Love Chooses You – Short Story

Love Chooses You

By Maclean Patrick

The sparkle of sunlight on the waters caught him by surprise. It had been a moody day,downcast and gray,with the sun shy behind November skies. This sudden burst of sun rays was a welcomed surprise. He paused a while, allowing the reflected rays to bathe his face in hues of gold and yellow. The caressing warmth broke the grip of the icy water flowing between his legs as he stood just shy of the river bank with his fishing rod balanced against his belt.

He pulled the fishing rod a little, allowing the line to drift more to his right. Thus, avoiding the fallen tree to his left, whose branches jutted out like petrified tongues of fire. Having his line stuck on any one of the branches would be disastrous, he rather cut the line then to attempt poking his arm in the cold frigid water looking for a stuck fishing hook. He leaned a little more to the right, pulling the line a good five feet clear of the sunken derelict tree.

The fish were not biting and he mumbled a complaint about how the mining up river had affected the water and driven all the fish out of the area. The gold mine was reaching the end of its production life. Gold used to be plentiful in these parts but in recent years the yield had trickled to mere gold dust. The nuggets were long gone, mined off sometime in the early 1940s just before the war.

A rustle among the tall grass on the far bank announced the arrival of a deer coming to drink from the waters and he raised his head to get a better look at her. It was not too often one can catch a glimpse of a deer out in the wild, most time it was either mounted to a wall or crumpled up by the side of a road.

The deer as it quietly drank from the river, her slender frame bordered by an ethereal halo thrown off by the dim, reflected light of the sun. Her ears flickered wildly, casing away the pesky mosquitoes buzzing over its head. She did not seem to mind him watching her drink. Almost as if she welcomed the attention from the man standing in the river, pulling at a fishing line and hoping to avoid a sunken tree.

Simplicity.

Why can’t things be this simple? He asked himself. One could live free and not worry about so called necessities. Drink when one wanted, eat what one finds and lived where one wished. The deer had more freedoms than he could ever get and he was supposed to be the more advance creature of the lot.

He reached over to the right pocket of his vest with his left hand and took out the neatly folded piece of paper he had placed there two days ago.

Perfume lingered on the sheets of paper, scents of the giver, and it stood out from the scent of grass, mud and water. It was her scent. As distinct as the scent of all things in the wilderness. For it carried her character and personality and told the world she was present in that space and time. And as he read the words to the letter, he knew she was there with him; silently watching him, like the deer on the far bank, who by now had caught the faint scent of perfume in the air. The deer raised her head and looked in the direction of our fisherman. Training her ears at him, as if waiting for him to read the contents out loud.

Dear Matt,

It’s been a while since I wrote. How are you?

I know this is would come as a surprise to you but I had no one else I could think of who could help me. It had always been you and only you who would be there for me. Somehow, I know you would never refuse or turn me down. You love me too much.

The tug of the line drew his attention away from the letter. There was a biter on his line and a big one from the of pressure it put on his rod. He released more line and allowed the rod to slack a little and then the tugging stopped.

Better luck next time.

I was too young to understand. Understand why you loved me so much. I was care-free and just wanted to have a good time in life. I didn’t appreciate the things you did for me. How you stood by me when my father left, how you comforted me when I went through that failed relationship. The way you waited on me, night and day; ever ready to listen to me and offer all the help you could give. I was too foolish to see that I was constantly breaking your heart, yet you kept quiet about all the hurt I caused. I did not see it then but I understand now.

His fishing line moved a little to the left. He watched it inch its way towards a disfigured branch and stopping short of touching it. Changing direction, it now moved to the right. The fish was testing the line. He smiled and released more line, giving the fish room to think about its next move.

All the while the deer on the far bank watched.

I left you that day not just because I was chasing after my dreams. I was running from you. I grew to love you and it scared me. I had dreams and things to do and I thought you would be tying me down. So I left and told you to forget me. But I cannot forget what you said. It seem stupid to me at that time but now I realize; you had been sincere about all you promised.

You told me you would love me forever. Love forever. I just could not believe it, yet you did love me and now, I know you are the only person who could help me.

The deer moved a step back and turned to face the forest. There was movement coming its way and it was prime to sprint out of the way if it was a mountain lion or a bear. The rustling in the grass parted way for a fawn. The fawn had been down wind and her scent was lost to her own mother.

The bright eyed and curious fawn took tiny steps towards its mother and found its place next to her by the river bank.

He noticed this and smiled. “Your child is beautiful,” his complement met with an approving nod from the deer.

I have a daughter and she needs a father. I’m dying from cancer and would not live long enough to see her leave school. You have always been a father, friend and love of my life, to me and now I just want you to be the father to my daughter and hopefully she will learn from you, all the things I wasted my life forgetting.

Matt, you cannot refuse me this. I know you love me and have always loved me. I’m sorry for all the things I’ve done to you and I hope you can forgive me. You cannot refuse my request. Please.

The tug on his fishing line was strong. It was time to reel the fish in and after jamming the base of the rod into his belt, he pulled on the rod using his right hand and for a moment he hesitated. He had always loved her and now she was going to entrust to him the most precious thing in her life, her daughter. A daughter he knew nothing about what more to be guardian over. He hesitated, rod in hand as the tension mounted on the line. The fish was fighting hard.

He was nearing his thirties when he came across the troubled teen. She had been passed on from counselor to counselor, each time given over as a case too hard to handle. A hard case, no-one wanted nor could solve. Her case file came his way one sunny Monday morning and he arranged to see her for the first time.

The first meeting was far from ideal, she dive-bombed every question he threw at her. She was intelligent and adept at arguing his questions with reasoning of her own. She was logical in her approach and he knew instantly why the other counselors could not break through her shell. They had tried to bring her to their level when instead they should have gone down to hers. To see the world as she saw it.

So it was a surprise to her when he suggested she showed him the neighborhood where she lived.

She showed him the derelict government built flats she was raised, until the age of twelve, for that was when her father left and her mother decided to move in with the uncle, two floors up from their original apartment unit. The uncle was a perpetual drunk and to save herself from him she spent as much time away from the home as possible.

Truancy was normal practice for her and often times, he would find her hanging out at the old abandoned cinema by the dock-yards. Sometimes alone, most times with her delinquent friends, no better off than her.

But she had a spark about her. Beneath all that swagger of hypocritical toughness, she was still a little girl looking for love. And he slowly found himself falling in love with her. Love was a powerful medium and for a moment it help keep her out of trouble, for she grew to trust him and to listen to him. He got her back into school and kept her there long enough for her to get a decent education. Yet as she came into her early twenties, her wild streak showed itself again and she wanted space and freedom of her own. His love could not hold her back but instead he chose to release her, with the promise that he would always be available in case she needed anything.

She disappeared from his life (saved for the occasional Christmas postcard) until the Tuesday morning, he received the letter. He had read it in his office and pondered on the decision he had to make. Seeing that it could not be something he could decide quickly, he opted to go fishing.

A friend had mentioned about the river just north of the city, four hours drive along the highway and another two by logging track, up to a place where some gold mining was still done. It was remote enough and far enough for one to spend time to contemplate decisions. Far enough for one to ask, what should I do now? Or should I bother?

Matt, you cannot refuse me this.

She had always been demanding but in that line she had shown desperation. She had reached the end of the rope and she turned to the one constant she had left, the man who had loved her all along. But was he still that much in love with her?

Matt pushed his fisherman hat up, allowed the cool mountain air to cool his head and tousled his gray hair. He had chosen to keep it long, an image of coolness that allowed him access to the deepest of troubled teen minds. Being a counselor to young rebels can put a strain on one’s mind and his final case broke his resolve and he left the profession, choosing instead to pursue full time his love for writing. His writings offered him release but that final case lingered on like a mis-behaving ghost. Haunting him for years until it manifest itself in full glory that Tuesday morning when he opened the envelope and read the perfume scented letter.

The tug on his line was heavy and he could feel the shifting of the fish weight side to side. It was fighting hard, fighting to keep its freedom and he could feel the pulsating grind of his own muscle as he strained to hold on to the rod. In a single swift move, he grabbed hold of the rod with his left (crumpling the letter against the rod), lowered his right hand to reached for the lower right hand pocket of his vest and to pull out his pen-knife. Without much thought nor hesitation, he cut the line. There was a quick swish and the line was lost.

Looking up he caught the approving glare of the deer and the fawn by its side. They had not taken their gaze off him the whole time and were seemingly able to read the thoughts of Matt, the fisherman. Good, they seemed to say as the deer turned and, with fawn in tow, silently made their way back into the forest.

He tossed his rod onto the river bank and held the letter in both hands.

I remembered your promise. You promised to love me forever and it stuck to me all these years and when I hit my dead-end, those were the words that came back to me. Your image came back to me, and I remembered all the things you did for me out of the goodness of your heart.

I never took the time to appreciate all the things you’ve done for me. I never took the time to acknowledge you. I took you for granted and made you out as a mere convenience rather than a person who loved me.

For all that, I am sorry and I regret having to live all these years without realizing all that.

Please, fulfill my final hope. Take care of my daughter and allow her to have a life better than the one I had. Give her the chances I never had and never let her walk down the path I took. Please.

Love forever,

Melanie.

He folded the letter and placed it back into his right pocket and looked out onto the forest on the far bank. Somewhere in the thick forest a deer was walking with its fawn. She would take great cares to teach the little one the paths that crisscrossed through the forest, what to eat and not to eat and where the safe watering holes were. Somewhere in that forest was a mother and child navigating their way through a dangerous place.

Was not life like that?

Life itself was a forest, a jungle some say, and the wisdom of the elder was needed by the young in order to survive.

In her life, Melanie did not have any elder until Matt came along and now she was attempting to put right what had gone so wrong in her life.

Everyone needs a second chance at things even if it can only live on in the life of the next generation. Melanie needed that second chance and it would live through her daughter. Matt made his decision and as he stepped over to the river-bank intent on heading back to his parked truck, he stop in mid stride and turned to face the far bank of the river and for a moment he could see the deer again, nodding in approval to his decision.

Matt smiled and whispered, “Thank you.”

Talent is crucial to good writing…sorry PERFECT writing.

I’ve met a lot of people who have express their desires to write. Their eyes light up when I tell them I write in my spare time, have a book out and regularly get my articles published on online newspapers and political opinionated websites in Malaysia. Glossy eye and spunky about the idea that people would read their writings they pursue the road I took. But not all roads are meant to be travelled by a bandwagon of wannabe writers.

My path to writing is unique to me. For everyday I spend writing, I had several years of practice. I did not get here by mere chance. I had to sweat it out and develop my own style and voice. I took to blogging in 2003 to better my writing skills. I needed to learn how to connect with an audience, write in words that inspire and move people and what better way than through blogging. From there I joined a writing group and practiced my writing there. I’ve written a short play and it was produced during my college days, written some really bad songs that are only worthy for my shower, poetry has been a dabble of mine since school days and only in the last two years have I seriously written short stories and full length features.

It took time and that is something all writers (good writers) have to go through. It takes time to polish one’s skills. There’s no shortcuts to being a good writer but if you want to be a PERFECT writer than you need Talent.

Let me say this over and over again. You need Talent to begin with. Some have it, some may not and this means not everyone is cut out to be a writer. Yes, you may have good writing skills but are you a storyteller? Can you capture the attention of an audience?

I learnt the traits of capturing the attention of the audience in my college days when I was part of the theatre group. I took to the stage and was a natural at it. From there I move on to writing for stage and essentially that’s where I learnt my strong point when it comes to writing stories – dialogue. The scene plays in my head like a play and I’m the omnipresent observer jotting down the details that I see. That’s my Talent. This is why I can write.

I met this wannabe writer who wrote a management book and he wanted to branch out into fiction. I read his draft and I told him to stick to writing management books. And he had the knack to tell me he lack creativity. How can you write fiction without being creative?

Talent is inherent in all writers. They write because that is the only thing they can do. We write because the moment you put a pen/keyboard before us, we start fidgeting and all rile up. We want to express ourselves, we want to tell the world what we see in our minds eye. We are picky about words and sentences and prose and how someone would say something. We listen in on conversations at coffee shops and watch people go about life, taking notes of what’s going on. We are loners and thinkers and philosophers and emotional wrecks (after a good movie) and all the while we want to write it down.

Talent is crucial to PERFECT writing. You either have it or not. I hate to bust your bubble but clearly, if your friends tell you your writing is like S*#T then please take up another hobby. Fishing or kite flying or planting roses. Anything else except writing a novel and thinking you’ll make a million out of it. Honestly, I don;t write for the money. I write because all my life I knew I would write and I just want people to hear what I have to say.

Have a reality check and ask yourself whether you’ve got TALENT to write.

Noodles in his hair – Short Story

NOODLES IN HIS HAIR

by Maclean Patrick

There were noodles in the little boy’s hair and he chuckled as he reached over to pick them out. His son must have been playing too close to the entrance of the 7-ELEVEN convenient store just down the street from where they stayed. He had warned the young boy, not to pick through the garbage-bin when the customers left the store. The opening of the door would most certainly push him into the agape mouth of the garbage-bin and swallow his tiny head.

His son stirred a little, shifting to the right as he removed the last of somebody’s meal from his tangled hair. There was a bit of coal on his left cheek, which he gently rubbed off with his thumb. His son had been playing by the exhaust vent of the Chinese restaurant, two blocks from where the two normally bedded for the night. It was clear, he had not heeded his warning.

One day he’s going to get his eye-brows burnt, he thought to himself as the last bit of coal came off.

His son was naughty but he was a good kid in the pure sense of the word. Short for an eleven year old and skinny compared to the rest of the children living on the street. Too much junk food and the onset of a poor diet contributed to this gaunky stance. A hot complete meal was hard to come by in a city where the divide between the haves and have-nots was glaring like the noon sun. Last night’s meal was still tucked away in his siphon bag. It would last them another night or two and then he would need to find another meal.

Where am I going to find the money for that? He leaned back and exhaled. His gentle sigh went un-noticed by his sleeping son. He’s too young to face all these things. What can I do? I’ve got no money, barely can hold on to my job and there’s barely enough food for the two of us.

He buried his head in his hands and rub the lines on his forehead. His hair was receding at an alarming rate, soon he would lose it all. But loosing his hair was the least of his worries.

He was now a skeleton of a man compared to the chubby self of his younger days spent frolicking in the highlands of his village located several hours away from the capital of the Philippines, Manila City and nested in the mountain range that divided the province into two.

Village life was simple but tending to cows and harvesting pineapple from his father’s land could not curtail the lure of the city and one hot July afternoon, he found himself on board a jeepney heading for Manila City. He would find work, he would make his fortune, he would buy a house, send money back to his parents and be a man of the city. And he did become a man of the city minus the money and the house and everything else in between.

He met a girl from Mindanao, dancer at a local club he frequent after his hours at the construction yard, who moved in with him and a few months later she surprised him with the news.

She was pregnant. Add child to the the list of things in his life.

In the beginning, the prospect of life as a family man seemed welcoming, romantic even. His life seemed complete. Almost.

Then 1997 came along and everything seemed to ground to a stand still. Work became scarce and construction projects came to a stand still. He lost his job and worst still, his de-facto wife ran off with a sailor from Myanmar, leaving him with a young son and a perpetual migraine.

Why?

There was no point to rue over spilled milk but most mornings he could not help but feel sorry for himself. What else can a man do?

Yellow neon lights flashing CAESAR CASINO reflected off the dark tarmac in front of him. The sound of drunken laughter startled him. Drunken revellers with money to spare and time to pass streamed out of the casino and he wondered if they would walk down his way and give him a tip.

Not today, the group walked the opposite way, maybe tomorrow night he would have better luck.

There was movement from down the street and he knew that his neighbors were waking up. They would be making their way towards the water faucet to clean up before making their trip to the outskirts of the city. HIs neighbor looked in his direction and he gave her a slight nod. She returned the nod and managed a smile. Thanking him for allowing her first claims to the water. She gingerly brought her daughter to the faucet, turned the water on and gave her a cold morning bath.

His son knew how to count and could spell out his name, somewhat better than him, who neither knew how to count nor spell. But he knew the city and the roads and the people who called it home. He knew who lived on which street and who owned which water tap and who had first take on any food served out by the restaurants. There was respect for each other and noone cross the other for they had no need for quarrel. The city was big enough to support them. No-one would go hungry if they stuck to the unwritten code shared among those like him. They were the hidden nation, aliens in a strange land where they were citizens yet lived apart from their countrymen. They exist in silence, invisible yet visible to the populace. Often times only acknowledged when it came to festivities like Easter or Christmas. Often times, a means for corporations to gain additional tax-cuts from the government. They lived on the charity or kindness of people, whether sincere or not, it didn’t matter. All they needed was food to live another day. Motives mattered little.

His son stirred from his sleep and rub his eyes. The weiry father managed a smile. Start the day with a smile, keep their spirits up and maybe something good would come their way. His son smiled back and ran his small hand through the rough patch of hair on his head.

His father rub his back, much to his delight and quietly told him it was time to freshen up. It was their time at the water faucet by the street. The little boy sat up and watched as his father gathered their belongings and rolled up their bedding. The cardboard box had served them well and it was time they replaced it with a new one. The little boy had found the box by the 7-ELEVEN store and proudly showed it to his father. It had a bright red chicken painted across it and he found it funny that the last thing he saw as he slept was a smiling red chicken with a thumbs up sign that seems to say everything was going to be alright. The previous night his father had amused him with stories of the chickens from a place his father said was located in the mountains. One day, his father had promised him, they would go to that place in the mountains and he was sure he would find a bright red chicken living among the pineapples, giving him the thumbs up sign and telling him everything was going to be alright.

His son shivered as he poured water over his head and it washed down his chest, cascading over the form of his rib-cage and down his thighs.

“Cold?” The father asked.

“Cold,” his son replied.

“You got noodles in your hair. Stop playing by the store.”

“I just wanted to get the noodles,” he replied, wiping the water from his face. “Miquel almost got them before me.”

“Did you fight Miquel, again?”

“No. I took the cup and just ran.”

“Stay out of trouble. Fighting is not good. We don’t fight, we share as much as we can. Live at peace with everyone. You hear me?”

“Yes, daddy.”

“Good, we need to go early. Better be there earlier so we can start first. Remember what daddy told you we are looking for?”

“Cans and bottles.”

“Good boy,” father smiled and combed his son’s hair with his hand.

They packed their box with the smiling red chicken under a staircase and walked slowly down the street, hand in hand. This little boy and rough middle-age man were going to Payatas where hopefully they could make two dollars today. Two dollars to keep them full for another day and enough to keep his son out of the 7-ELEVEN garbage bin and no noodles in his hair.

Note: I spent 5 days in the Philippines last year and walked the streets around my hotel. I was struck by the human story I saw around me and the image of a father and son sleeping on the street never left me until today. This story is dedicated to the unnamed father and son I found sleeping just yards from the 7-ELEVEN store, where I had breakfast one morning in June of 2007.