Untold.

Day 12.

I’m back on a plane.

This year, I’ve gotten on and gotten off planes more often than I have done in my entire life. This year alone, I’m counting that I’ve clambered upon turbojets and Boeing 737s clutching my crumpled air ticket at least 6 times. Some people don’t even travel that often within the space of a YEAR. Or a decade. I really cannot complain.

Its quiet now.

The lights have been turned off for the passengers to start settling in for the night. I took a DVT preventing saunter down the aisle and you know how those overhead lights that you can turn on to continue reading showcases people like museum pieces? All they’re probably missing is a label underneath. It seems so familiar. I’ve seen this exactly scenario 3 times already this year. Yes. It is. But not quite. I can close my eyes and remember the past 12 days. A haze. A blur. Of laughter, tears, food, fun, cuddles, kisses, and a bachata like no other.

Was it just a dream? Is this what people refer to as the Twilight Zone? Where you are in a certain place and you wonder whether the events that happened really did happen or whether you just imagined it. If it was a dream, then I”ll let it slip past. It was a good dream. But I know it wasn’t. It was a full on, Technicolour production, where I could still feel her tears on my lips and her eyes, scrunched up and messy from all the crying. I can still feel the way she holds my hand or slips an arm through mine or the way she pecks me on the cheek often throughout the day. I can still remember, teaching her bachata, holding on to her hips, looking at ourselves in the mirror, her hair cascading over her face as she mouths the numbers to the steps.

No, no, baby, don’t do that. Don’t count. I want you to feel.

She clings on to me and we move on carpet, searching for that perfect hip flick. She tells me that she loves it when she goes off time and I gently pat her hip to direct her. Her scent invades my senses, permeating, soaking. I’m drowning but oh. What a beautiful death this shall be.

It was last night.

There was a light drizzle.

A live band played everything from jazz to slow rock and I pulled her up from the little staircase we were sitting on.

Come on…let’s bachata.

“Baby ah….dunnnnnnnnnnnnn….I dunno how to do the fancy fancy steps, k?”

Just move with me. Baby, close your eyes, and move with me.

“But I really dunno how to move lor…”

Shh. I love you.

And so we moved. We just moved. Because that was all the music ever asked from us. And the singers laughed and clapped and announced to everyone that we were dancing.

But here I am. Flying away from the girl that has once again captivated, kidnapped, captured from me. Her tears still stained my jacket. Her perfume still lingered around my neck. Her pout against my lips, her dimple when she smiled. Her arms around my waist, head buried in the crook of my neck, her hair tickling my nose.

“Promise. Pinky promise me that you will come back to me.”

I will. I promise.

1745hrs.

I’m sleeping on the plane on one of the front seats flying back to Wangas when I wake up. The plane is one of those turboprop affairs that has a total of 18 seats in all and they’re spaced out to 2 a row with the aisle in the middle.

I wake up and I wonder where she is. Oh, she’s probably sitting at the back. I’ll meet up with her afterwards.

And then I realised that I came back alone. She’s not here.