[lamchopz]

Chapter 1: Compassion

9 pm. Darkness had fallen. The moon had already set its pace across the starry sky – a long way to travel before the glittering sun began to rebel. The night was calm, and the wind gentle. Everything seemed motionless. It was the nocturnal world one would expect. Suddenly, the godly silence was broken by the funky music slicing through the air. Tracing its source, I immediately understood my brother’s room was the pool of those riotous incoherent notes. Having known him for years, through familial obligation – not that I wanted to, I quietly left the house for a peaceful walk. The park was just ten blocks away. It was 9:05 pm.

The chill settled around me. I never thought it would be this cold. “Well,” I told myself, assessing the irony of the situation, “thoughts are just fantasy after all”.

For eighteen years, I had always believed happiness is the fruit of perfection. Nobody is perfect, totally perfect. That is why we enjoy ourselves this minute, and weep the next. One could be the envy of the entire world – famed, wealthy, and gorgeous – and yet, his heart forever trapped on the journey seeking its missing half. My mother once said, “You are an intelligent boy but that doesn’t mean that you can comprehend everything.” I had not understood her then, and I never asked, knowing that she would not have answered me anyway. Five years had elapsed since. I still had not a clue.

The streetlights were dimmer today. Perhaps, the full moon had stolen the glory of these aerial lamps. From high above, a cozy draught touched down on my face. It felt icy, yet tranquil.

The park gradually surfaced from afar. The mist slowly thinned out, clearing the gravel path connecting to the entrance. Smiling, I headed towards the gate. It was Valentine’s Day.

Silence, overall. Though now and then, the intimate sounds sneaked out from the bushes. I wanted to curse myself for not finding a soulmate sooner, but it was my choice not to. The last thing I ever wanted was hurting a girl in a separation. I could feel it when my friends told me of theirs, then out of nowhere, my ‘celibacy’ was summoned to the round table where jokes and silliness presided. “Facetious buddies”, I mused.

9:15 pm. The marble pond drew closer as my body tangoed through the air. For ten minutes, my mind had completely been removed from reality, wound on the wind and elevated to the sky. It dropped short. To my right, I spotted a bench in impeccable singleness – one leg and one seat base stretching out above, next to a fountain where the statue of a goddess resided in the middle. Right in that lonesome picture, there sat a solitary figure.

A dark figure. A phantom. A lost soul. The last described him best.

Perplexed, yet, intrigued by the sheer knowledge, which lay right in front of my eyes, that there was also another virgin who managed to desist from the temptations all around, I approached him with measured caution – there was a need to be on alert, but no real indication of danger. His body rose from darkness. A wreck caught my sight.

“Are you OK, buddy?” I enquired; his head still sank in his arms. I refrained from a second round of questions. My friends branded me “master of singulus” because of my habit of asking only once – ‘singulus’ is not defined in contemporary English; its invention was based on “single”. The term means “one and one only”.

Never before have I seen a state of melancholy so profound and prolific – it felt as if every passing minute pulled together tighter and tighter and time and space seemed to freeze, then crash upon a focal point: him. The mass shook several times – each turn, a stream of tears fell on the ground, dispersed and vanished. Then it iced, and stilled.

Unknowingly, I tapped on his right shoulder, and found myself seated on his side: “Do you really think those tears can dissolve your miseries, my good friend?” Right at the end of my sentence, his eyes traversed upwards, searching for the voice that awakened him and the body asleep for so long. His hand quickly embraced the foreign touch that offered the flame of compassion and comfort. The cold of the night reached him at last.