EW23

Disclaimer: please read this series of posts starting from EW29, then backwards.

I know you got sick of me mentioning your nine times leaving, again and again. "You've left me nine times you can do it again" sounds so distant now, truth finally attaching itself to a little dare.

But I also know for a fact that you've lost these 'nine times' somewhere along the way, not remembering where some of them even are. The one where you left me crying at Jurong East is familiar, we both know that story. The one where Tinder was your first comfort stands out too, your girls becoming ghosts that haunted me.

This is the story of your first departure, put aside immediately after it happened. So easily forgotten, but now reopened along with its dust and spiders.

You were two months away from 17, in your white ITE shirt with the sleeves rolled up. There was a time when we met as much as we could, your willingness to come to the west just to see me. For the life of me, I don't remember what we were arguing about there and then; it happened so quickly.

I was holding my laptop bag, the one that doubled as a backpack and had flowers all over. Somehow it slipped from my grasp, and it landed on the floor with a very dull thud.

Unsurprisingly I blamed you, raising my voice a little, You see what you made me do! You picked it up for me, but you snapped back How is that my fault?! You already knew me for my anger, having witnessed it firsthand a few times now.

Then came the most ridiculous argument ever, to be topped with a fight about movie tickets three years later. It had to do with you trying to use the machine to top up your Ez-link, and then suddenly stomping away and leaving me clueless. I asked what's wrong, but you didn't answer, I yelled again What's wrong with you?!

And you finally snapped back, The machine can't accept my coins! What a stupid thing to yell, to have people turn and look at you for, but it was enough to rile me up. I walked away and soon disappeared in the crowds; it didn't matter because you didn't chase me.

For the entire weekend I was your stranger, someone on your timeline going off about the guy who broke her. And I know we were officially broken up, not just a fight somehow, with the way you weren't bothered to work things out anymore.

My layers of ego didn't take long to strip away, wishing you were mine once again. Admitting the fault was mine or even apologising was heavy on my tongue, but I made it clear that I wanted to be part of your life again. You accepted a few days later, after a blog post spilling whatever I wanted to.

It wouldn't be the first time you came bouncing back when you left. It wouldn't be the first time I used my magic with words to convince you to return. But our ghosts still ring clear at Clementi, my walking away and your deciding not to stay; the first of our many departures.