Love in a Universe out to get you.
Love is how we evolved to get back up every time.
He claims himself an author. In fact, he has multiple books published, multiple awards received, from smaller to small. Enough to claim himself the title.'
But in the little town he called home, if you asked for “Lee, the famous author who wrote X and X, you know, THAT Lee,” people would think you’re mad. Truth of the matter is, they are not reading people. I mean, what’s the use of reading? If they need something, they can just go on the Web. In turn, what’s the point of an author. The sailor sails, the builder builds, what’s the author auth-ing? And again, what’s the use? That no one knows of Lee isn’t something out of the ordinary there in the little town. Can’t kill him, ‘cause an author ain’t a singer or an actor. A name that people can’t put a face to, or a stage to, is a name better not known. Lee is happy not being known. Happy or sad, he puts it in his sleep. After writing his quota for the day, at around 9p.m., he curls into a ball and slumbers the night and the feelings away. When he wakes, he brushes his teeth, washes his face, watches his TV, and he starts writing again, all the way until he feels the pang of hunger. There’s another thing the author enjoys: eating, but only because it gives him the energy to do what he really wants: biking.
Lee has a sports bike, a rather expensive one. He and his wife saved up for years, before any of his writing has taken off, to buy that bike, so his wife could say “at least you can do some exercising.” That afternoon, people saw Lee walking home. The author asked his son, Yu, who was 30:
Do you happen to know a fellow called Chin?
Before he was an author, Lee was what you’d called a labourer: anything that paid, there he was. He spent a few years at a harbour, moving boxes from one container to another. Another few years were as a teacher, which he hated, then as a ranger, which he’d rather enjoyed. Not because the job was any enjoyable, on the contrary it was dangerous work for very little money, but he got to bring home the occasional fruits and dead animals for his wife. He was a labourer through and through, sacrificing strength and health for the promise of a well-fed family. He had two daughters and two sons, but one of the girl died due to the dangerous nature of him being a ranger: some poachers’d shot her out of revenge for their captured friend. In court, they said, crying, that they were only tried to scare the girl. Lee, who learned well that an eye for an eye… did not press charges. The poachers were young, and guilt would teach them better than prison.
Yu, the oldest, was unfortunately and helplessly addicted to drugs. It could be said that Lee wasn’t what anyone would call lucky. Yu would drop in and out of rehab, and the fourth time that happened, Lee started writing. While the alcohol just couldn’t wash away his sadness, the quill could. But the quill, at the time, didn’t make enough to stop his son from stealing. Out of rehab, Yu was, into prison, Yu went, for two years.
A week before his release date, Yu called his father to pick him up. The prison situated deep in a rice field. From the main road to the ugly, concrete cells were 10km of green pasture that came straight out of a painting. Here and there was a dab of yellow corn, purple grapes, red dragonfruits. The two years have trained Yu into a bit of an arborist. It was the prison’s compensation for locking people up: they must give them something to return to society. Lee was glad that his son finally found an interest, but mostly he was skeptical, for can 2 years of prison cure 20 years of addiction?
Done with his first true meal – a bowl of char siu and noodle, Yu lit a cigarette and looks at the rain. Raindrops whitened the space outside the restaurant, highlighting his ever-presence desperation as an addict and his father’s disappointment. Lee could see the black dots on his son’s arm. 2 years, in fact, did nothing. Go to show how effective prison is.
So, you’re still at it, huh? – A rhetorical question.
As with all rhetorical question, Yu didn’t answer. And silence often means yes. Lee didn’t press the matter.
Your daughter is going to primary school this September. Your brothers and sisters I haven’t heard of in years. I’m not too young myself.
Yu was still silent.
Penny for your thoughts?
Silence.
We can try rehab at home, with methadone.
Methadone in itself is a narcotic. Fight fire with fire. When methadone enters the bloodstream, it makes you sleepy, just enough for you to sleep away the addiction and withdrawals. And Yu did. For months, all he did was eat, sleep, shit, drink, sleep… not particularly in that order. And one day, Yu woke, no longer an addict. But Yu knew methadone wasn’t what kept him clean. It was the old author, who stuck to him like a shadow, feeding him and talking to him, patting him on the back and rubbing ointment on the shoulders he himself scratched.
When his daughter graduated from primary school, Yu has been using methadone for 5 years. That’s 11 years since his wife left, when he first got roped into using drugs. The drugs have long killed everything else that made him him, and Yu thought losing his manhood was nothing compared to what he’s been through. But now that he’s better, he misses his wife.
One day, after work, Yu asked something of his father:
Can you help her, Dad. My wife, she’s pregnant.
Where’s the husband then?
Dead, car crash.
Lee being himself, didn’t press the matter. He simply put on his clothes, and rushed his son to do the same. Yu’s wife was quickly found and taken to the hospital, and Yu thought long and hard about how ironic it was that he was so fortunate while his father wasn’t. And he said “I love you Dad” to himself.
Yu was back with his wife, like the 11 years gap and another husband between their marriage didn’t happen.
That afternoon, people saw Lee walking home. The author asked his son, Yu, who was 30:
Do you happen to know a fellow called Chin?
Yeah. What’s up with him?
He took my bike.
Yu grabbed the phone.
Yo, Chin. It’s me. That bike you snatch this morn’, that was my Pop’s. Be a good boy and bring it back, before I call the fuzz on you.
Yu said Chin was in prison with him, also an addict. Yu apologized on his behalf, but since Chin’s going to return it soon, let’s not make a big deal out of it.
The old author said:
Can you convince him to try methadone?
His parents are dead. He can’t get it prescribed without a guardian.
Let me be his guardian.