Short moments

“Anyone wants more ice-creams?” Ray held out several cones of a variety of flavours: there were cookies and cream, chocolate chip, good traditional vanilla, and tangerine orange. He grinned widely as the children gathered around, each jumping for the prized food, screaming and shouting in noisy excitement, hands outstretched, as Ray held the dripping ice-creams high beyond their reach.

“You have to stop tempting them, Ray,” a slender young lady approached him from behind, lightly punching him. The echoes of the children’s shrill voices pounded on her ears.

Ray smiled at her, a genuine smile. He distributed the ice-creams to the young kids and thanked the ice-cream man with the regular annoying childish theme song blasting from his radio.

Ray held her hand and both walked away from the park. Ray had never bothered splurging his money on himself or on the others until lately, and it had his girlfriend wondering. Puzzled at his sudden change of behaviour.

As light faded into dusk, the sky painted with hues of red and blue, they entered the nearby local Amour Bar, professing an antiquated outlook and a tantalising selection of cocktails. “Bonsoir¹,” Ray nodded to the bartender, who was in the middle of disinfecting mugs and glasses.

The bartender, a burly, hairy man, barely looked up from his intense concentration of making sure the drink receptacles were rid of unnecessary bacteria. “Je voudrais un vodka, s’il vous plait²,” Ray motioned to his friend of many years, a companion whom he could rely on for listening to his oft-repeated wistful tales of work.

“Since when have you been spouting nonsensical French?” the bartender asked, while continuing his meticulous rubbing and glasses-cleansing spree.

“Since I realised how beautifully eloquent the language is, Alex,” Ray stared at the rows of carefully placed bottles of liquor behind Alex the bartender blankly. “I’ve always wanted to take classes, you know. It’s bloody romantic and -”

“I know, I know,” Alex sighed, placing the last wiped glass down. “And what would our beautiful missus want?”

“Just the regular, Alex,” Jul’s eyes twinkled.

Three drinks later, a rugged-looking man with a goatee sat next to Alex, and ordered himself a mug of beer. Alex detached himself from his deep conversation with Jul, and turned to the man, an air of familiarity surrounded them.

“Hey Henry,” Ray said, the words coming out in a slur, his face flushed red.

“Yo Ray my man!” this person of utmost familiarity returned the greeting. “So how you going?”

“Nothing much,” Ray took another sip of his Absolut. “Other than the fact I’d like to confess how much I’ve admired you and hated your guts.”

Henry took all of one second to decode the hostility and lunged at Ray, who deftly turned to the side.

“The fuck, Ray?”

“If you’re asking me what the fuck is, it sounds like your face,” Ray laughed out loud at his pathetic joke.

Henry’s face cringed and twisted with anger, as if he was trying very hard to prevent molting lava from erupting beneath his skull. “I’m gonna -”

“I’m so sorry, Henry,” Jul lightly pushed Ray away. “He must’ve drank a glass too much.”

“It’s only fucking vodka!”

Jul ignored him and left some notes on the table for Alex. She dragged a half-awake Ray away from the potential bullfight, his eyes bleary and dazed.

---

Ray awoke with a start.

His head was like a tribal drum, bashing against his cranium like a song gone wrong. Like a song infused with elements across the genres, it felt sucky. His head felt sucky.

He gingerly removed the blanket smothering his body, and strode to the nearby drawer, his left hand supporting his head as if it threatened to disengage from his neck anytime.

It felt like a hangover. But Ray was pretty certain it was not. He reached out to the small bottle awaiting him from beneath the recesses of the drawer and took out a blue and white pill. He swallowed it, his breathing less hard, less noisy.

The luminous green digits stared back at him: 3.14 a.m. His head still hurt.

Almost crawling back to his bed beside Jul, sleeping peacefully on her side, Ray hugged his knees up to the forehead, seeking comfort, seeking relief of this physical pain.

”..not asleep yet?” Jul turned to him, mumbling.

“I’m scared, Jul. I’m scared,” Ray enunciated slowly.

“What about, Ray?” she began to rub her eyes.

He turned to her, facing her shielded face, hidden beneath her silhouette. He paused, mustering the courage to say the words. How could this be any harder than muttering sincere words of pre-engagement, like a common procedure, “Would you marry me?”, just two weeks ago?

Ray was quite afraid. Not for himself.

For her.

“I’m dying, Jul.”

The world seemed to stop.

It took quite some time for those words to sink in. Die. Dead. Death. It meant a host of things apart from Ray not being with her. It meant he would never be around to cuddle her, it meant a loss of a best friend and soulmate, it meant there would never be tiny kisses before going to bed.

“Dying from what?” Jul’s words struggled to come out. Struggling to come to terms with the word ‘death’.

“Cancer.” Ray replied, simply.

“Did you go for treatment? Chemo? Radiotherapy?”

“No,” Ray shrugged.

“Will you try them, for my sake?” she asked in bewilderment. Her initial reaction was leaning to incessant screams of “Why not?”

“I’m sorry Jul, but I’ve already seen enough what chemotherapy could do to you. Your hair dropping off, difficulties in eating, suffering all the way to one’s death. Sometimes it seems as if it’s the therapy that kills you, not the cancer.”

Jul began to sob as the word ‘death’ slowly enveloped her. As she slowly understood what it really meant.

Ray thought upon the ice-creams he had once bought for children whom he didn’t even know, his long put-off French classes, his girlfriend’s exorbitant engagement ring, his recent skydiving excursion, his even more recent confession of loathe and dislike to a friend of many years.

And his confession of undying love to the girl whom he loved for many years.

“Is that why you’ve been spending all that money?” Jul’s words staggered out in between her tears. “You were so thrifty before. So.. stingy, even.”

Ray nodded. He made no attempt to console her, but he gently pulled Jul’s hand on his chest.

Thumpthump, thumpthump, thumpthump. Half a second interval. An endless cycle of rhythmic pulse.

“It’s still beating,” Ray said, almost amused.

“Then let’s enjoy the moment.”

---

¹ Good evening

² I would like a vodka, please