I took a train to visit you in the city where you lived. It was a Sunday morning in May, the sky clear and fresh, the single white cloud floating in the sky shaped like a smooth fish.
When I left, I told my parents I was going to the library. But I was going to see you. In my nylon backpack were sandwiches for lunch (my mother had made them and wrapped them tightly in plastic wrap) and my school books, though I wasn’t planning to do any studying. There was less than a year left until the university entrance exams, but I tried to put that out of my mind.
On a Sunday morning there weren’t many passengers in the train. I settled down on a seat and batted the word permanent around in my mind. Not a simple task for a seventeen-year-old high school boy who had only just become a senior, since the breadth of what he could imagine as permanence was pretty limited. The only thing that came to mind was a scene of rain falling on the sea.
Every time I see rain falling on the sea a certain emotion washes over me. Probably because the sea eternally—or at least for a period of time that’s nearly eternal—never changes. Seawater evaporates and forms clouds, and the clouds rain, in an endless cycle. In that way the water in the sea is replaced again and again. Yet the sea as a whole doesn’t change. The sea is always the same sea. An actual substance you can touch, yet at the same time a pure, absolute concept. What I might feel when I watch rain falling on the sea is (probably) that sort of solemnity.
Which is why whenever I thought about wanting to make the emotional bond I had with you stronger, to make it more permanent, what came to mind was that scene of rain quietly falling on the sea. I picture us sitting on the beach, watching that sea and rain. We’re seated close together under a single umbrella. Your head rests gently on my shoulder.
The sea is so calm. There’s barely a breath of wind, and without a sound, tiny waves lap at regular intervals at the shore. Like a bedsheet fluttering in the wind. We could sit there forever. Though no image came to me of where we would head after this, where we should go. Since the two of us sitting together on the shore, under an umbrella, was already perfect. When something is perfect, where are you supposed to head to then?
This might be one of the issues with eternity—not knowing where you should go next. But how much value was there in a love that didn’t seek the eternal?
I gave up thinking about the eternal and started thinking about your body. About the swell of your breasts, about what lay underneath your skirt. Imagining what was there. I’d fumble with the buttons on your white blouse one by one. I’d fumble, too, trying to undo the hook of the white bra I pictured you wearing. My fingers would slowly reach out under your skirt. I’d touch your soft inner thighs and then…No, I don’t want to think about that. I really don’t. But I can’t help it. It’s a whole lot easier to imagine than the eternal.
But as I was imagining all this, I suddenly realized that a part of my body was totally stiff. Like some indecent marble ornament. Inside my tight jeans my erect penis was terribly uncomfortable. If it didn’t simmer down, I doubted I could stand up.
I tried thinking again about falling rain and the sea. The stillness of that scene might calm my teenage sex drive. I closed my eyes and focused. Try as I might, though, I couldn’t conjure up the image of the shore. My will and my sexual desire, each with a different map in hand, were heading in opposite directions.
We always met in a small park near the subway. A place we’d met many times before. The park had playground equipment for little kids to play on, water fountains, and a bench under a wisteria arbor. I would sit on the bench and wait for you. But this time, at the appointed hour, there was no sign of you. That was unusual. You’d never been late before. Actually, you always arrived earlier than I did. Even if I arrived a half hour earlier than the time we set, you’d already be there, waiting for me.
“Do you always come this early?” I asked.
“More than anything, I enjoy waiting here by myself for you to come,” you told me.
“Enjoy waiting?”
“That’s right.”
“More than actually seeing me?”
You grinned but didn’t respond. All you said was this: “I mean, when I’m waiting like this, there are endless possibilities, not knowing what’s ahead, what we’re going to do. Right?”
Maybe you were right. Once we actually met, those unlimited possibilities inevitably were replaced by a single reality. And this must have been hard for you. I could understand what you were trying to say, though I didn’t think that way myself. Possibilities are just that, possibilities and nothing else. For me, actually being beside you, feeling the warmth of your body, holding your hand, and sneaking in some kisses, away from prying eyes, was far better.
Thirty minutes passed, and you still did not appear. I kept anxiously glancing at the hands of my watch. Had something happened to you? My heart pounded with a dry, ominous beat. Did you suddenly fall ill? Or were you in a traffic accident? I pictured you being rushed to the hospital in an ambulance, straining to catch the wail of the siren.
Or had you somehow—how, I didn’t know—sensed the sexual fantasies I’d had on the train that morning and had they disgusted you, so that you never wanted to see me again? These thoughts made me embarrassed, and my earlobes grew hot. But those kind of things can’t be helped. In my mind, I tried my best to explain it to you, and to defend myself. It’s like some large black dog. Once it starts to move in a certain direction there’s nothing you can do. No matter how hard you yank at its leash—
You showed up forty minutes late. You sat down, without a word, on the bench next to me. Not a word of apology for being late. And I didn’t say a thing either. We sat there, side by side, without speaking. Two little girls were playing on the swings, vying to see who could swing higher. Your breathing was still ragged, a faint sheen of sweat on your brow. You must have run all the way there. Your chest rose and fell with each breath.
You had on a white blouse with a round collar. A simple white blouse nearly the same as the one I’d imagined in the train. With the same kind of little buttons I’d (in my imagination) undone. And you wore a navy-blue skirt. A slightly different shade of blue from what I’d pictured, but basically the same skirt. That you were dressed very close to what I’d been imagining—fantasizing about—took me by surprise, left me speechless. I couldn’t help but feel sort of unsettled, and tried hard not to imagine anything beyond that. At any rate, dressed in your white blouse and plain navy-blue skirt, seated on a park bench on a Sunday, you looked stunning.
Yet something was different about you. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. All I knew, at a glance, was that something was different.
“Are you okay?” I finally managed to say. “Did something happen?”
You wordlessly shook your head. But something had happened. I could pick up on it, the delicate sound of wings beating at a decibel beyond a human’s audible range. You rested your hands in your lap, and I gently covered them with mine. It would be summer soon, yet your tiny hands were cold. I tried to warm them, even a little. We stayed that way for a long while. You were silent the whole time. Not the momentary silence of someone searching for the right words, but silence for its own sake. An introspective silence, complete in and of itself.
The little girls were still playing on the swings. I could hear the regular, rhythmic creaking of the metal. How wonderful it would be, I thought, if what lay before us was the vast sea instead, with rain falling on it. If we were looking at the sea, then this silence would be much more intimate, much more natural. But this was fine too, the way it was. I didn’t dare ask for anything more.
Finally you took your hands away and stood up without a word, as if you’d just remembered something important you had to do. I hurriedly followed and got to my feet. And, still without a word, you began walking, with me following. We left the park and walked down the street. We went from a wide street to a narrow one, then back onto a wide one. You didn’t say anything about where you were going, or what you were going to do. Which also was unlike you. Whenever we met you burst out with all kinds of things, like you couldn’t wait. As if your head was forever packed full of things you had to tell me. But today, after we saw each other, you had yet to utter a single word.
Before long it dawned on me—you had no set destination. You were merely walking because you didn’t want to stop in one place. To keep on moving itself was the goal. I walked beside you, following your pace. And I kept silent as well. My silence, however, was that of a person unable to find the right words.
How should I act? You were the first girlfriend I’d ever had, the first person I was so close to that I could call my sweetheart. Which is why, being with you, facing this unusual circumstance, I couldn’t decide what I should do. The world was filled with things I’d not yet experienced. My knowledge of female psychology, especially, was like a blank notebook, nothing written in it. So I was flustered, unsure what to do in the face of this you-I’d-never-seen-before. For the time being, though, I needed to stay calm. I was a man, and a year older than you. Though that probably didn’t make much of a difference. It might have meant nothing. But sometimes—especially when there’s nothing else to rely on—a silly token position like that might be helpful. Who knew?
At any rate, I couldn’t panic and at least had to appear calm. So I swallowed any words and continued to walk alongside you, at your pace, as if this were nothing out of the ordinary.
How long did we keep on walking? Every once in a while we’d stop at an intersection, waiting for the light to change. I wanted to hold your hand then, but you kept your hands tucked in your skirt pockets, your eyes fixed straight ahead.
Had I done something to make you angry? Did I mess up somehow? I didn’t think so. We’d talked on the phone only two days earlier, in the evening. And you were in a good mood then, cheerful. I’m really looking forward to seeing you the day after tomorrow, you said. We didn’t talk after that. There was no reason for you to be angry with me.
Stay calm, I told myself. I’d done nothing to upset you. Whatever troubled you was, most likely, something personal, unrelated to me. As I waited at each intersection I took a few deep breaths.
We must have walked for about thirty minutes. Or maybe a little longer. I looked around and saw we were back in the little park. Our bewildering hike through the city had brought us back to where we’d started. You headed straight for the bench at the wisteria arbor and sat down without a word. And I sat down beside you. Just like before, we sat side by side, not talking, on that wooden bench with its peeling paint. With your chin tucked, you stared at the space straight ahead, barely blinking.
The two girls on the swings were gone. The two swings hung there, motionless in the May sunshine. The empty, unmoving swings looked introspective, somehow.
You rested your head lightly on my shoulder, as if suddenly remembering that I was there. I rested my hand on top of yours. The size of our hands was so very different. I was always surprised at how small yours were, impressed that such tiny hands could do so much. Twisting open bottle tops, for instance, or peeling tangerines.
And then you began to cry. Voicelessly, your shoulders trembled faintly. Maybe all that fast, ceaseless walking had been meant to keep you from bursting into tears. I gently put my arm around you. Your tears fell, audibly, onto my jeans. Sometimes you made a choking sound and a short sob. But you spoke no words that I could make out.
I kept silent too. I was just there, taking in your sadness—what I took to be your sadness—as it came. I’d never experienced this before. To react to, and accept, the sadness of someone other than myself, and have them fully trust me.
If only I were stronger, I thought. If only I could hold you more tightly and say more encouraging words—the most apt, right words that would break the spell. But I was not yet prepared. And this fact left me sad.