The Blunt End

You’re beautiful. You’re beautiful. You’re beautiful. It’s true.

It’s true. James Blunt’s song has become the theme song of our relationship. I can even stretch it as far as saying that his Back to Bedlam is the soundtrack of our shared lives.

I saw you’re face in crowded place. And I don’t know what to do.

The Lord was dead, and so was Metro Manila, when Black Saturday descended like a dry, and dehydrating storm, an anticlimactic pause from the fervor of the past days. Yesterday, Good Friday, we sought the refuge of churches in towns dotting the shores of Laguna de Bay: small churches, magnificent churches, disappointing attempts at modernism and stunning preservations of Philippine colonial and earthquake baroque. The road back to Manila was quick and smooth that I felt the day passed by like a dream. This dream was supposed to be the highlight of my week. But Good Friday shrunk into insignificance when I saw his face in an unusually crowd-less Greenbelt 3.

His image when I saw him for the first time sticks to my mind like peanut butter to the roof of the tongue. He always looked good in black. He looked clean. He had a digital watch on his left arm and he was wearing denims and a pair of sneakers. And he was wearing the best smiles I’ve ever seen in a long time.

Nearsighted people like me are cursed with the need for intimate contact before we recognize people but we are blessed with the gift of seeing people as a whole, rather than dwell into the details. These details, we never see from afar. So from where I was standing the moment I spotted him seated against an orange chair, he was beautiful. It’s true.

Up close, I swam into the depths of his eyes and bathed in the beauty of his face: the smooth ripples on his forehead, his formidable nose, his thin lips, the crow’s feet that show on the corners of his eyes when he smiles, his strong chin, his rough jaw line. He was a joy to look at, a treasure to behold. He had to be mine for the taking.

He must have been having his fair share of the sun, for, like the people of these islands, kissed by the sunlight, he has inherited a sunny disposition and a welcoming smile, a demeanor you would not instantly expect of a man from a faraway land.

I must have been smiling a lot.

I listened to myself speak to him. I was watching my words, wanting to make the right impression, wanting nothing less than for him to see me bare my soul, wanting him to know how sincere I am for every adjective I use. He laughs with me when I crack a joke. He smiles at my anecdotes. And I do the same. For, the moment he opened his mouth to speak, I felt a kindred spirit talking. He was meant for me.

When our time came to an end, I wondered if I could survive the next few hours. He breathes life. And his words nourish me. And his ears when they listen are like an angel’s wings, hushing me to a whisper, wanting to listen, yet in private. He was comfort. He was joy.

But I managed to survive until the day when we met yet again.