May 9, 2020

Saturday 1:00 am

I can’t stop.

My heart keeps pounding in my chest and I don’t know if it’s because of fear or stress… But I can’t stop thinking about him today. I want to see him. Maybe it’s because of my talk with the executive chef earlier… Or is it because I’m scared of being found out? I have no freaking clue why I’m like this but… I miss Alex. I wish he was here with me right now, reassuring me that everything’s going to be okay. I miss him so much I feel like I might go insane.

Or maybe I’m already insane? It’d be crazy if I wasn’t… Seeing as how I’ve technically been fired.

Okay, I might be overreacting, but… I’ve been told to take a break. For how long, I don’t know. The big boss didn’t say anything except that he “knows” I’m probably burnt out from working in the kitchen by myself… Ha! That’s basically the same as being fired, isn’t it? What the fuck am I supposed to do now? I’m too scared to go traveling and too cowardly to go to my parents’ house to relax. 

If I didn’t have this disease, I would have jumped at the opportunity to travel somewhere to refresh my mind or something. Now… even going out to get groceries is a daunting task for me. 

I’m always afraid that I’m going to lose my way, or momentarily forget where I am and what I was doing… I’m scared that the people in my day-to-day life will perceive me in a different light if they ever see me acting incoherently. I just want people to remember me as Ethan Jung, the French pastry chef, not Ethan Jung, an Alzheimer’s patient! I don’t need or want their sympathy. ...I don’t want another reminder of this fucked up disease...

I digress.

       So… Basically, I’ve been stuck in my house all day, doing nothing but reminiscing about the past and what I should have done differently. It’s funny. When you’re busy living life, you can’t even afford to think of the past, or imagine what you want to change from the past… Yet the minute you have some time to yourself, you start remembering everything, even things you never want to think about.

You want to know what I’ve been thinking about? Well, you already have an idea, since I wrote about it earlier… Whatever. I need to let this out.

I keep thinking back to the time when Alex taught me how to make a peach galette. I can still feel his warm hands on mine, flour dusting our hands as we work the butter into the dough. I would do anything to hear his deep, throaty laugh again or... To relive that moment when we shared our first, sweet kiss as we sat near the window admiring the Eiffel Tower, both vowing to become great pastry chefs... 

I— we were so happy then. I wish I could turn back time and be with him again. I miss his stupid jokes, his odd and quirky Russian accent, his obsession with citrus… Everything. I keep regretting destroying all those photos and memos that captured our intimate feelings back then. I can barely remember what he looks like anymore, but there is one thing I can remember perfectly: his genuine, loveable smile.

That addicting, boyish smile of his will always be in my mind… 

       It’s stupid, I know, you don’t have to remind me. After all, I was the one who called it quits eight years ago… If I had known that I would get Alzheimer’s, would I have left him like that? Would I have refused his proposal to stay with him in France and open up a shop together? Would I… have been brave enough to come out and be confident in my relationship with him…? Shit, I’m tearing up again, haha. Fuck. Ha… I’m pathetic, aren’t I? 

Well, if I can’t ever see him again… I at least wish I could taste that peach galette just one last time… Just to see if it tastes as sweet and buttery as it did back then… 

**NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.**