About Nude Not Naked

Here are the statistics. I have had several long-term relationships with a few men. There is HighSchoolSweetheart, someone that I loved when I was 16. The relationship was a combination of obligation to God (we were church going) and pure innocence. I took a look at him walking into my life and I had gut instincts that he would be with me forever.

The feeling is weird. How do you describe looking at an angel and feeling that you belong together? And even when time and place tears the both of you apart, you will still be together in spirit. It is the feeling that there is this person on earth that will think of you and will love you. You will never be alone on earth because there is a connection to this person. You will never be alone because your souls are tied together and destiny will always bring you back together, like frothy waves along the beach on a summer's day.

You know when you are much younger, you do not have as much mobility as you do when you are older. When I was young, I was governed by the choices of colleges that I needed to go and he was governed by his career options. HighSchoolSweetheart and I were worlds apart, in a time when the internet was still scarce and email was unheard of. We burnt holes in pockets, calling each other and loving each other while our physical bodies were continents apart.

When we had better control over our futures and I was studying for my Masters, we found ourselves away from home and away from everything else. It was just the two of us, sitting in the bathtub, drinking wine and being ourselves.

He just returned from the UK with a bachelor degree and was basically bumming around until he had to go home to Tamparuli, to visit his family. Life was simple and fun for the first few months when we were together. Then reality struck and he flew back to Sabah to be with his family. His sister was pregnant with a drummer's baby. The decision to keep and raise the baby without a husband was a rather difficult feat to achieve when one is surrounded by village folks and Christians. He chose to stay back with her and to help her through that period.

It was something that I absolutely understand. He wrote me a long letter, a letter that is still with me. Sometimes I read it and a sense of despair fills my heart. I spent my teenage years sitting at the foot of my bed, crying and asking him to come back to me. How stupid, if you really think about it. He was in the UK at the time and he would not have listened, no matter how hard I cried.

He did come back. He did come back. He will always come back, you see. I might not know when he would turn up at my door but I know he would turn up in my life again and again and again. The bond is so strong, I knew we would continue to remember each other as we walked this earth.

Two years had passed when he joined a huge group of my friends, celebrating my graduation. He lost himself and his voice somewhere between all the bouquet of flowers and soft toys. Graduation could well be one of the best moments in my life. I was well loved by everyone. Looking at photos from that day, I can still see my father’s eyes gleaming with pride. I had so many flower bouquets that my friends had to help me carry them. And in the middle of it all, stood HighSchoolSweetheart with a secret.

Alan took a long walk while HighSchoolSweetheart told me that he promised that he would not walk away from me this time. By then I was already at a point when I could not deny how good Alan was to me and how much I appreciated Alan’s friendship. On that day HighSchoolSweetheart returned the gold chain I gave him when we were lying naked together in bed, a long time ago.

“You have changed,” he said.

“I know,” I said with a smile. I looked into his eyes. “I am no longer innocent,”

He saw me with Alan. Then he saw me with Henrik and now he is seeing me with Alex. It has been a long journey. We have been friends and lovers and friends again for almost half our lives. We talked through Yahoo! Chat often and then some times we needed space. We are both firstborn and equally as strong willed. Perhaps that’s how we survived through the years – through sheer persistence to track each other down.

HighSchoolSweetheart told me a few days ago that he was returning to Tamparuli. He is tired of city life and he can’t seem to score that chick he has been dreaming of. I nagged him. We are like an old couple sometimes. I nagged him that he did not try hard enough, that he had too high expectations of women these days. He basically wanted to marry a pristine virginal girl, like a pastor’s daughter, who is able to get down and dirty feeding free range chicken in the kampung (trans: village). Everyone knows that it is an extinct breed in KL.

It is upsetting. Maybe that is why he is doing this. He is doing it because he knew it would upset me. He is going back to his village, to be with his people. He said he wanted to grow a rice field and perhaps some maize. Find himself a simple church going girl and just breed like rabbits.

“Tough luck when you never had sex,” I typed into the Yahoo! Chat when he made the announcement.

It felt so sudden. I mean, I do not even have the time to give him a good-bye hug since it is my turn to be in the UK while he remains in Malaysia. Now he is going to get himself lost somewhere in the middle of nowhere, where internet connections are poor and mobile lines belong to just a few in the village. I will not be able to talk to him nor ask him how he is.

“Happy birthday! I thought you might cut the phone line soon
in your attempt to get rid of me, so here’s an early greeting.
May God grant you all your heart’s desires.”
~ a text message I sent him last evening.

He said he had to run. He cannot see me too often and we shouldn’t speak too frequently. He says it fucks his mind. He said he is doomed to a lifetime of loneliness, filled with his grandma’s nagging for him to “find a nice girl and settle down”. He said I should not be nice to men because it breaks their hearts.

He said it was all my fault. Then he asked if he could fly to the UK, kidnap me and tie me to a taugeh (trans: beansprout) tree. I do not know whether to laugh or cry when I read it. I am sitting at the foot of my bed, 14 years on and I feel like crying hard.

I am sorry.





"And I never meant to cause you trouble
And I never never meant to do you wrong
Ah, well if I ever caused you trouble
Oh no, I never meant to do you harm"
~ Trouble, Coldplay