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Everything was falling apart. It was dark. Thui needed him; but she knew in her heart that he had used her. She did not consider leaving him; but there was this opportunity, this great chance. She had thought that her dream was not there or she had gotten to the end of it, like when you wake up in the morning and think you're still dreaming. But soon she realized that there was still hope. She wanted to hang on to that dream no matter how illusory it was.
She needed to part, to part from everyone and everything; and start anew. She was aware that every separation meant connecting somewhere else, and each connecting would be another slavery.
She always had the nature of being attached when she was very young, almost a child; for she had learned at a very early age of twelve that the only people who had the look of loneliness were the ones who were not able to be really together. Others like her just would adhere to the crowd. She was not part of anything or anyone; and definitely no one and nothing was part of her. She would stand withdrawn from people even Chean, feeling not so much part of him or herself. Everything was only part of her situation. Nevertheless, she was more tolerant than anybody she knew because she loved no one and if she did, it was just a little.
She always despised people who had a look of suffering and disconnection along with a certain kindness. She would not understand it. She showed no suffering and she lacked kindness. She did not want to waste her life, to spend her life without refreshing it. She was bored, discontented, and she blamed it on her circumstances. But when she looked around, she noticed that everyone was bored and dissatisfied. It just killed the audacity and energy that she needed.
Love, the great emotion which ordinary people understood, was just the same for the literary people. It had lost its meaning for her a long time ago. She remembered all that love, the young, unprotected love she had and learned at very early age, calm and lengthy, sensible and emotional; nonetheless, now she had no memory of it, as though it never happened. Now she was not sure if that had been love or lust.
She remembered the first time she had felt the desire for being with a man. she was only thirteen then. She had nor known any man, neither was introduced to the nature of intimacy between men and women. She was bathing when suddenly she felt this strange sensation. It was her first moment. She shuddered, almost slipped, it took only a half minute. but when it was over, she felt something that she had never known before. She twisted in pain, almost lost her breath. Even though the sensation was painful and unfamiliar, she tried to feel it again; but not every time it happened.
One year later, at age fourteen, she had the real thing for the first time in the alley behind her house with a local boy. It was not the same. It seemed all that boy thought about was to gratify himself. After he was done, Thui clung to his boyish body and with entreating eyes and without talking made him to go on. But the boy released himself, got up from the dirt and walked away from her. She allowed other boys to do the same to her. Almost everyday she find a boy to do that to her, and never she felt the way she had sensed when she was bathing. With boys, every time she was more disappointed than before. She became famous for letting boys to do it to her, she was called names; until she met Chean. She was then fifteen.
Chean's calm and oval face did not reveal any emotion as Thui's did. However his speech carried a sorrow more overpowering than Thui's usual ferment. The relationship of a man and a woman had never been an easy one; but perhaps it was the grandest and simplest in the world. And when it worked, it was certainly the most rewarding.
However for the very young, inexperienced couple it was full of battle along the joy. With him, Thui sometime felt the pleasure that she could only get while taking a bath. She mostly had the pleasure, like the very first one, on her own. She believed then that men mostly would not consider that women could be gratified, too. Therefore, the intimacy was only a thing for men.
To Be Continued
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