what won words

 The key was pain.

The kind that came with the usual sadness, sometimes anger. Even some forms of happiness come packaged with pain. The way new opportunities bring goodbyes to old colleagues. The way births of nephews come with the deaths of uncles. The way heaven shifts to a man you have known only three years from a mother who put up with you for twenty-six.

With the three years of a better partner and two years of a better workplace, the three months away from blood relations was the last piece of the puzzle. While tears were shed and severed ties clumsily mended, I am not shy to say their absence is one of the reasons to my newfound happiness.

I've gotten to the highest I could, now taking the lift double the floors than before. Now my bedroom window goes from curtains that are never drawn to a view down an expressway to my old neighbourhood. Now there is no hoarding or bedroom lights buzzing, things getting fixed quickly. 

But this form of happiness comes with its own underlying pain. There is silence outside the bedroom door when midnight strikes. There is silence outside the windows, no background noise to lull me to sleep or crying of roosters to shock me awake. There is silence under my blanket instead of my throaty tears, and silence in my head instead of words, words, words.

I don't have many words when I'm coming home to someone who treats me well everyday. When my things in the fridge and money on the dresser are left alone. All the pent up anger and nighttime sadness were fuel for my writing, and it's hard to have either when you live with someone who only makes you laugh.

So with this separation from the ones who have hurt me comes formalities, the kissing of hands, niceties, the odd question of how I've been. With this new life comes goodbye to an old comfort. I think it's time to lock up this eccentricity the way the train tracks have been boarded up. Now I am learning to occasionally bleed ordinary red instead of dark ink everyday.

Until next time, when I find a new fear or lose someone else that may as well be myself.