“Hieroglyphic Heart”

•“Feel the Feels” Reedsy Contest (November 11, 2022)

•Writing Prompt: Write about a character reminiscing over something they should have said, and how their life would be completely different had they said it. (sad)

   “Hieroglyphic Heart”

Daniel Taa

     He sat at the park bench, waiting for her to realize that she loved him, in the hope that she would come back to Langston Hughes Park, the park where everything fell apart.  Eliot found out through a Facebook post about a man bigger than his body wrapped around his girlfriend’s arms.  Daisy had perceived bigger plans than Eliot.  Daisy wanted to study at John Hopkins University with a man named Tom, a richer man who had everything figured out in life for that time after high school.

        Eliot knew something about having everything together, maybe that is why she said yes to his prom proposal and their relationship which was based on the fact that their friends in high school, the graduating class of 2020, justified that Daisy and Eliot should be together given that they were the two friends with the highest grade point averages.

       Like every good couple should, Eliot really wanted her to take care of him when he started to get all lost and depressed from overworking himself.  But when Daisy left him for Tom, it was Eliot’s older brother and older sister who did what she couldn’t do for him when a man loses a woman.

       He walked home depressed and anxious, finding his older brother and sister waiting for him in the living room of their parents’ home.

    “I can’t go to school anymore” sighs Eliot to his older Filipino brother and older Filipino sister where the terms Kuya and Ate run in congruency with the terms as uncle and aunt, but for this undivorced ethnic family, the terms Kuya and Ate were used as a form of respect for an older brother and older sister.

         “Mom and Dad won’t like that I can’t finish school, but I just feel so unwanted and lost and like somebody just punched me in the gut” desperately gasps Eliot upon sitting down on the living room couch next to his older siblings.

       “Mom and Dad won’t care, you’re our little brother, they probably won’t even care if all you ever did from here on out was hang out with your friends and smoke weed on the weekends until you figure things out,” carefully says his Kuya Christopher.

      Alexis adds,  “Yeah, when my boyfriend broke up with me, all mom and dad ever wanted me to do was sit down in front of the TV and eat ice cream.”

       “But I’m supposed to major in English Literature and be a writer because we were supposed to live in a mansion, which she promised me we would live in on that train ride to San Francisco with our friends, when we listened and shared my earphones and borderline vintage iPod and the music and playlist that I always wanted my first real love to listen to, ‘I would give everything I own, give up my house my heart my home’ just to have you once again!…’” frantically and embracingly says Eliot.

      “Hold him down!” commands Alexis.

      As Christopher bear hugs his little brother with muscles made at the gym, Eliot helplessly fights the open air while repetitively singing, “I would give you everything I own, give up my house, my heart, my home… I would give you everything I own, give up my house, my heart, my home… I would give you everything I own, give up my house, my heart, my home, just to have you once again, just to touch you once again, just to love you once again…” and in doing so, Eliot falls asleep and Christopher carries him to his own room to lay him to rest.

“He needs rest” says Alexis to Christopher as Eliot sleeps.

“He chose the cheer captain when he should have chosen the girl on the bleachers with sneakers” solemnly says Christopher.

“We’ll brief and debrief him in the morning” closes Alexis.

…

       It was the feeling of impending danger in a societal norm which valued perfection and every implication dissatisfying the thesis that our lives and our personalities were anything but perfect which made us quit.  It was the sad realization that our lives weren’t perfect which emotionally degraded our nights when we came to the realization that we needed to go to bed and wake up to a new day of creating a future together.  It wasn’t necessarily the realization that sex is just sex, it was also the better realization that I wanted to create a life for us just outside of the drugs, the parties, the alcohol, and nights of sneaking out while our parents were sleeping.  It was the thought that we had a chance at it outside of the yelling and screaming of our parents telling us that they don’t send us to good schools just to have a good time on the nights that we could have and actually needed a comforting voice to lead us out of the feelings of the depression and anxiety we already had from our insecurities of whether or not we fit in to the upper class we were born into or the mere fear of watching our grade point averages go down a few points because Ivy League schools would never accept a student resume with flaws and imperfections.  And the pressure of coming home sad and hurt to be comforted wasn’t exactly a reality that was afforded to us in the fast life and the Filipino family affliction.  Because the fast life actually bought us friends, but it didn’t buy us a person who would look out for us in times of trouble, except if therapy bought us that privilege, yet both of us know that a love like that should come without a price tag. (Eliot in his composition notebook journal upon waking up).

“Watcha doin’?” asks Alexis

“Journaling about my relationship with Daisy,” says Eliot.

“Why don’t you message her on Facebook?”

“She blocked me”

“Do you want to visit her?”

“I’m a nobody, why would she want me to visit her?”

“When I saw a picture of my ex on Facebook, I was literally shocked,”  explains Alexis.

“What happened last night?”

“You partied too hard”

“Oh”

“No, you had a mental breakdown.  Most of the time, that happens to signify a shift in your life.  Kind of like a phoenix disintegrating into ashes and evolving into a more evolved form of a phoenix”

“Oh”

“But with a few cups of coffee, healthy eating, a lifestyle change, and a few tiktok videos, you should be good as new,” continues Alexis.

“How do you know all of this?” asks Eliot.

“10 years of therapy, medication, and experimenting, you pick up a few things…” proudly says Alexis.

“Oh”

“And you have some homework to do. In that journal of yours, you need to write down a cost-benefit analysis about your relationship with Daisy,” affirms Alexis.

“What’s a cost-benefit analysis and why do I have to write that?”

“It’s a pros- and cons- list about how you honestly feel about your past relationships which should save you the ten years of mental health services you might need to attend to”

“Okay, I will, Ate.”

“Okay, don’t forget to drink your coffee,” confirms Alexis as she serves Eliot a fresh cup of coffee.

“Yo Eliot, when you’re done with that coffee, do you wanna play some basketball in the backyard with me?”  playfully attacks Christopher.

“Okay, but I have to write a cost-benefit analysis about my past relationship first”

“Jesus, you gave him mental health homework right after a mental health finals week?” jokes Christopher with Alexis.

“Hey, I’m not the one forcing him to go to a mental health basketball practice after a tough loss at the state finals” retaliates Alexis.

Laughing together, Eliot looks in innocent confusion, but happy and wondering how he saw how everything was taken away from him, but yet how love, joy, and understanding can still exist.

“What did you do when you saw your ex with another person?” asked Eliot as he looked at his older brother.

“I got sexier.  I realized that if she wanted someone richer, above our social class, that just because she got someone richer, it didn’t mean she got someone hotter. I have a nice body.  What I valued most from my past relationships was the sex.  If she didn’t value it, then maybe somewhere along the line, she will, but the greatest socially acceptable payback was the fact that she’d want me back.  In the case that she missed the nights we sneaked out, she was going to have exactly no part of this hot piece of ass,” lectures Christopher.

“He probably texted his ex last night telling her all about how much he misses her and shit,” jokes Alexis.

“Basketball.  After breakfast.  And after homework,” justifies Christopher upsettingly as he storms out the backyard sliding door.

“Okay, I gotta go to work, see you in 8 hours,” says Alexis.

“If you get lonely and feel like you have no one to talk to, you can call Nanay.  She really helped me when I was going through a break-up.  Do you still have her number?” adds Alexis with her lunch bag in hand.

“Yes.”

“Okay, good. Another word of advice.  Sooner or later, you’re going to be her topic of conversation over coffee and tea at a coffee shop with her friends, so you best believe that you give her something good to talk about.  And don’t forget to do your homework” concludes Alexis as Eliot approves of her word of advice and watches the door softly close.

In his composition notebook journal, he wrote:

  Dear Daisy,

  What did I do wrong? I miss you.  I feel so depressed without our late night conversations, makeout sessions, and memories that hurt like a covid booster shot.  I miss our late night outs, our coffee outings and the times we would party together with our friends.  All our friends are separated off to college and I feel so lonely.  My whole life revolves around you and me creating a bright future with you got me feeling like I’m in limbo for all the effort I tried to put in the relationship and that Cross Country Competition to impress you, but instead of even showing up to any of my competitions you probably just told your friends that I didn’t get first place or that I put too much effort into senior year without you having informed me that we were supposed to save some of that energy for college.  Why couldn’t you just be honest with me?  Why do I get the feeling that you led me on?  I know you tried to make me stay, but all you had to do was open up and have a real normal conversation about where our future was headed.  We were supposed to look out for each other like a normal couple should.  I don’t get how feeling depressed should change things.  If you can’t be loving and supportive and nurturing for your own boyfriend, how do you expect to be loving, supportive, and nurturing for your own goddamn kids.  Kids who will probably never get to know about what we had because you cheated on me you godamn goldigger! I did nothing wrong, but love you honestly.  Just, just, maybe I’m just supposed to be content that I didn’t ruin your godamn future.  You were the love of my life!

…

     Eliot drinks more of his coffee, cooled down by now, before the time it was served with boiling hot water on a coaster, on top of his parents’ dining room table.  Then, he goes back to writing.

Negative Aspects of my past relationship:

•she didn’t know how to make love

•most of the time, it was really me talking

•she always gossiped and started rumors

•she loved math and science

• I hated math and science

•her parents didn’t approve of me

•she wasn’t as sentimental as me

•she listened to trash music

•she gets really jealous of people living better lives than her

•she didn’t know how to accept responsibility for her actions

•she didn’t know how to talk like a normal person

•she couldn’t have an adult conversation with me

•she complained too much

•she used her toxic family as a stepping stone to gain more friends rather than directly conversing with her family in order to work things out

•she had a bad history with other men

•she had low self esteem and people with low self esteem tend to get off when other people’s lives aren’t doing so good

•she took my sexiness, beauty, and handsomeness to her head or she got tired of it and took it for granted

•she found my monthly anniversary emails annoying

Positive Aspects of my past relationship:

•sex 

•someone to talk to

•I got to say that I had a girlfriend

•sex

•blojobs

•she gave really good blojobs

•I made it to third base, but not home plate

•blojobs

•someone to take care of

•someone to give all my love to

•I was able to exercise my need to be a good lover

•she would always laugh this type of laugh whenever I made the corniest jokes that was borderline too smart to be diagnosed crazy, but too idiotic for anyone else to understand

•that magical moment we spent on top of a hill at night with friends while she magically changed the batteries of our phones which were the same borderline vintage Samsung brand as mine

•blojobs

•blojobs

•her handjobs

•sex

I think I could email her, but really, I think that would annoy her.  Maybe I could just not write her or contact her and let the work I did in the relationship speak for itself once she snaps out of the infatuation phase of her new relationship because this girl just pretended to care and made you believe she cared about you when she really could care less about the people who truly mattered in her life.  She earns your trust then once she figures you out, she is off to the next person she could figure out and then leaves you lost and confused about life and the meaningful moments you held with her.  Her love was a losing game that just might make her feel as lonely, scared, and afraid as she did me and everyone else she left behind to rot in their own suicidal emotions.  Maybe I could just write how I feel about her in this journal and not ever show her but maybe show people who might want to be my future reader audience for my writing career which might work out with enough determination, endurance, and self-educated research in business.  I could use the composition notebooks as a rough draft manuscript for a novel I could write in the future around somehow getting published with or without an education because Maya Angelou and Jack London didn’t have a degree, but they turned out alright.  I don’t think I should go to school because it’s stressful and I would just be playing a losing game with her wanting to be a doctor.  I think I just have to stay in my lane.  Maybe I just need a new social life with working-class people, a good relationship with my brother and sister, a good minimum wage job with working class people like Starbucks where I can find someone who will find me weird but fucking beautiful like snow on the beach.  And I need to create a social media platform as a marathon runner.  Maybe build good strong, tight-knit relationships rather than short-term, shallow money-based relationships.  And I need to sign-up for a tiktok account.  Maybe if it all works out, she’ll be a doctor, and I’ll be a C.E.O./Writer someday.

“Hey! Are you gonna play basketball yet?!” excites Kuya Christopher opening the back door.

“Yeah! Almost done!”

Eliot finishes his coffee, puts the mug in the sink, texts his Nanay, Are you busy today Nanay? Can I visit you later today? -Eliot… then goes back to his composition notebook for a while, before opening the sliding door and entering  into the sunlight of his parents’ well-decorated backyard basketball court of a green-manicured bushes with his brother.

…

All this would have gone so much easier if we were just able to talk it out, the end of our relationship, like normal people, and just move on from it like normal people, instead of going through this whole plan of a charade to survive a modern day bourgeoisie social class.  Maybe if we had better communication during the relationship and when the relationship ended, we wouldn’t be so afraid of actually and really giving it our all in our next relationship.  Would what could have been fester like a raisin in the sun?  Or would this event become an opportunity for me to become the mastermind of my own success?  By design, maybe I just need someone who is raised right and who wants to raise kids the right way, rather than decrypting a hieroglyphic heart my whole life and living in a paper perfect Barbie World.  Life might be hard right now, but I know that it won’t always be this way.  At least it was not a dream deferred.