Day Three

Listen <3

Day Three

It was mind-numbingly quiet today at work. I like to keep busy so I don’t have time to think. Today I had plenty of it.

I felt like a queen, surrounded by colleagues ceaselessly offering me chocolate that I didn’t want to eat.

John noticed my poopyfacedness.

What’s wrong sniffles, he asks. I say nothing and look at him, poopyfaced. He cracks up laughing and tells me I look like one of those miserable-looking little toy puppies with the wobble-heads that you put in the back of your car. I pout. He laughs more.

I know! He says. How about you take my Macbook Air home tonight. I tell him that would have been an excellent idea about a week ago when Jez was still in the picture, creaming over the prospect of spending the night with it.

He then hands me a box of Zoloft with a serious face. Take three. He says. I can’t keep a straight face.

The thought has actually occured to me. Not three tablets, but just the thought of antidepressants. That being said it was a very semi-demi-serious thought, if that. I know the mechanism of action of those things. I don’t want them potentially up- or down-regulating my catecholamine receptors, thankyouverymuch. This I have to take like a man. A sexy man. With boobies.

Back to antidepressants though. Everyone seems to be on them. I asked Eugene whether it was as simple as walking into a doctor’s office and saying “look, I’m feeling kinda sad, so gimme a tablet”. He said it was and I’m not surprised. There are too many doctors who prescribe anyone anything and call a cough asthma.

For a good part of the day I couldn’t stop being reminded of Jez.

Train goes past Lewisham in the morning. Mirjana sent me off to buy lunch from the pasta shop that sells the risotto that Jez liked that I once brought back for dinner. The whole plaza was reminiscent of us walking through it, me chirping away at “this is where I buy my shoes, this is where I buy my sushi, this is where I buy my lingerie. Giggle giggle”. The fruit shop full of things we said we’ll try one day. The harbour bridge we never climbed.

There are so many things I want to do. And in all honesty I don’t want to do them with anyone else, because it was never their plan. It was ours.

I’ve never felt so wrong doing something right.

Day Three

Pick a star on the dark horizon
And follow the light

You’ll come back
When it’s over
No need to say goodbye

Day Three

We went to see Prince Caspian last night. The movie was too long for my liking, especially when I haven’t seen the first Narnia movie. Prince Caspian was somewhat pleasant to look at, so I guess $12 well spent.

It was Mylinh, Derek, Jenny, Bao, Marty, and me. More appropriately put, Mylinh and Derek, Jenny and Bao, Marty, and me. Jenny spent most of the movie sleeping under Bao’s jacket, and I spent most of the movie poking Marty and asking him who Ice Queen and the lion were.

By the time we were home it was past midnight. After some brief bickering with Jez over I don’t even know what to call it, over talking, I guess, I went to bed. It was cute. It was like talking to an angry little boy.

Day Two

Everybody else thought we were perfect, too.

Stop making me sad guys. Please.

ryuhou says (6:50 PM):
to be honest
ryuhou says (6:50 PM):
im sure thigns will work out
ryuhou says (6:50 PM):
i duno
ryuhou says (6:50 PM):
last time i saw u
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
you jsut light up
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
when u talk to him
annie says (6:51 PM):
last time was last time mike
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
still
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
its like
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
ive never seen any1
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
like that
ryuhou says (6:51 PM):
im sure u guys got soemthing special going on

Day Two

Freida filled in for Eugene today. I thought Eugene had finally had enough of my shit and decided it was his turn to bail out just to spite me, but it turns out it was his birthday. I know this because we had scrawled our own names in black marker all over 29th of June and 20th of August on the pharmacy calendar.

I called to wish him a happy birthday and to inform him that I was right in predicting I’ll be single by this weekend.

I cried all morning. Freida made me many cups of tea and customers offered me much sympathy on what they assumed was hayfever.

As a result I didn’t end up tidying the store like Janet had instructed me to before she left. I bought lunch and threw it away without eating it.

Despite the above insanities I was still loving the novelty of my newly crammed exam knowledge. Freida has an aversion for scripts so it was up to me to save the day.

An elderly lady came into the pharmacy with a thick wad of repeats for a million medications. She flipped through them and was under the impression that sertraline, atenolol and ranitidine (which she referred to as “rafen”) were generics of each other. She was also categorising her medication by the time of the day during which she takes them, which I suppose would be fine if she didn’t have herself convinced that if two medications are both taken in the morning, they must be the same.

I recommended she visit her doctor to eliminate the drugs she won’t need to avoid confusion, and typed up for her a list of her current medications, their uses, and their substituted generics.

Another woman called to ask whether she can take Digesic and paracetamol concomitantly. I calculated for her the amount of paracetamol she’s allowed after her dose of Digesic, but found out later that she was developing allergies to the dextropropoxyphene and suggested she stick to paracetamol first and see her doctor for an alternative.

By the end of the day, I felt like I’ve done my job (despite the fact that the shelves were still dirty and I hadn’t bothered to vacuum a lot of places).

Freida decided to give me a lift to the city since there were no trains between Wynyard and the northern line. I would have much rather waited a whole hour for the bus and then have it break down on the harbour bridge because Freida dropped me off at … Hyde Park.

Day One

This is possibly the end of Day One.

I sat down with my parents after dinner. We talked about a lot. My faults. His. Ours.

I hadn’t told them a thing yet.

My dad speculates – he doesn’t love you anymore. He must have ruled out vice-versa because I looked completely miserable.

No, I say. He loves me. I love him. We want to be together. We just can’t … stand each other.

I had already told my mum about the ring. She had already berated me for my carelessness. So we fill in the gaps for dad.

He took it differently, and told me that Jez wanted the ring back because it had cost him a lot of money, and because he wanted to be able to give it to his next girlfriend. I said that was one thing I would bet my life on that Jez wouldn’t do.

Besides, he has to fork out $600 to have it fixed (or … remade) first.

So he was upset because you lost it, because that means you didn’t care? My dad asked. I nodded. And then you bought a new one trying to make up for it? I nodded. Jez’s dad had laughed when he found out that I had done so. My dad didn’t laugh. He just looked confused.

How can he make you feel bad enough to buy a new ring? He said. You screwed up and lost the old one, but now that it’s lost, what else can you do? If you’re upset about it he should be comforting you, not the other way around. He should understand. You didn’t do it on purpose.

I didn’t say anything. It wasn’t as simple as that, and it wasn’t just about the ring. He went on.

If your mother lost her wedding ring I wouldn’t be angry. I’ll tell her not to worry, and then buy her a new one.

My mum smiles at him. I smile too, vaguely aware that I’m admiring two people who I’ve always been sure have never been in love.