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I watch the news and I see you. I walk outside and look at the billboards, the displays at the store, the magazines and I see you. Every day, in one place or another, I see you. I went to see your movies just because I wanted to see you. You first public interview will air in just a couple of hours. I would not miss it for anything in this life. To hear you speak and tell about yourself. I can imagine sitting close to you and you telling those things to me.
Some say that it’s wrong and I’m a sick person, but I don’t think so. I’m not a stalker - I don’t follow you, I don’t spy on you. I don’t even know where you live, where you sleep or where you shop. I don’t know with whom you live and with whom you share your bed. I don’t know a single thing about you that’s not public. Not a single thing after high school. I can claim the title of your friend from back in the day, but nothing more. You don’t probably even remember me, we weren’t bffs or anything. Just classmates and casual friends.
But I loved you. I still do. I loved you from the day I first saw you in the first grade of high school. It was your beauty that captured me first. Your fine slightly curly blonde hair that you kept in pigtails. Your twinkling mischievous green eyes and your crooked smile that was constantly on your lips. You were tiny back then and I imagined picking you up many a times. To carry you away with me to the sunset, like your opposite actor did in your movie. I wished so much I could’ve been him it hurt.
But I am me. And we could never be together, not the way you want, not the way society wants. We’re both girls and you always talked about being a bride. I cannot promise that to you, nor could I promise you happiness. I could promise you distance and hate and suffering. Othering, contempt and exclusion. Those are all the things I could promise if you stayed with me. Those are all the things I’ve experienced after telling about who I was, who I am. Freak, they called me, sinner. Unnatural. I could never do that to you, so I keep everything inside and just watch you from afar.
As I sit here and wait for the interview to start, I try to remember what you were back in the day - a bit clumsy and cute, ambitious, smart. You liked acting even back then and joined the drama club even in middle school, you told me once. I high school you were already a seasoned actor and had played major parts on stage. But none of that went into your head, you were still nice and friendly. You always helped everyone, even me. You smiled and laughed. Lately, in your billboard ads, only your lips smile, but not your eyes. I wonder what happened? What took away your laughter from your eyes? Did someone hurt you? Did you lose someone? Is this why you’re always alone in public?
You interview starts and I absorb every detail I can. I was hoping it would’ve been a live interview, but apparently it’s a recorded one done a week ago. I’m prepared to memorize every question and every answer, so even if some day my recording dies, I can still remember all about you. You’re dressed more casually than in your ads, of course. It’s been awhile since I saw you in a simple skirt and blouse. You’ve matured a bit. Still short and cute as a button, but you look adult now. But your eyes are still the same twinkling mischievous stars they were when I saw you. You look happy. I smile at that. Whatever has happened to you, is clearly making you happy. I feel a slight tinge of jealousy when I think I’m not the one making you smile like that, but I’m used to it by now. I can be happy for you even if it’s not me who’s making you happy.
"Good evening, and welcome to our show!" The interviewer starts. I don’t really care about his greetings, I’m watching you. But so is the interviewer and he clearly notices. "What’s up currently, you seem brighter and happier than the last time we met?" He asks. So you have met him before? Maybe it was for the interview in the magazine last year. I don’t know, but this is your first public TV interview, that I know for sure. You look at him and smile at him, with that bright smile of yours that comes from deep within. The smile you used to sport back in the day. Who has made you that happy, I wonder?
"Indeed!," you answer happily, "I recently found… found what I had lost years ago and thought I’d lost forever. And it made me so happy my manager told me to stop screaming!" So that was it, I wonder what did you lose? You brooch that your grandma gave you when you graduated? You always held that close to you and you loved your grandma. I wonder if you lost that brooch and then found it. It was your memento from your grandma, after all. "That’s nice to hear" he says, "if I may ask you, what was it? A heirloom or an old photograph perhaps?" Called it, heirloom I think, but then I see your face. You shake your head and smile gently. Your eyes are cast downwards and a small blush creeps onto your cheeks. I’ve never seen that look on your face and it pains me that you can have that expression when you think about someone. "No." You say and smile at him. "It wasn’t a ‘something’, but a ‘someone’ " you say with such warmth in your voice. So you were in love? No wonder about that expressions then. I wonder what kind of person it is. Is it someone you met in your short college days? Or even someone back from high school?
The interviewer clearly gets more excited as he continues. "Oooh, love life! This is getting good from the start! We don’t know anything about your relationships, are you finally saying something publicly?" You look at him and clearly think about it, I can see your left lip rise a bit, which always marked that you were seriously considering something. "Yeah." You say, clearly having decided that on the spot. I can see your manager making frantic faces in the background, but you don’t care. "Yeah I am. I think it’s time." You say and sit straight, clearly this is making you anxious a bit. I wonder if the person is someone very known now, and this will set the headlines on fire for the couple of the year or something. You are pretty enough that you can get anybody, I wonder who you chose. "Wonderful!" The interviewer says. "So, who it is? How long have you dated? Are we going to get to know him anytime soon, or are you going to keep some secrets still?" You smile at him again and fiddle with your fingers. This was clearly something you came up just now, and not in the script. "We have never dated, " you say, "but I’ve loved that person for years and years now. Our paths diverged after high school and I was never brave enough to confess." You say with sadness in your eyes. So it was back when I knew you! I wonder who it was. There were a couple of guys in our class that some say were good looking. Or maybe it was something older. I remember all the other girls had hots for the third-years when we were in our first. Maybe it was a guy from an upper class that I never knew.
"oooh!" The interviewer gasps "so you confessed to your first love from school, right?" He seems clearly enthusiastic about this. "No, no I didn’t yet." You say. "I just found that person after so many years, I don’t even know if the feelings are mutual. But, I’m going to confess soon. Pretty soon infact. If everything goes to plan, when this interview comes out, I’ll be at her doorstop with a bucket of roses and tears in my eyes." You says and I almost missed it. Her doorstop. Her.
Contrary to what I decided from the start, the rest of the interview goes right over my head, I cannot think at all. The sound confuses me too much. The sound of a doorbell ringing, and through the window in my front door, all I can see is a bucket of roses and strands of blonde hair.
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