Aftermath

Three months feel like a long time, especially the three months that follow suit being dumped after a four-years relationship. I died several times and have developed a thousand scars in the process, all of which I feel proud of right now. How did I survive so many times?

I recall the day I first died; I'd just ended work and was going home to my Paya Lebar house, the one with the grandmother and aunt and uncle who sheltered me for the whole of 2013. My uncle wanted KFC, so I was going to get some for him.

The entire day my other half of that time, the wind, wasn't there for me. He replied my texts late and the last thing he said was wanting to date someone other than me. He appeared before me suddenly that night, when I was walking to KFC; took out a knife and plunged it into my chest, leaving me to bleed out on the floor.

I told myself to get up, people are watching. So I collected my legs and went to buy KFC, nobody noticing the blood dripping beneath my clothes or the trail I was leaving behind. Or the knife still poking out of my chest.

That was a Thursday, the 6th of April. The following day I started to die again; I didn't eat a single thing. Had the intention to damn near starve myself. I started seeing no purpose of staying in this world a year before but never quite acted on it. Never found the perfect way of leaving, constantly wishing I could kill myself a thousand times in all the ways I'd desired.

Public transport was always the only place I could cry in. I took the long way home on my bus 21 that Friday, curled up with my knees to my bleeding chest, tears and snot running down my face. Loud sobbing and shoulders shaking, sleeves across my eyes and nose.

It took me less than a day to pick myself up again. The very next morning I got out, hopped on bus 88 and rode it to Bishan, feeling like I could do anything. I started conversations with old friends, with girls that I always wanted to talk to but was too shy to. I smiled at a baby girl looking at me, something that I never usually did.

The Monday afterwards I told my colleagues everything. My best friends, the only people who accepted me so easily and who make me laugh every single day. They finally knew what the tattoo on my stomach means and the truth of my 'spine surgery' back two years ago. They wouldn't get the whole story, even if they read my blog because of our language differences, but they understood.

On Good Friday I was supposed to go drinking with the one whom I call the flower, but the unexpected happened and I guess it didn't feel like we had the rights to meet anymore. I was still in the process of understanding why he didn't want the wind and I to be together, and I couldn't really hate him. We couldn't even talk, it really felt like we didn't deserve to.

So I packed my passport and a red dress and ran, but my plans fell short when my cousin found me staring at trains by her house and decided to drag me to a staycation in Johore. I guess it was fate, because while she did the checking in, I met a butterfly who was struggling to get out, constantly crashing into the glass window ahead of it. If it wasn't for this insect I would not have stayed longer; it was really the tiniest things that gave me push or pull.

But I ran away again the moment I set foot back in Singapore, passed by completed stations that were construction sites the last time I saw them. Visited my old school, climbed and leaned over railings and poked my head out in the pouring rain, hoping I would somehow slip and fall.

Even today I still recall the words of somebody from my secondary school. We were never really friends, just strangers who follow each other on Twitter and Instagram; but she once wrote about how she admired me for my tendency to run whenever I wanted to. She thought my running away from things that scared me was an act of courage instead of cowardice.

I tweeted one last thing on the 20th of April before I disappeared: Always do what you are afraid to do. And that was exactly what I did.

I took a knife and finally ran it down my arm, after weeks of just imagining it. I bled for hours but I didn't want to bandage myself; I wanted to let it all out. I let it stain my shirt, I let it go all over and beneath the keys of my keyboard, I let it mix with the coffee I forced myself to drink. I went to bed and work still bleeding.

When I left my workplace that day, I didn't run for my bus like I always would. Instead I took a cab down to the bus terminal at Bugis and hopped on a bus that would take me to Johore. In the past, I was always afraid and uncomfortable with going anywhere outside the country by myself. But that night I felt invincible, I felt so powerful with that fresh wound on my wrist still wide open.

I discovered a few unimportant things on my solitary trip past the border. I realised how everyone else was going through a routine and I was the only one among the crowd who was feeling a new adrenaline. I realised how much easier I slept anywhere other than my own bedroom at Pasir Ris. I realised how easy it was to go on with life and not post everything that you do on social media. I realised how I was a universe and the wind will never take much of me anymore.

And then the month of May went by in a blur. It started out slow, the morning I listened to the playlist I'd made for her, for my daughter. Sobbing like a baby over the loss of one, how fucked up was life? I was just getting my milk coffee like I did every morning when I exploded into tears, ruining my face further and trying to cover it with my shaking hands.

Of course I tried to find her grave. I gathered up my balls to e-mail KKH about it, on their address for Postnatal Depression. They took days to reply me while I was obsessively checking my inbox all the damn time. I died again when they finally told me that according to some law, I'd lost all the rights to know the location of my baby, just because I hadn't claimed her during the time of birth/termination.

It felt like the only way I could move on from her was by forcing myself to think I never loved her. I never gave her her life, the only thing she had the rights to. I never claimed her as mine when I lost her, never prayed for her despite wanting to see and hear her all the time. I have not moved on, but I had to force myself to keep walking.

I frequently took the East West Line from Pasir Ris all the way to Joo Koon but never cried despite the abundance of memories with the wind. I admired how the train bent when it was heading towards Joo Koon, a Singapore flag fluttering in the distance. My heart only shattered and I felt a few tears when I once looked at a little girl sitting so quietly opposite me.

I met a pilot who brought me to sunset by the pier, boats coming and going beneath us and the sun setting on our backs. He told me I was made to discover these things on my own; why he never wanted to catch me despite having strong feelings three years ago, after the first break-up. He isn't here anymore but I owe him for that, for helping me believe I was made to float around always.

Despite being broke after spending 200 bucks on Microsoft Word, one day I just decided to pop into a saloon and do whatever I could to my hair. I went in with long brown hair, the dyed locks that have seen everything with me from August 2014; I went out with hair to my collarbone, the edges dipped in a colour that was neither red nor purple, somewhere in between.

I found my one and only poly friend that is even remotely bearable still, played cards with him and his friends until midnight. His mom interrupted us a few times, asking if any of us has seen her cigarettes. I loved her then, the way she stumbled around mumbling to herself, and I realised how important friends are, the company of people around you.

After four years, I just started talking with my one other 1995 girl cousin from my father's side. I went to Aljunied to fetch her, an overhead bridge that goes right next to MRT tracks. Sometimes you find yourself slowing down just to catch sight of a train, right? Or perhaps it's just me.

There I stood, bouncing around on my torn canvas shoes by a petrol station; waiting for her to come right up in her white car whose make and model I don't even bother to know. We were the two girls who stuffed our faces with nuggets and burgers at the Burger King in a Kallang mall. Who filled up a long dumb survey just to get free fries.

Work continued being my favourite place, my colleagues and their bounce, their ridiculous faces and dances. The girls were my best friends despite all of us coming from different cultures and places. Four years ago it was the girls from secondary school that I laughed at Marina Barrage with; in the middle of May it was my three girls from work, two from Ipoh and one from Macpherson.

We played Uno over pizza, destroying our friendships with each other in the process. Took pictures with Marina Bay Sands behind us, leaning against the sunset and one another. I loved these girls so much and I knew they loved me back, me with my broken heart and overworking brain.

But of course the one who had just graduated from poly had to leave, had to find her own full-time job. Her last day working with us was on the 31st of May, when we all got McDonald's after work and played Uno again. I couldn't imagine ever having to leave this job, and she was the only part-timer who lasted so long with us, two whole years and then some.

This year was my first Ramadan without the wind at all, but it turned out to be my favourite. He was my entire world, but sometimes having nothing is the only way you could have everything.

The first day of the fasting month also happened to be my maternal grandmother's birthday--I don't really take note of how old she is because I don't want to remember how much closer she is to going.

I used to be attached to my paternal family in my childhood; after my solitary days in 2012 all that love crossed over to my much smaller maternal family, and I couldn't have it any other way. We were the obnoxious bunch gathered around a table in Penang Culture at the airport, from a grandmother to her two great-grandchildren.

My workplace is in the heart of the Malay society especially for our special month. Every evening there would be a sudden burst of Malay customers at work, as usual mistaking me for a Chinese. I would see kids sitting on the floor outside Popular, breaking their fast when the time comes.

The only times I actually literally run is for my double deck 21 every night. It was a lot harder when my usual route was clogged with my people, Malays, off to get their raya clothes or decorations or maybe just some keropok lekor, who the fuck knew?

I secretly loved squeezing through everyone, dodging people and hopping up sidewalks. The adrenaline rushed twicefold when I once pushed through the people waiting for the light to turn green; everyone's eyes on the girl in a black cardigan, running across the line of cars and ignoring the sharp whistle of the traffic policeman.

I thought the Ramadan in 2014 was eventful, but this year's has come to be the best. I spent so much time with the wind when I was with him, I didn't give much to anyone else. The month of June was my favourite, my solitude being reason for days spent with those that mattered.

I have my loneliness to thank for the night I'd sat in my cousin's car at 1 in the morning, singing 2007 hits with the smoke from her cigarette running through my nose. For the night my financial consultant drove me home on the highway, the both of us singing a song that I can't stand called Closer.

I have the absence of the wind to thank for the night with his best friend, laying beneath the moon until 3 in the morning. Were we really just on a hill in Marsiling, or was that the top of the world? The moon was full, just like how he was next to me, his hand on mine. It's funny how I have gone through so much but it is the holding of hands, such an innocent act, that hurts and helps me the most. His voice telling me I'm glad you didn't die, becoming my wake-up call every morning.

Back in the early hours of 10th June 2015, I was dealing with the loss of a second heart. Two years later in the first 3 hours of 10th June 2017, it was the opposite, my head leaning against the person I had to think of in order to stay in this world.

That night I reached home at 4 in the morning, and it was my first time in forever sleeping without the lights on. I've had trouble going to bed in the dark since 2013, but the 9 hours spent with the one I called flower and moon and everything in between helped me overcome such a tiny thing.

The next week I had an off day on a Friday again, and I felt a bitterness bite into me. And what do I do when in doubt? I get out, hop onto bus 88 and alight at Bishan, admiring the views along the way. But it wasn't enough, and I found myself taking the Circle Line to Paya Lebar, walking through the bazaar crowds to get to my workplace at One Km. My safe place, my haven more so than my houses are.

I called up one of my best friends, the one who'd just recently left to find her own full time job, and we got our colleagues the keropok lekor they are all in love with. We laughed over our seafood pasta and the LiHo drinks we smuggled in, down at Saizeriya; her phone camera on me with her voiceover, Look at this naughty Malay girl eating non-halal food.

We walked from One Km to MacPherson MRT, talking about the one I called flower and wondering if there could ever be anything between us. You know how the rest of my best friends are mostly Malaysians, and one being from China; how I could never express myself fully for them because of the language barriers? I have her to thank for being there, be it the first few weeks when I was still a part timer at Popular, and that night talking at the bus stop til 11 at night.

What a coincidence, to be the only passenger walking towards the other escalator at Paya Lebar station; what a coincidence, for the wind and his secondary school friends to be the only ones walking towards me. Truth is, I saw the one I called the river, and the one whose face I always thought looked like a monkey; and then I saw him, the very hurricane that ripped my heart to shreds and almost broke my life the same way.

I saw them all from afar, and I had the chance to turn on my heels and walk the other way, but I didn't. I walked on straight, because I didn't feel afraid. I wasn't afraid I was going to slap his face, or run to him and beg for him back, because I was already too high up to do either. I already knew by then how powerful I was compared to them all; the way they panicked upon seeing me just intensified my pride.

And those are the days that made this year's Ramadan my favourite.

On the first day of raya every year my father says the same thing: I scold you, I hit you, only because I love you. He says I'm the one who stresses him out and breaks his heart the most, despite being the quietest and least social among my siblings. I know he will never learn that actions are not always influenced by company, but by solitude as well, and I've learnt to accept it. I'll accept my fate as the black sheep of the family, linger around on my own while my parents and brothers will always be making the people around them laugh.

That afternoon was my first time visiting my maternal grandfather at the nursing home. In the past I always took the chance to sleep over at the hospital whenever he was admitted, but I couldn't take it when he had to stay at nursing homes instead. My parents, my younger brother and my aunty, all of us gathered around my grandfather in our baju kurungs the first day of raya.

My mother pointed to me and asked him if he remembered me. He looked at me, no words spoken, and she prompted: Tak ingat ke? Abah yang kasi nama ni, nak sangat kasi nama tu. I looked at him, withholding all my tears, and smiled at this old man who has forgotten the granddaughter whose name he had given nearly 22 years ago.

At the last house of the day one of my many aunts told me she would pray for me to meet my jodoh. I always thought what a powerful word jodoh is, even more so than a mere 'soulmate'. I once believed the wind and I were each other's, that I was made to always be swept away by the hurricane that he is.

I wish I'd told her that I have found much greater things than a mere person to marry. I have found love in solitude and hope in strangers, only possible after the leaving of the supposed love of my life. I have my cousins, how I thought I never belonged with them because they always have a cigarette between their fingers while I have a pen between mine. But of course I do, because we share the same blood. They are never quite your friends, never quite your siblings, but they will be there for you the same way both are.

They were the ones lingering beside me midnight, blasting their stupid mainstream songs and smoking in their damn baju kurungs, but how I loved them so at that moment. How I loved my paternal relatives again after five years, my father and his eleven siblings and all their children and their children's children. There was hardly any room in the house to stand in, these relatives occupying the living room the way they occupied the space in my heart again.

On the cab back home with my parents and 17-year-old brother, I realised how everyone grew up into cigarettes and I was the only one who grew up into trains, but I couldn't have it any other way. I started thanking fate for throwing me into her tornadoes and black holes all the time, her faith in me to pull through it all. And I don't quite believe in Him all the time, but sometimes I love God a little for the way He's made me.

4 months ago I was part of two, somebody's girlfriend. They say having a significant other is the best, but it was his leaving that helped me find love in a life I was about to give up on. I always thought I was fire for my passion in everything that I do, every little thing I come across, and he a bird for his tendency to leave as and when despite the mess he'll leave behind.

But you know, in the three months from early April to late June I became my own eagle. My heart broke but the pieces came to be my wings, and the people around me became the wind that blew beneath me. The wind comes and goes, just like all of them, just like me; but I'll never forget those three months. I disappeared to find myself, but I found greater things, I found infinity in loss.

Of all the poetry I've written this is still my favourite verse, written in mid May:

Despite its infinity the universe doesn't scare her
Maybe the hurricane wasn't the worst of a stir
She needed more than a crash, a dive and a delve
To realise the biggest storm of all was herself.

There's this bittersweetness that has no word powerful enough to describe. But it's just like how you'd survive a tornado ripping through your hometown, how you'd go back to see your house and neighbourhood torn down. You've lost everything you've ever known, but you know, at least you're still alive. That's how I've learned to feel, I've learned to tend to my own wounds first and understand that pain isn't the only thing life has to offer.

I guess now it's safe for me to say, I am overcoming my depression. Even a second is worth gold, and three months was enough to change me. I was never officially diagnosed, and neither did I have the intention to be labelled as such, but I managed to at least claw myself out of the dark gaping hole that is this mental illness.

It's hard for me to say sorry but although I've said it a few times when necessary, I am not the least bit apologetic for the ways I have harmed myself, for my stupid decisions that caused me both physical pain and emotional suffering. I built my throne on the heartache and all the blood that came dripping out of my arm, the bodies of my pasts that I have killed. A throne sitting amidst the hurricane's aftermath; a knife poking out of my chest as my crown.