Sunday, May 30, 2010

The rain...if it were a song, I could've memorized it by heart, every beat of it, and maybe add some notes of my own.
Saturday morning offered a mild sunny cheerfulness, I got up early and ran to the second floor to make a quick breakfast fix; instant noodle boiled in water. It tasted like how it sounds. I ate the noodle half-heartedly while looked outside the wooden window, the small road was still abandoned, the wet fresh leaves of the trees and the browning leaves of Benjor from last Galungan and Kuningan festive days stood helplessly next to the right gate.

We went to the office that day for a quick work. My friend gave a a silent treatment during the whole ride, constantly rubbing his nose, his neck, and yawning, and touching his belly. He said he was okay, so I stopped looking at his restless self. We drove in silence except for the loud music from the USB stick and our occasional curse to another drivers.

The weather turned ugly as the afternoon approached, we left the office around lunchtime, still no much words spoken, this time he drove faster, I danced to the bent of the road, nodded my head and tapped the palms of my hand on my thighs and sang louder to the same musics we have been listening for almost a month now. He sheepishly followed the beat with his bass voice, hummed when I smiled and  looked at him, with one hand touching his belly, 'hey, what is going on?' I asked him.

'I'm always okay,' he replied looked to the other way, avoided my stare.

We pulled over across the Balinese restaurant for lunch. Sat down. He ran his fingers on the keyboard of his mobile, texting. I looked at the Balinese teenage girl whose seat facing mine on the other row behind my friend's seat, then scanned the whole small room, then returned my gaze to the same girl who had been checking us out since they arrived. Now the boyfriend turned his head and looked at me, a suspicious look as if I were teasing the girlfriend.

My friend put down his mobile, looked at me without smile, I waited to hear him saying something. I sipped my tea, hungry but didnt really want to eat anything, the food came and soon he grabbed the spoon and the fork, started his lunch.  'I have been suffering from this diarrhea since last nite,' he finaly confessed, 'I was woken up from my sleep last nite because of migraine.' I didnt respond, looked at him, waited for more detail, 'and my back hurts,' he stopped, mimicking a sad sick face.

I let him went home first, 'I gotta walk to the barber shop to get my hear cut.' He had a good nap that afternoon when I watched the first four episodes of Queer As Folk season three on the computer with my headset.

It rained again. My plan escaping the boredom by going down to Kuta became impossible. I retreated to the sofa and called it a day.