I am cursed with an undying love.

A love for something I can never reach, a love which has eluded me ever since my first steps into the hallowed halls of our community library.

A yearning that I could never fulfill.

Even now, as an adult, stepping into these halls once again, albeit for a different cause, that love keeps coming back to taunt me, to fill my head with promises that were never fulfilled.

I ran my hand over the dusty counter, a counter full of happy memories, of books returned and lost, of haggling over penances, of our librarian, Ms. Bakan.

I sighed my head, and continued forward, turning my head to look at past mementos.

A few more paces. I noticed the dust getting thicker and thicker, covering everything in a thin blanket. A poor man's snow.

A little to the left. There. A corner where me and my mates used to eat candy bars we sneaked in from the store nearby. Later on, in our teenage years, a corner where we experimented on new things. Drugs. 5 dollar wine. You name it, we tried it.

Come on now, just a bit more. Your legs, your frail sticks, can and will make it.

There. Another corner. Another time, place, memory.

A girl, Hannah. Helga? I sighed. Another name, lost to time's unforgiving wood chipper of ideas.

My first experience.

We snuck in, late at night. Exploring new places, new little nooks and crannies where librarians hid the best books that nobody would ever find.

Oh, what a find we had! Rowling, Brown, Grisham, Silva, Crichton, and even a full list of Adam's works. There were so much. There were too much.

We couldn't resist. We read all of them.

And even after that ran out of allure, we decided to explore our bodies.

We explored how fast or slow one should go, how to get somebody higher into the realm of pleasure before you. How to pleasure.

But that is nothing, compared to now.

Those are the bygone fruits of foolish endeavors.

The last steps. A staircase.

Finally.

Huh.

It's still there.

I walked up towards it, feeling the black, burnished wood under my fingers. The feel of the strings, rusted with years of unuse and abuse alike. The seat, worn leather exuding dust upon a single press of my palm.

As I felt every inch of my friend, I remembered something, an excerpt from a book that had caught my eye.

"And once the notes are in the air, they collide against one another. They spark. They burst."

I wonder if that will happen.

I wonder if my notes will reach out, farther than I could see, colliding with one another and solving that Gordian Knot inside of me.

My last chance. Before everything runs out.

Time, money, self-belief. All run out in the end.

This is my time.

With a heavy sigh, I sat on the seat, fingers poised to pounce, to make these hallowed halls sing once again of happy times.

To make everything better.

A deep breath. A count to 5. Exhale.

Go.

Fingers weaving, darting in and out as fast as needles, playing the fantasy I've always wanted to see.

I've waited a very long time for this.

The build-up. Fingers, going faster and faster, in danger of tiring out.

I keep going.

I just want to see her again.

Now, the chorus. Melodies, flats, sharps, scales, all bleeding into each other.

Memories start flooding into my mind.

Of how I first met her, banging on the keys with some kind of childish determination, trying to make harmony from chaos.

Of that same smile she flashed me, full of uncertainty and anxiety, but yet filled with that fire.

The succeeding years of improvements and failures, of periods of work and periods of rest.

And finally, the year everything broke down.

Wait. Do I see something?

A hazy blur, almost disrupting my concentration, my fingers shifting melodies once more. From the base of Chopin to the high notes of Beethoven.

There.

I could hardly notice it, but there. Beside me. The smell of lemon and spearmint.

Her smell.

Then, all of a sudden, new notes start to play.

Another melody, full of force and bravado, and yet so quiet, starts playing alongside mine.

I almost sobbed in relief. She IS here.

Then, a voice.

"I missed you, you know?"

I almost stopped playing. My heart threatened to jump out of my chest, whether out of fear, surprise, or longing, I wouldn't know.

She must've noticed my fingers slowing down, for she said, "Please don't stop...it's my only link here."

I tried swallowing back my tears, and focused back to playing, to keeping the rhythm and the beat alive.

The words stuck to the back of my throat.

"I-I...mis-missed you t-t-too..."

A ghost of a sigh.

The melody began changing once again. From the high notes of Beethoven to the soothing, slow notes of Senbonzakura...and the sound of keys, imitating the sound of slow rain.

"You know, I always wondered how you play and yet are able to do other things." An echo of laughter. "I never learned."

I sighed, while my fingers moved with a mind of their own.

She continued. "I focused too much on the inside."

Senbonzakura began moving faster and faster, to keep up with my emotions, shifting and turning into different things, things I had never seen before until now. Things I kept to myself.

Longing, unrequited sorrow, happiness.

Surrender.

After a period of silence, she then said, "Why come here, after all this time?"

"Why me, of all people?"

"Why do you still want me to stay?"

"Even after what I've done?"

The man began slowing down, his fingers trembling with emotion. His determined Turkish March slowing down to a slower Bach Minuet. And then nothing.

It took a long while, a period where his fingers did nothing at all but lay on the ivory keys, some now wet with his tears.

“I just wanted to see you again.”

“Because I love you. Even after all this time.”

--FIN--