A day of freedom, a lifetime of oppression.

Chapter 4 - Ghosts Exist

I spent the next few months checking in on Sharon's writing occasionally. If the world were a battlefield, her writing was where she retreated to when she was wounded.

There, she would bleed freely. And it looked like a bloodbath. I shared her pain as I read her words. I longed to embrace her again, like we had when we had met at the foot of her block, before heading to that park bench.

I was glad that her accounts, on the platforms she chose to express herself on, were publicly viewable by anyone.

There was something about her writing. Undeniable raw talent to express her most intense thoughts and emotions in metaphor. She wrote things which stuck in your head.

The first time I had come across her writing, it had struck me as uncanny in both emotional depth and in her carefree bending of grammar.

It had been months. Yet, we were still writing about each other. Unable to let go of the inspiration we brought to one another, we had been secretly reading the other's works.

One of the recent chapters in my book had been a farewell letter to Sharon. It seemed that there were no end to farewells between us.

"If I were a pile of smoldering embers, you'd be the crackling fire which sets me alight."

Or perhaps a towering pillar of flame, given how burnt I feel right now. I can't remember the exact words which were said. That's what happens when you say things without thinking too much.

All I remember perfectly, is the way I felt saying it.

It's the first time I've spoken like that. My existence had been a lifelong drought before you.

A spark in pitch-blackness is visible for miles around. A spark amidst a drought sends glorious beams of light into the distant reaches of outer space. In fact, if I remember what I have studied in science correctly, those beams never stop traveling, until they hit something.

Given how empty my universe feels right now, chances are they'll keep going. And yet, I am grateful for your timely reminder that the dying notion of muses - stemming from ancient Greek mythology for good reason - is irrefutably based in reality. I guess I'll just have to wait for the next one.

Forgive me for blocking out your light, for my eyes hurt from what they see. Forgive me for shielding my ears, for I find comfort in my music. And please, forgive me for staying out of reach.

It's the only way I can no longer burn for you.

How could someone ever leave your life if it were as though they were still regularly telling you about their feelings?

We were haunting each other through our writing. I finally understood that ghosts did exist.

On the days I woke up feeling terrible, I knew that Sharon must have been in my dreams.

Every morning, I told myself that the person who had seared love into my brain with a mere gaze was dead and gone.

It was easier that way.

That way I could accept that certain things were gone forever, like Sharon's singing. Sharon had never sung on her broadcasts, but she occasionally had when it had been just the two of us in a call.

I could see why Sharon did not sing on her broadcasts. Her singing did not have the pitch-perfect quality that audiences craved. It had a tendency to waver off-key. But there was a raw, uninhibited passion with which Sharon expressed herself when she chose to use her voice. And I very much admired that in her.

I guess it was typical to admire in others what I lacked.

I watched as she listened to Mandarin songs on her Spotify.

No matter how beautiful dusk is, darkness will set
I still remember the resolution in your voice as you said goodbye
As night fell, I had the fleeting illusion of burning sun scorching my body
Our love has become a disillusion

There was something about Mandarin lyrics being translated directly into English lyrics. Something was lost, in the process. Something of flair and beauty.

But the translation communicated the essence of the song to me effectively enough.

The glassy surface of a still river, framed by unyielding mountains, sears a scene of sensation into one's mind only once a day upon sunset. Was I forever cursed to suffer darkness after witnessing beauty?

According to Sharon, what I had felt between us was just all in my autistic head. Nothing but an illusion I had conjured up.

Happiness had always been an elusive creature to me. It slunk in the shadows, ready to cause injury if cornered. It did not like being touched.

I had avoided it the best I could. The consequences of a brief feel of its silky fur were often dire. The crash that followed the fleeting high was often too painful, and the recovery too drawn out for those brief moments of pleasure to be justified..

My life was a melancholic melody, peppered sparsely with the magic of discovering what seemed like my fate. But disappointment always prevailed.

Just like that ten dollars worth of Bitcoin I had bought for less than a thousandth of a cent each, a couple of months ago. I had read on the Internet that they were the future of money, and that they would soon be worth a dollar each. When that happened, I would have turned two dollars into twelve-and-a-half grand.

Something to help my parents with the rent, and pay for cigarettes, I had figured. Elation had been the default emotion for a couple of weeks. After all, I had finally stumbled upon a potential small fortune.

But Bitcoin had stayed below a cent each, and eventually, my dreams of never again having to pay in change again withered. They yellowed and faded as the darkness took over, once again. Heartbroken, I had cast Bitcoin to the recesses of my mind, refusing to think about it.

Let them rot forever where they are. I'll just pretend that I had dropped the ten dollars, I had decided.

But the pain induced by the cryptographic world paled in comparison to what I was feeling now.

Sharon had made me happy. She had made me feel so safe.

Every time happiness disappointed, it had been harder and harder to feel happy again. Would I ever be happy again?

I think I remember
The dream that I had
That love's gonna save us
From a world that's gone mad
I guess I just feel like
What happened to that?

The lyrics of 'I Guess I Just Feel Like' by John Mayer filled my room, as I continued to type my book on Wattpad. Every chapter was accompanied by an image. For the latest chapter I was typing, I chose a picture I had of her singing on a video call.

Digital photographs never fade naturally, unfortunately. So this one had to be forced through extremely heavy editing. I guess I'll just have to try to do the same with my memories of you.