i used to believe that i'm one of those who get it. today, however, a few hours after i got off the bed, in the company of friends from college, i began to entertain doubts of my own. the doubts must have sprung from the fact that these friends have gone "serious"; the quality must have rubbed off on me, for now, i feel like i want to take things seriously and be taken the same way.


so off i went to see if the object of the game has changed.


it has. and it no longer involves j.


because all i see is the letter d.

a reasonable light

"the stars are out tonight; shall i let them catch me?"

here i am at two in the morning, getting ready to go work my gorgeous butt partly off, transferring a bit of stocks and bonds to some six strangers, beneficiary of the estate and trust accounts of the deceased so and so. not that i'm forced to; it just so happens that i am so drunk what's left of my brain refuses to process any argument that has to keep sensitivity and self-preservation the victors. drunk, even without the influence of alcohol and such things that make people forget who they are and what they are here for- like some people i know.

and, so unlike these people- who presently have gone off to some (very, very less) obscure bars for the much-wanted but less-needed elixir made of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen- i am discovering something that they will never, ever, ever come close to knowing- which leaves me feeling so overwhelmed by the fact that i am feeling so overwhelmed by an overwhelming fact. baby, i am dancing in landmine country!

as if it isn't enough that my heart is in itself a time bomb, waiting for time to run out?

now, out i go in the cold of the night, under a blanket of starry skies...

distractions

funny.

and i mean, funny funny, not funny haha- that i did not think too much of gregg and our complex interactions when i was whiling time and the cough away in camarines sur, with friends from work. most of the time, it was p who kept my mind occupied- the nerve of a stranger to impose on me and my thoughts, no? and more nerves of me to have allowed the bastard to.

as if i can help it?

speak of help, i'm thinking i need less of it now in trying to keep gregg out of my system. he is gradually falling off it (pat on the back, pat on the back). p was making sure of it- he'd better, as i am slowly creeping into poverty and death (shudders) just to hear him say my name. hahaha. think about taking a cup of coffee worth some people's 3-meals-a-day package, twice or thrice a day, especially when you should avoid coffee, per doctors' instructions (understand that we're also talking about medications alongside it)! the heart has a mind of its own, really, and the stomach is the least of its concern.

hey, 'concern' rings a bell. i wonder if chuck is concerned about my feelings when he sometimes just looks at me- no "hello's", no smiles (even when it's expected of him)- when i stand before him, in all my splendor and glory (just a thought- if it was 'naked' splendor and glory, would his countenace and attitude change?). i wonder if he regrets not making me feel so special and loved (hahahahaha!) moments after he acts sooo uppity and standoffish. i wonder what makes him smile and call me by name (the not-so-famous one) sometimes; and i also wonder if he knows that i lose the will to breathe when he does that? he makes me wonder, no? hahahahahahahaha!

i don't think i'm in love; i'm shopping, dear.

succumb

i try not to think about him, so i cannot write about him.

i fail, obviously. it's like not thinking about living. not thinking about what to eat, what to wear, where to go, when to sleep, who to talk to. it's unthinkable! if only he can be unthinkable! but alas, my poor heart cannot survive a day, or an hour even, without the nourishing thought of him. as it is, i am already half-dead as i compose this post, dead some minutes ago, and revived by his pictures in friendster some seconds ago (and counting).

i love looking at his pictures. he looks like some spoiled brat who wouldn't think twice about throwing tantric fits if deprived of all that he wants. and i wish, i'm part of those wants. tee-hee. wishful thinking never hurts.

what hurts is the fact that in his pictures, winnie is there with him too, smiling, mocking me for having fallen in love with the man he owns...

aaargh!

i die again.

crazed

i was pulling my hair over when i would see gregg again.

most probably, i'm going to see him tomorrow, when work resumes, but of course, you cannot talk sense to madness; it just would not wait. i wasted time earlier, checking on his usual haunt, for evidence of his being there. i met disappointment in the face, naturally.

gregg. i see him in the monitor.

gregg. i hear him in my playlist.

gregg. i smell him in my cinnamon swirl.

gregg. i breathe him.

circles

this too shall pass. hopefully.

t.d. surprised me in the afternoon of christmas day when she sent me a text message saying that she broke down and cried like hell when, in the middle of having fun with her family, the thought of m.h. just suddenly flitted by. it was not surprising to know that she cried in his memory- she always does; what surprised me was how she could have cried like crazy in front of everyone!

i've always felt that we both are in the same situation, but i can control such outbursts of emotion. i don't know if i should be envious- she can express herself anytime, anywhere, with anyone; i cannot. so, with all the humor and the bitterness in me, i told her, "but of course, you are crazy. we're the same in that respect. i almost cried myself when i had to spend christmas eve without gregg, but i got brave. you have to do the same. be brave. just try not to fall asleep, because i did."

i always try to make her feel better, even when i know everything is futile. i should know.

last night, i saw gregg just once- and he was asleep.

nothing can comfort me.

wishes

alone.

that's how i spent christmas eve last night. i've spent such eves in the office for the past three years, so it was something different. the difference, however, was far from being appreciated as i slept the whole of it! ha-ha. everyone was away, and i was kind of tired and well-spent, anyway...

my first thought this morning was how gregg spent his. with winnie, i'm sure. having a spanking good time. or sleeping. the guy sleeps all the time- what with his boring girlfriend and all! ha-ha. mean, at such a time like this. sorry. i take that back. i wish he had a great time, with whomever he spent it.

and i wish we could spend new year's eve together. well, i will be in the office for year-end churvanesses, and i'm hoping he would be too, for whatever churvanesses.

merry christmas, all!

colors

he wore red yesterday.

he looked bright and becoming. i fell in love with him all over again- an incredible phenomenon, which is made even more incredible by the fact that i have never fallen out of love since the day i first admitted to loving him: a double duh, a double ding, and a double disaster.

and i need a double punch in the head to wake up from this miserable enchantment. though i doubt it would have its desired effect- because everything becomes nothing when i look into his eyes (uh-oh, uh-oh!)- i'm not afraid to give it a try. those who will carry on the task of punching me will have to think twice, unfortunately. gregg has the biggest and the strongest-looking biceps in my part of the universe, so... haha!

so, anyhow, i realized that whatever color he wears, my heart will always just go jumping, jumping. the color of his (or their- his and winnie's) new blanket fooled me though- i did not recognize him until two hours later when i first spied him on his side of the lounge. curses, curses.

i'm still in love.

irony

oh my God!

i so pity him. he's just right here, snoring his brains out while winnie is starbucks-ing wih her fatty gang! if, by some stroke of wicked, twisted fate, i were to own his heart, he would never, ever, ever fall asleep; my most difficult challenge in this lifetime is to keep quiet for at least 3 minutes- putting it to good use will benefit me and him, naturally! we will both have a spanking good time talking about us, and everything else prior.

obviously, he's the one asleep, but why am i the one dreaming?

scream

gawd!

i couldn't believe my eyes when i saw him in the lobby, sitting, looking bored and spoiled, as always. how could it have been easy to believe when momenst ago, i was just thinking and blogging about him?! i was taken by surprise, but acted cool, as is my wont in his presence.

i threw him a look, like the one i usually save for non-issues. he looked back, and resumed in his boredom and his thoughts.

i want to scream!

aaaaahhhhh!!!!!

caffeine + gregg = doom

i just had an espresso frappe- grande, the right size for me, no matter what type of drink i order- and cinnamon swirl, one of my two bread addictions (the other being breadtalk's floss varieties), so i cannot sleep.

i was with roxy, the only one who understands my promiscuity. and who accepts it as if it were the norm. i speak of the p word, because that's what we (in part) came to starbucks for (is it coincidence that the p object's name starts with exactly the letter p, too?), in this night of maddening holiday traffic. whatever the case, we did not find p there tonight, but i got to see this pretty barista up close. we used to think she hated roxy (for reasons that were not obvious, especially since she and roxy both live in the same building- the excelsior) but i heard and saw her greet roxy with enthusiasm and energy that must have come from a bottomless pit- for it was infectious and did not seem to end- and which smothered our doubts to oblivion. how foolish of us to to have even thought she held something against roxy!

well, anyhow, we retreated to our corner of the coffee shop- there, where we could see the comings and goings and spot the spottable and unspottable- and talked about, guess who- gregg. he would always be part of my thoughts, if not the whole of them. and as in every sigle preceding gregg conversation, i expressed my hope for him to talk to me as a friend would to another; we could pick it up from there, you know (hoping, hoping). all i got from him so far, were smiles of the uncertain kind- "should i smile or should i not?", was what i thought he must have been thinking in those rare occasions. sometimes i wonder, "is he even really smiling at me?" i mean, it's possible that i was just imagining him smiling- for all i know, he could be smirking all this time! curse him for all his ambiguities- he is successfully driving me to the edge!

here's how.

there were days when i would find him waiting for the elevator down, and i would go back hide where i came from (to avoid him, dummy), but i would come out (later, after forever) finding him where i had seen him, and i would have no choice but to take the same elevator that he would. at other times, i would go sleep in the lounge, fearing that my eyes wouldn't make it home straight from the office to my bed, and wake up, catching him watching (or seeming to watch) my waking actions (i.e., smoothing my ever-growing frizzy hair, yawning, et cetera). and we also have our pantry moments; having lunch together, one or two tables apart, and always, always, throwing glances each other's way. but we NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER talk!

i have tried to fathom my inadequacy to keep him out of my system, but it is not something within analytical range, so i let it on, to ravage what's left of my common sense and uncommon sensibility. i gave his presence power over my actions, his voice dominion over my realm. everything i do when he's around is for show- for him to catch, to hear, to see and hopefully, to like and long for...

what can i do? fall out of love?

i wish.

sighs

and so it happens that he shows up whenever i least expect him to.

but don't get me wrong; i'm not complaining. fact is, i look forward to breathing the same air he does, all the time. something soothes my heart everytime i lay my eyes on him. it makes me sigh as i try to catch my breath. i feel everything solid about me turn to mush when he looks at me.

he looks at me. i do not know what to do, or how to act. it always happens, but today, it's gotten worse, which may be partly because i have decided to accept the fact that i'm in love, and partly because i know there is no way that what i feel will ever be requited aptly. it seems like a tragedy, but i'm grateful for every moment. the realization makes me feel more strongly about everything that surrounds the circumstance of our being in the same place, at the same time, in what i hope to be in the same unexplainable feeling of being lifted higher by forces far greater than any other that physics could explain.

i am so in love that coherence is my weakest point right now. my way of thinking just doesn't seem to go one way or another- it leads everywhere. anything from the mind going blank to processing every single stimulus can happen, and nothing makes sense, in any event, or non-event. and frankly, i do not care. what's important is, my senses feel him.

introduction

the mistress of gregg.

who is gregg? he is the lounge parasite. winnie's 100+ month-long love.

who is gregg to me? my stalkee. my reason for smiling the silly high school smile. my means to a semi-normal lovelife (or the lack of one). my purpose for the i-have-all-the-time-in-the-world belief.

i am the mistress.