Letters

We hide ourselves behind stories.

The Sunlight caressed my skin, sending goosebumps all over. I love the Sun, but the colour I couldn’t stand. The yellow of hay, the red of wine, the dreamy white that reminded me of paper. I tend to look at the Sun through some sort of filters: camera lenses, windowpanes, leaves, as it stretched the street, flirted with the flowers, bathed the people. I tried to look at Sunlight wherever, whenever I could, but I hesitate whenever I had to come to direct contact with it.

Just the thought of Sunlight piercing, burning my skin, wetting my pits and palms, how it always reminds me of paper… Old paper… Terrifies me. Once, I tore off a page and put it under Sunlight, to see how the colour changes from white to that slight yellow, pen readied to write. The August heat and moist made everything clammy, and my damped hands dropped the pen. The paper remained still under Sunlight, and a peculiar thought came across my mind: if I did write, I would have destroyed that Order, that Peace.

People say I looked like my Mother, a man with feminine features.

“You dropped your pen.” – Rosalind, an employee at the café, said.

The paper remained still on the table. The café was empty.

“Thanks, Rose. I was just thinking, maybe we should get the more expensive beans, draw in more guests.” – I answered.

“Reaaaally?” – The barista said from the kitchen, his sarcasm echoed the walls.

“Of course! What do you take me for!” – I laughed.

It was the afternoon, the Sunlight was at its end. I looked at the piece of paper, turned it on it sides, trying to read what the Sun might have said. It was as white as the moment I tore it from the notebook. The Sunlight was gone. The day went by as normal, they got a steady enough stream of patrons, the machines worked as intended, the news still ran all sort of nonsense, hundred of kids were born, hundred others died in their stead, a book was published, ten was declined, the amount of authors forgotten increased to match infinity… They can’t eat their words, so they died from starvation. I took the piece of paper to wipe some spill coffee. The paper blackened, pierced, torn. An empty piece of paper will remain empty. I haven’t written anything.

I looked exactly like my mother, people said, but I was male. Mine and her face was round, our eyebrows were thin, our eyes double lidded. The only differences, I supposed, were my bigger nose, and my eyes don’t shine like hers. We even shared the same space for a mole, right under the eye. If I’d let my hair grew, I’d look exactly like her when she was younger, and that upset her sometimes. So I cut it short, buzzed it even, and went to the gym for years.

I don’t remember much about my father, but I knew he was living somewhere in the same city. I think, or as my mother told me, I inherited his nose, and personality, and how I walk, how I talk.  The day of the divorce, I had full intentions to live with him because he was proper rich, but I ended up with my mother in the end, just because our faces were similar. If I had stuck to the original plan, I would have been provided, and might have never knew the pang of hunger. Living with my mother, I learned to love words. Instead of buying clothes, she’d asked me to pick the cloth I liked, and sewn something by hand: a sweater, a scarf, a tshirt. She taught me how to properly smoke a cigarettes, because if I was to smoke anyway, I might as well do it right. She never really cared how well or badly I was doing in school, as long as I’m passing. If I were to leave school, I were to do my own paperwork and made my own money. I could still expect two meals a day out of her.

I opened the café with her money and the miniscule change I earned from odd jobs. We never touched the money my father sent.

I first told her about the girl I liked when I was 21. She taught me that if verbal words were difficult, then let my pen did the talking. I saw my face in her eyes then, and she saw hers in mine. I didn’t write that letter in the end, the paper was empty, although the pen was there, the envelope was there.

I brought my mother an envelope once, filled with money. It was a “business venture” that turned out very well. Mother wasn’t happy.

“Why?”

“You left for a whole year, and all you got was money? That’s your money, son. For a gift, I’d expected something different.”

“I’m 23, Mother. A bit too young for marriage. Besides…”

“Besides what?”

“There’s the café. I really don’t have time.”

I also sounded like her. Mother was teaching part-time, and her voice was hoarse due to the fact. I’ve convinced her to move on once or twice without any tangible results. She didn’t want to get back to my father, and she would reject anyone’s approach. She didn’t love him, my father. Her love was for someone else, who’s left her to chase his own business ventures in another country. The day he left, Mother’s love was gone. She’d accepted to be my father’s wife, but never lover. She told me about the man who left. There was never a betrayal, but love was cheap and fame was alluring. I asked if he was back, would she reconsider. My mother shook her head. To her, love comes once or never.

I put up candles throughout the café, and lit them when night fell. It was both a hobby, and a way to bring about a kind of atmosphere for the guests. I’d sometimes light candles in the bathroom or in my study, just so I can stare at the light. I hated scented candles. When I was young, when blackouts were common in the city, I often studied under candlelight. When I left school, I would turn off the fuse and light my own candles. The longer it burns, the more the sap melts, the shorter the candle, until there was only the fluttering wick, and darkness.

I don’t think I’ve ever written anything under candlelight. I wanted to ask my mother that, but stopped myself. It sounded strange. How about now? I have my pen readied, my paper white, my candle lit, but nothing came. Until the was hardened, the only words upon the page was the secret messages that fire and Sunlight shared. Mayhap I got no talents for writing, or could it have been that I left school early? Perhaps I don’t write enough. Opening up a café, or business ventures, or the odd jobs… No, they were, in fact, all odd jobs. I’ve never had a career. Even my reading wasn’t a passion, but mere pastime. I read what I wanted, and never bothered with anything “Victorian” or “Gothic” because they seem too thick. I don’t even know what those terms meant.

Verbal communication contains about 70% of the truth, or no truth at all but mere predictions. That’s what my mother taught me. That’s why we never wrote a single letter to one another. We hide ourselves behind stories. Before I knew it, she was gone.

Sitting there, under the candlelight, I saw my mother in the mirror. I dared not move, afraid she’ll be gone again.

“I should have written you a letter.” – I said.