Feeling author's note:

Thank you so much for reading this far.

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Philemon

As how some of those bitter lines go, In a world where everybody hates a happy ending story, many could be considered as one of its many contradictors and that certainly includes me, for no one, in his or her or their sane state of mind, would ever hope for a sad ending-because majority of this world's population have what we could coin as fixation on many million good things. Fixations that customarily run from the littlest to the most potentially, palpably best things.

That was why when you left me seven months ago-those months of straight bitter tears and goodbyes. Those several months of liquors and cigars on sleepless nights. That past half a year of tallying the days that came after your leaving. Those innumerable months of standing on the brink of collapse. And those countless months of intrapersonal battle of unrequited love-all those, made me realize-though in a hard way-that if I couldn't-though I'm still at hope-have the ending I preferred with you, then at best I'd be giving the ending I deserved for myself.

"Good morning, Sir Manolo, Sir Gaddiel," the nurse by the admission desk smilingly greeted my companions as she threw her glance at me bestowing a much wider smile. "Good morning, Melo. It's nice to see you again."

"Good morning," my best friend and my old man greeted back in chorus, whereas I returned her the favor with a beam.

Been braving to attend my Psychotherapy sessions with one of the most reputable Psychologists of the National Center for Mental Health for already quite some time.

I was diagnosed with Major Depression. At first, as an initial response, I was scared. I was scared of going back to relive my pasts in my head. At the same time, I was scared of that fucking stigma attached to people seeking for mental help-those possible unintentional or subtle prejudices, those possible avoidance and spurning I'd receive because for them I could be unstable, violent or dangerous due to my mental illness which may lead me to judging myself worsest than they do or even push me to the very edge of breaking down.

But all I could say now-to hell with all of them. To hell with all their negative attitudes and beliefs. I am. Not. My. Mental. Illness.

Gaddiel thanked the heavens hard that I finally didn't resist getting help. Manolo thanked the heavens harder, that I fought to live. And I thanked the Heavens the hardest 'cause reliving my life and allowing myself to mend made me see the beauty in my used to be chaotic bearer of a self in this equally chaotic bearer of a world.

As I go through with all my sessions, I've had little by little opened and closed so many doors-a door not worthy to re-enter, for it was where I had the darkest hours of my life, but was worthy enough to be unlocked to see how far I've fought; a door worthy to re-enter every time I feel like losing again, for it was where I had all the same-failed and succeeded to battle my inner demons; a door worthy to keep open, for it was where I found the people I'd be cherishing all throughout my everyday life; a door worthy to re-enter and be unlocked over and over again, for I supposed it was so far the best though under construction room-it was where I met someone who turned the tide and brought out the best in me-it was where I met you.

"Let's go?" the nurse pulled me back to my senses as she held me loosely on my arm. "Doctor Bobby's waiting for you."

I simply nodded in response and pushed to my feet.

After a few, I had myself seated on the one-seater couch where I used to prefer staying during our hour of a session every two weeks. She sat on my right and on her side located in front of me was an empty chair.

"How are you?" she asked along with the ever present warm smile on her lips.

"I think I'm doing better than the past months," I genuinely said.

It's a kind of conversation I hated the most before, but I now had myself acquainted with for wellness' worth.

"I could both effectively and efficiently work and communicate with my employees now," I went on. "Little were the times I am having that recurring nightmare that makes me want to opt to stay wide awake at night. Lesser were the urges of inflicting harm on myself as well as withdrawing myself from everything and everyone every time I feel so dirty with my past hitting my consciousness. I do have a little up to not much of those feelings of emptiness and helplessness though-yeah-that's just it," I held back at the agonizing thought of you.

"Though? Go on, Melo. You know you can tell me everything," my doctor said in her soft, heartfelt voice, I couldn't help not to give in.

"I-I don't....actually...understand....I-I may have been....in great progress as I see it....I may have....dried the wounds....of my excruciating past....But....I don't know....why....there's still a searing wound inside me....that seemed like....it's only her....who could mend....." I kept on stumbling.

"Melo, we are not in a race. This isn't about who heals first. This isn't about healing everything in one click. It takes time, so, take your time. Everything is a process. And the time of the process depends on your clock. Don't rush yourself because no one's rushing you. You shouldn't be rushed. Okay?"

"I don't know....but....but....when....I get to think about her....About what could've been us....It's sometimes....hurting....me still.....Makes me....want to heal...fast...'cause it somehow....makes me....unfunctional....it's driving me....crazy....I have....so much....to tell her but.....she wouldn't hear me and....that....swallows....the sanity.....out of....me...."

"Don't you trust yourself? Don't you trust your own process?"

"I-I do....I do. I do," I said with elevating firmness at each I do.

She smiled. "So, you think if ever you'd see her or you'd get the chance to talk to her, you'd be able to tell her all of it?"

"I...trust myself, yes...but...I....I am.....ready....at the same time....I....think....I'm not....for I am....afraid....I wouldn't be able....to find the words....that would match....with....with my....endless thoughts of....unspoken words for her....And words....that....that wouldn't.....make her.....leave.....the second time...."

She just listened to me, just as she always does. Never tells me she understands me. Never tells me she knows how I feel. Never tells me I could nail this and that. She just gives me an ear and a heart and a hand all the same. She just makes me feel she's with me. She never forces me to do things. Never forces me to voice out my thoughts especially when I'm not ready yet. And never was there a time that she decided what and what not should I do, perhaps she suggests. And it's amazing how I find every of her suggestions worthy to do. They're all helpful and best to my mental being-one thing I regretted I resisted before because I was still scared to pull all my unwanted memories from my unconscious back to my conscious, with which little I knew just dug myself deeper to a blackhole. Lucky am I, that it would never be too late to save oneself.

Later on then, she tossed a glance at the chair beside her, just in front of me all the while. "Melo, what if I'd tell you, you can talk to her-"

"How?" I cut her off, very much eager to hear how.

"What I can actually help you with here is for you to practice communicating with Sirach. It's called an Empty Chair Technique, where you'd get to have dialogues of unresolved conflicts with someone by imagining that certain person sitting on this chair, " she went on as she tapped her hand on the chair's cushion. "And then you'd tell that someone-you'd tell Sirach everything you wanted to tell her. Everything."

"She wouldn't hear me still. Would that even help? Would it not perhaps break me harder?" with furrowed brows, I asked. Though I trust her with every bit of me.

"Would you like to try?" I remained silent with evident hesitation on my face which vanished the moment she went on. "Don't worry, Melo, okay? Just like our usual processes for the past months with the other therapeutic techniques-if you're not comfortable with the process we are to do, you can tell me, and if this particular technique will inflict you any degree of distress as you do it, you can let me know as well and we'll stop right away, okay?" she asked again and I had eagerly nodded along with a thin smile which she returned before she pulled the chair closer to me.

I took a long indrawn breath as I dawned imagining you seating on the empty chair. I envisioned myself as I was just in an empty close room, and it's just you and me. When I finally did, it's like no one, nothing else, was existing.

"Austin, your absence was a perpetual gloom for what seemed like a millennium-that had I wished we've met in a parallel universe where the clock was set to our previous lives where neither of us were as damaged as we actually are so that we'd get to secure a lifetime of togetherness. But it's farcical how time really is an invariable wrecker in everything-that you came when I was still an evil resistant to blunt the sharps of my horns, and I came when you weren't yet of a pouring sunshine able to brighten up your own sky. As so you came when I was playing with my fire and you were splattering gases that instead of giving warmth-we burned," I started.

"How do you think she would react if you'd tell her that?" my Psychologist asked.

I chuckled bitterly. "I bet she'd just say, ha? Like what she usually says every time I tried expressing myself to her. "

She pasted a thin smile on her lips. "Go on."

"But did you know the worse we cause ourselves with? It was a realization of what appeared like a million ponders to know-that Physicists were downright candid when they said the truth in physics always seemed to be far-out than what we could've imagined, for we both came like two endless infinite voids that vacuumed everything in us even the love we are supposed to preserve-you emptied me, more so I emptied you," I had went on, but kept on stopping to swallow the hard lumps forming on my throat.

"You felt that way? You felt that you emptied each other?" she asked me again during my pause and all I could respond with was a hard nod as my eyes came watery. "For that, what is right there inside you that you wanted to tell her?"

"I wanted to tell you how sorry am I for all that. I am so sorry that I resented you thinking you were selfish when you needed some time to garner back whatever was lost in you while I was thinking highly of myself for offering you all that was left of me-when in fact you were actually offering me the best and I was offering you a half-baked one."

I stopped again when she asked, "How do you think she would respond or feel after that?"

"Like she's being swayed by a man, who fell the shortest of the person he should've been for her and mostly for himself," I replied and she simply motioned her hand so I had went on talking to a fragment of you. "Barring all that, I wouldn't tend to lie with the truth that you didn't waver to slip off my mind. That if I'd be given a chance to turn back the time and pick a memory I'd be replaying for the rest of my days-I'd unhesitantly choose those days when I could still own you and when I could still live for the idea of an 'us'. Then, I wouldn't dare to go back to the present, if it means I'd be jarred in the non-existent timeline of you and me. Either wouldn't I lie that other than wanting for the time to replay-I had still been creating a separate life with you in my head though there was little to no chance of fixing what had been broken in the love we are supposed to hold.

I know how far-fetched we are to still be put into actuality-making those hark backs and fragments of my imagination as the only means for me to have you-hence I am still keeping a hold even in the littlest of its probability 'cause maybe, just maybe, we're not really meant to happen sooner. Neither we're meant to happen back then. 'Cause maybe we're meant to happen later when everything in our own separate world has already landed into their right places. When we're both healed. When we're both the best versions of ourselves. When we're no longer chained in the agonizing pasts we had. When we're free to search for someone to own and ready to be owned. And I couldn't wait for that to happen, for I was-though I was on the verge of giving up-still am-though your seconds of absence kills me-and would be-though nothing in this world assures no one-waiting for your indefinite return."

I suddenly broke down right after my last word escaped my lips, not 'cause the technique caused me distress, perhaps the heaviness in my chest weighed lesser than the tons I used to feel inside. It was like though you were I-don't-know miles away from me-I reached you.

As the session ended, it took me sometime to muster up my sane, leave the room, and go on facing another day waiting for me outside. Outside where I didn't expect to have a chance-on with my second kind of sunshine that hadn't shone on my sky for several months when I saw you standing meters away from me, wearing a maternity dress shaded with my favorite hue while talking with a woman in white coat.

I might have drawn your attention for some unknown cause that you turned to look at my direction.

Then you smiled and said, "Nandito ka rin pala."

All the sane I mustered up departed when I heard your voice that I so missed to hear.

"Nandito.....ka rin.....pala.....?" I asked as I suddenly blinked a tear.

But what you said next came like a quicksand in the desert, it sucked all the sanity I had mustered.

"Oo....para sa sarili ko....sa magiging anak ko.....at para sa 'yo....kung naghihintay ka pa......"

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Epilogue would be posted some time next week. Let's kindly set our mood for it by listening to "You" by Basil Valdez.

I fancy you all to pieces.