Circle of Clubs

There are two stories I know of you. They were the most important moments in your life, and I want to pay attention to every detail. We are at my home, my mother is cooking in the kitchen, and you are reading your book in the living room behind me. Your bookmark, a playing card that you said led you to me, rests on the lamp table beside you. It’s 5:00 PM, and I’m on the dining table with my laptop. You and I have been dating for about two years, but when I start at the beginning of what you’ve told me, it feels like I’ve known you your whole life. 

We’ve never met. But you already know me, and I already know you.

You said you were a different girl growing up. You watched shows no one else did and had strange hobbies no one else liked. You were young, but you remembered thinking you were nerdy with your glasses, and you read books but had no one to talk to about them. No one paid attention to you, but you would rather have that than be someone everybody knew. It’s much easier to stay within the shadows.

When you reached university, you were the same person you always were. You were Holden in a field of rye; terrified of growing up. But things were changing, and the tide was against your will. People were friendlier than ever. They would greet you at the coffee stand, ask about homework during lectures, and invite you to hang out at their places. They would ask if you drank alcohol, smoked weed, had your first kiss, or had done it with a boy. None of these things mattered before, and suddenly you felt like an open book able to be read by everyone. You thought they would see right through the fortress you spent the last eighteen years building and discover that your story wasn’t interesting. The problem was that you were the author, and although you had big ideas, you didn’t know how to write a remarkable ending.

Our school had a Welcome Week where new students could socialize before classes began. On the first day, you met your two roommates who would become your best friends, Miyako and Kaida. Their confidence intimidated you. Miyako was tall, cool, and had the wavy long hair you wanted. Kaida was short and wore glasses like you, but you thought they made her prettier. She radiated fun and would never run out of things to say, so conversations with her were natural. You were even a little bitter at the size of her chest. When the three of you were at big social events during the week, she was always the one who drew other people to your group.

Most people you met that week, you did not understand. All of them were out to get you, but in a good way. They all bid their friendship for your time. Miyako and Kaida were the highest bidders, yet even they were enigmas to you. Part of this enigma was the realization you needed them or else nothing would be initiated in your life. But even as you pretended to be similar to them and their greater group of friends, when you watched a lonely boy eating alone at the food court, or a girl in the main hall holding herself as if crowds were dangerous to her, you did not bother talking to them because you were not a bidder, and you felt rather grateful that you weren’t in their predicaments. This gratefulness turned into indifference at them, this indifference morphed into disgust as time passed, and this disgust soon turned into hatred, when later in the semester you smashed a plastic plate of food off a girl’s hands and blamed her for being too awkward at the party. 

You don’t know, but that girl cried that night. I know because she’s been a friend of mine since high school. She was as shy as you before your transition. That was her first party, and she only went because she understood she had to fix her shyness problem. After you did that, she never went to a party again.

This transition you had is the second story of you. The ending you wrote for yourself here is not one I like. I think about it a lot. I also think a lot about how it’s unbelievable you got there, considering your humble beginnings.

#

Although at the time you believed you had two paths, I know how this story ends.

To make things short, by the third week of your first semester of university, you will have a crisis. Your mother and father were immigrants, and they raised you to have the values of a society they once lived in, but you didn’t. They were strict about the possibilities you were allowed to hang out with friends. By the time this third week comes, you will end up believing that you are too sheltered for the culture of this place, and you will start believing in two things: first, that you must change yourself to survive for the next four years, and second, that despite everything your parents have done for you, you’re blaming it all on them.

You will spend more time with Miyako and Kaida. Soon, all their opinions will become yours. At one dinner, you will tell them about your favourite anime, books, and games, knowing with certainty that they do not enjoy these things. You still spend most of your time watching, reading, and playing them, but at this dinner, you will tell them it was only a phase you had when you were younger. And the most important part: “I’m not into those things anymore,” you’ll say.

Miyako and Kaida are very social, and the more time you spend with them, the more friends you will meet. Eventually, you will adapt and learn from them. You will observe the way they carry on conversations, their specific styles of humour, and how they make boys laugh. These will be intimidating boys, boys you’ve seen in your past schools but have never been interested in. The boys only talk to them, but as you learn more about how to act, you will notice they will start talking to you too. This will give you a rush of excitement, and this is when things don’t go back.

Your old hobbies will become an afterthought. Instead, one weekend, Miyako will take you to the mall to go shopping and you will wear clothes you’ve never worn before. Another weekend, Kaida will invite you to a karaoke night with her other friends, and you will try shots of alcohol for the first time. You will change, and you will not notice.

One day, you will see a poster on the wall of the student centre. It will be for the university’s gaming club. It promises fun, pizza, hot dogs, and many people who will share the same gaming interests as you, all as a fundraiser for a local children’s hospital. For you, to meet like-minded people was a dream, and you will almost fail to contain your excitement in public. This will be your chance. You won’t have to try so hard anymore. You can relax. What will you do?

You will ignore it and keep on walking. It’s a relic of an era long gone.

The night everything will change will be the club. It will be the same day as that gaming club meeting. In the week leading up to it, you will get close enough to Miyako and Kaida that they will be practically begging you to go with them, even though they know you’ve never been. You’ll learn many new foreign words: a cover, DJ, pregame, Lambdas, and so on. They will make your head spin.

The problem is that the club terrifies you. Thinking about it gives you massive anxiety.

“We’re going to have so much fun. We want you to come!” Kaida will say.

“And my boyfriend is going to be there,” Miyako will say. “Anna said she could drive us. Michelle will be there too, and Tommy, and…”

“Listen, Marielle, I know you’ve never been to a club before, but it will be fun, I promise. I’ll pay for half of your ticket. We’re going to get you so drunk!”

As a consequence of your new ties with them, their request will become your priority. It will take precedence over the new game you were going to download that night, or that book you borrowed from the library yesterday, which you’ve been waiting ages to read. Most of all, you will swallow your fear to accept the invite, and you will go with them at all costs. They will say you will have fun, but you will get too drunk and have a terrible time.

#

I remember you told me you were so scared that you didn’t buy that ticket.

The only things you knew about the club were from movies and TV shows, and none of them were good or humble. Loud music or dancing in crowds weren’t interesting to you. Your parents said to never do drugs, and they always told you to be wise about your decisions and the places you go. They were older, wiser, and had gone through it all before. They knew the causes and the effects, and most importantly, the outcomes too.

Whether any of what they thought was right or not, you believed them. You declined the invitation to the club. Miyako and Kaida were beyond disappointed, but you knew they would get over it next week. You decided to attend the gaming event instead.

When you saw that poster on the wall, you didn’t keep walking. You stopped to look.

You knew this other group of girls that liked going to these events in your classes, and they had once asked you to come with them after learning what type of person you were. You had rejected their invites because you were embarrassed every time they asked. This time, you called them up yourself. They were ecstatic to hear you were coming with them. They were bringing their controllers for Mario Kart, and you decided to bring your favourite social role-playing game, The Resistance. You played it with your cousins once at a Christmas party and you wanted to introduce it to anyone at the gaming club who was unaware of the endless amount of fun and laughter it could achieve within a group.

Before going, you felt you were betraying Miyako and Kaida. But they would not understand the type of fun you loved, as you would not for theirs. You ended up having a great time at the gaming event and you were relaxed with the people there.

#

One day, a handsome boy in class will hear you talk about anime and think you are nerdy. You’ll be within a group of people, and you will be talking with your new friends about it, and he will be in that circle. You’ll be the one talking, while everyone is listening to you, and he’ll make some remark about how nerdy it all sounds, and you’ll turn red and immediately stop talking about it. Your friends around you will laugh and not take it seriously, but it’s easy for them since they weren’t the ones talking, and it’s this moment when you’ll believe the boy’s words are right.

The following week you will start enjoying the things you’ve always enjoyed less. One day you’ll decide to stop watching anime, then the next you’ll decide that reading books is no longer for you, and finally, you’ll believe that games are only for kids. Real grownups have a mental list of the best places to eat downtown, the current jobs the people they know are working, and how to dress well with the latest clothing brands. So, one day you’ll start by learning fashion. You’ll go on the internet and look at flashy clothes, with the goal of learning what looks good on you.

Miyako and Kaida will help. They’ll be excited to dress you up. They’ll take you shopping everywhere, and you’ll ask your parents for money. No more hoodies and sweatpants. They’ll make you wear jeans, leather jackets, plain and plaid crop tops, formal blouses, and fancy skirts. They’ll teach you everything they know about how to make their hair and makeup look good. It’s all so new to you, but you’ll like it. You’ll like it a lot. Maybe you’re scared about wearing it because you don’t like drawing attention to yourself, but you’ll understand you’re making real progress on yourself, and actually, the attention might be nice.

You’ll spend most of your free time exploring these new fields. You’ll change the types of media you consume, from fiction to social. You’ll only be interested in things like a new sweater Miyako found, or what Kaida’s doing tonight with a new boy she met. You’ll feel like a different person, and you’ll love it. Now you’re growing up.

The next time you’ll chat with that boy who made fun of you, he’ll notice how you’ve improved the way you dress and changed your hobbies. He’ll even stare at you more because you’re now prettier, which will give you a little rush of adrenaline. But he still won’t ask to hang out with you. In the end, you’ll be glad you escaped your comfort zone, and Miyako and Kaida will tell you how good that will be. But at the same time, you’ll feel like you changed who you were, and nothing came out of it.

#

At the park one day, we were on the swings, and you said when you were researching fashion, it was so foreign to you that you were terrified of it. 

One time, when you visited home for a weekend to take a break from the campus, when your sister walked into your room and saw the clothes you were looking at, she said, “Oh! You’re going to wear that? You’re growing up!” and you blushed.

I don’t know what you were looking at to give her that reaction, but you didn’t continue researching fashion after that. The thought of drawing an entire room’s eyes to you made you uncomfortable. You liked keeping a low profile so much that you were happy if your professors didn’t know your name. You never told Miyako and Kaida about this short interest, and they never took you shopping.

You had looked at your other nerdy friends in class. They wore hoodies and sweatpants all the time. Their hair was frizzy and unstylish, and many of them had glasses and acne. But why were they so happy all the time? It didn’t seem like they cared that no boys paid any attention to them. They had laughed at the one that called you nerdy. You once thought that they lived in a bubble the way they depended on sticking with each other. That they deluded themselves in a lifetime illusion of control in a world where they had none. But Miyako and Kaida lived in a bubble too, the way they would never understand the lives of these friends of yours. You decided to become more like these friends, more uncaring about appearance, more uncaring about what people thought of you, more uncaring about the stresses of life. You avoided the boy who thought you were nerdy, you avoided anyone who didn’t like you, and you stuck only with your nerdy friends in class. 

Your true self was no mystery to Miyako and Kaida. You could not surprise those who lived with you, and even less could you surprise those who had limited expectations of you. They accepted you as you are, but no further.

This worked for you for a while because it was more comfortable. But every so often you got reminded again of your flaws. Perhaps it was a girl, or another boy, who insulted your clothes, or the games you played, or the obsessions you were passionate about. Each time this would happen, your peace was disturbed, your bubble got shattered, and you had to rebuild it. The bubble’s reused materials got weaker over time.

#

The new version of you will take over. I say it like this because this new you is still you, it’s just one you’ve never met before, and it’s unfamiliar in every aspect. It’s foreign to your parents, and they will not like it that much. Deep down though, your father will be happy that you are using the freedom they’ve given you, and your mother will be happy that you are becoming a woman she never could.

You will go to the club many times and meet so many new people. You will go to many house parties and will have a sense of belonging within a greater community. It will be great.

The problem is, you’ll have no close friends.

You’ll have Miyako and Kaida. But Miyako and Kaida are like you, and they have many friends, so you won’t always be at the top of their priorities. They’ll be with different people every weekend, and you’ll feel betrayed, even though their loyalty to you will never waver, it’s just that they have loyalties to many other people that don’t waver as well. These weekly betrayals will still hurt, and you won’t bring it up because it will feel like your problem.

“Relax Marielle, I think you’re being a little insecure,” Miyako will say. “I have to go home this weekend because my high school friend is having a birthday party. I would bring you, but she doesn’t know you.”

On another day, Kaida will say: “It’s like you can’t sleep without your eyes open! I planned this with Maya weeks ago, you can be alone for one weekend, can’t you? Oh, but I’m going downtown with other friends next Saturday, and then I’m studying for a midterm the next weekend after that, and…”

They will no longer feel like best friends to you.

You’ll feel like an outcast. So, you’ll start searching for something or someone to relieve your pain. There will be this emptiness in your stomach you won’t be able to understand, and not even your family can help because they’ll be hundreds of kilometres away.

One night, at a house party, a boy will talk to you because you’ll look lonely.

You’ll be next to him on the couch, and there will be cards on the coffee table. There will be people talking all around you, but you’ll look bored. He’ll chat with you for a bit, and you’ll chat back. Then, he’ll pick up the cards on the table.

“Hey, I’ve been practicing this. Do you want to see a magic trick?”

“Sure, I’m game,” you’ll say.

“Well, it only works 50% of the time.”

He’ll shuffle the cards. He’ll make you pick a card. He’ll lose it in the deck. He’ll show you five cards that aren’t yours, then put them on the table. He’ll do a lot of nonsense, but you’ll find it funny. He’ll show you the five cards again to make sure they aren’t yours, and you’ll assure him they aren’t.

“OK, I might’ve messed up.”

You’ll laugh.

“Wait! Let me try one more thing.”

He’ll put the five cards that aren’t yours in your fingers. Then he’ll slap the top four off. He’ll say it’s your card. When you flip it over, it’s the Queen of Hearts. It’s not your card, but he’ll make some corny line about you being the queen of his heart. You’ll find it extremely funny, probably because you’ve drunk a lot already.

“I’m kidding, I know that’s not your card,” he’ll say. “Your card is in your pocket.”

You’ll feel it there. When you draw it out, you’ll gasp. The Four of Clubs.

#

This boy will become your boyfriend. You’ll love him a lot, but soon you’ll learn that he is clueless about the things you used to like. He doesn’t watch anime, or play games, or read any books. He’s a lot like the current you, all he does is stay social and hang with friends. But all he’ll talk about with friends is the next hangout or past hangouts, as if that’s all they can talk about, a non-stop circle of them. It will all feel silly.

You’ll be able to see the child he used to be, but you won’t know if he’s hiding a childish past just like you. All you can see is him now. Maybe the both of you are pretending to be adults, and it’s been so long that now it’s true. Your relationship will feel like both of you are playing grownup and neither of you know when to stop.

You’ll know he loves you, but sometimes it will feel like he doesn’t understand how nerdy you still are. Worse, he may even not like it. He’ll never be one to understand the interesting facts you learn from the internet, or the emotional stories of the books you read, and this will bring you pain. You’ll be alone in this aspect. Sometimes you’ll even worry that he’s only staying with you because you are attractive. But this won’t be the final tier of the pain, it will be the fact that this attractiveness is one you spent the whole semester procuring yourself. It’s your fault.

You’ll feel more alone than ever.

On the night you’ll break up, the two of you will be at another house party. You’ll have quizzes, assignments, and midterms coming up, so the stress will cause you to be uneasy. You’ll be pressured to drink, so you’ll have more than what you had planned. You’ll be in a delirious state, clear to everyone at the party. Your boyfriend will try to help you, but for some reason, this will only make you angrier.

But what will anger you the most is another girl at the party. This girl is so shy it comes across as cute. She’s got glasses, she’s small, and she’s meek. She’ll be wearing a Kirby shirt, something you used to love. She’ll be everything you once were, so much that you’ll see yourself in her and it will hurt. In your eyes, she’s perfect. The problem is you won’t recognize her.

What you will do is go up to her, drunk, and try to have a conversation about games, since you can tell she plays. She’ll see you and get scared because you won’t look like someone who plays games. You’ll look crazy. The fear in her eyes will inspire your guilt, and this guilt will quickly turn into resentment.

“Stop being so awkward,” you’ll say. “I asked you a question. Answer me!”

When she won’t, you’ll smash the plastic plate of food she’s holding in her hands to the floor. She’ll let out a little cry and start apologizing.

Some girls will start defending her, calling you out. Some boys, too. Your boyfriend will pull you away from the staring crowd. He’ll bring you outside. He’ll try to talk to you and comfort you. By this time, you’ll have calmed down, and your senses will have returned. He’ll be with you, but it won’t matter. You’ll feel alone.

He’ll sense this. Then, he’s going to ask you a heavy question.

“You don’t love me, do you?”

Your heart will fill with dread and guilt. You won’t answer. But then he’ll say something that will catch you by surprise.

“You don’t love me because you found someone else.”

You’ll think about that girl at the party and how she doesn’t belong there. You’ll learn this is the root cause of your anger. You don’t want her there because you want to protect her. Protect her from what, exactly? Well, the tide of the world that washes away who we are. You won’t know it explicitly in words, but you’ll know this force exists, because it’s doing its work on you. 

The other part of your anger will be the revelation that she could not recognize another fan of games, too. You’ll be alien to her, and this will hurt.

“Yeah,” you’ll say. Then you’ll stare into my eyes. “I’m in love with someone else. But this may sound weird, because I haven’t found him yet. I feel like I’m looking at him now. Like I know him already. But he’s still a stranger, and I don’t know if it’s my fault. I feel like he’s watching and slowly slipping out of my reach.”

“It’s OK. I’m fine. You can still go back to him.”

“I don’t know. It might be too late.”

He won’t know what to say to that. Instead, he’ll change the subject.

“That girl didn’t belong in there, huh.”

For a second, you won’t know which girl he is talking about. “No, she didn’t.” 

You’ll exhale. “I don’t get it though. Don’t you think it’s good to be balanced as a person, though? The people in there have been in this game longer than she has, but it doesn’t mean she can’t play. And you saw the way she looked at me. Just because I’m, well, me, it doesn’t mean I can’t like Kirby, does it?”

You’ll start explaining everything to him. You won’t know why you started on this path in the first place. The social events you’ll have gone to will all be fun. You’ll have the time of your life. You’ll have made many memories with a large group of people. This sense of community will be unforgettable. 

But it just won’t feel like home. Suddenly, you’ll be flooded with memories of your father reading in the living room, your mother cooking in the kitchen, and you playing games on the TV with your sister.

#

That’s why you never went to those parties.

At least, that’s what you told me. You did go to many clubs, but they were the nerdy kind. The only parties you knew were the ones where you thwarted Bowser’s plans.

The thing is, you won’t exactly be happy.

But you’ll be happier. All you ever knew was home, so you brought home with you to university. It only made sense. Others sensed this home and were reminded of theirs. So they made friends with you, and you watched anime with them, played games with them, and read the same books as them, even well into your twenties.

You felt loved. You stayed who you were. You didn’t know many people, but the ones you knew were comfortable enough to have you over at their house, and that made all the difference. You had real best friends, the ones that would be at your wedding and would make it to your hangouts on the weekends even with two or three kids to take care of in the future.

At the board games club, you met my friend when you played Clubs with him and two other people. You won the game with the Four of Clubs, and you got so excited the group laughed with you. It was memorable, so you kept the card as a bookmark. My friend learned you loved to read, so he told you to check out the book club. One day, you went.

This is when the story of me and you began.

“Hey,” I said to you, at the book club. I told you I liked your shirt. It had a character on it from a video game we both played and loved. Later, you would tell me how obsessed you previously were with it, and I’d tell you how I experienced the same thing.

“Thanks,” you said, with mild happiness. Then you told me about how you got it at a convention. I listened with genuine interest. You started with transparent boredom on your face, but when I asked more, the uncertainty in your eyes was replaced by enthusiasm, and as you chattered about your time spent there, and as I reciprocated the same knowledge of the topics only you’ve known about your whole life back, your smile got bigger.

#

When you almost failed to be at that reading club, if you had gone to those house parties instead, you were a girl I almost never knew. But you made it home.

Now you tell me you wanted to become a different person. That’s OK. We’re allowed to change. But never do it for others. Well, I suppose your introverted fear had given you greater happiness in the end, and you should listen to your instincts if you aren’t comfortable with something. We have them for a reason. Danger today is disguised. Well, now I sound like your parents. But your old hobbies aren’t a bad thing, there’s a reason you like them, and others like them too. So many more than you think. Like how you didn’t recognize that girl at that party, and how she didn’t recognize you. But there are people like her that go to parties, and there are people like the second version of you that like games. It’s quite laughable that this is a problem.

But you’ve yet to figure it out. As of now, I’ve known you for two years. But that’s my perspective from now. As for you?

The truth is you haven’t met me yet. You don’t know if you ever will. So at every moment in your life, you’re faced with a crossroads of decisions that could increase your chances of finding someone, but lessen them for finding me. It’s a hard decision because life is short, and you want to find me young so you’ll have the most time with me, but you don’t know if I’ll be there for you sometime in your future, or if all you’ve been doing is wasting your time and you should give up and settle. It’s impossible to tell. 

Do you want to be loved, or do you want to be yourself?

Some stories say that all you must do is wait. Others say that you must go out there yourself, make yourself available, and connect with the first person you will, because you must face reality and real people, and the goal is to accept the differences between the two of you to stay less lonely.

That is not the goal though. The goal is to find the one that you can be yourself around. The one with the greatest capacity of repair when the two of you will fight. And fights will come. You can argue with gypsies or throw cards to change your fate about it. It won’t matter. Fights will come, and they will be the test. And, if after them all, they still stay; well, that is the goal.

Some people win the lottery, some people don’t. Some start the game as twos or threes, but others start as a Queen of Hearts. Some draw the Joker and laugh at all their misfortunes. You drew the Four of Clubs. For every person for you, there are ten thousand not for you. For every year you find a prospect, there are ten years you don’t.

It has arrived at an extent where we must make a constant effort to preserve what makes us who we are, against a torrent of a world trying to take it from us. More than ever comes the need to protect it like keeping a fist-hold on our card during a tsunami. Where advertisements run amok the masses and their effects on self-esteem are uncontrollable; where we are disrupted from the peace of our lives every day with constant digital reminders of how much better the lives of those around us are. It’s incessant, it’s unyielding, it’s a ceaseless burden and it makes us grow weary of living. The most dangerous symptom of life.

#

Once you walked in an atrium in a futuristic city in a foreign country. This atrium was inside a giant mall, and it was full of plants. Vines climbed up glass walls, letting sunlight slip in between them. Modern architecture was before you, sleek and vibrant, intricately in accordance with the green of the trees and grass, in harmony with the mirror-like backdrops where you could see your reflection. The garden was tended to and healthy, as if reserved for a holy figure.

You were on a trip with your mother. It felt freeing that no one spoke or understood your language, so the only way you could meaningfully connect with the people there was through humanity. It was here you took a break from life, inhaled a deep breath, and understood your potential. There were children with their mothers playing around the benches and fountains. The laughter of the children, a language you did understand, was calming for you. It reminded you that life wasn’t inherently arduous or joyous. You felt the way they felt, and you were carefree. Since they didn’t know you, you could have invented yourself in any way you wanted to them.

You were as indeterminate as a card yet to be drawn, always present but never fully realized. The peculiar thing is that it becomes clear what card you’ll choose two seconds into the future. Suddenly, there won’t be any other possibility of having chosen another card. You’ll wonder why it was a mystery in the first place. It’s not for me to say you’ve reached that point now. It might be best to say you’ll reach it when you finally learn the trick.

When you walked around, you knelt and found a four-leaf clover in the garden. You were so proud to find something everyone had overlooked, but in return, you had no one to show it to. Your mother was busy somewhere else. Regardless, you recognized this to be an important detail of your day, and you were happy for yourself. You smiled, pocketed the clover, and moved to the elevator.

In the elevator, a mother and her young daughter were inside. The girl could not have been more than seven years old. She watched you with wide eyes, then spoke to her mother in a foreign language. For a moment, your peace was disturbed again, and you paused to analyze yourself. Your trauma returned as adrenaline rushed to your heart. You weren’t dressed in any particular way, and your hair was alright. Nothing was on your face, and you had walked in with a smile, not any emotion that would cause reactions. You hadn’t even spoken, so your foreignness would not have stood out.

Then the girl spoke in English. “Mama, that girl is so cool,” she said, tugging her mother’s dress and looking up at her.

The mother hushed her, but it was too late, her effect on you had taken its place. You were infected with a creeping smile. All the blood rushing to your head stopped. You don’t know what that child saw in you in that elevator, but you liked to believe she had seen your character. You could not hold back your joy, despite your efforts to remain outwardly composed, but you saw the mother see your smile from the corner of her eye, and although she didn’t make eye contact with you, she smirked as well.

You realized how far you had come. Little girls looked up to you and thought you were amazing for being an adult. To them, you were ahead in life. You were composed, organized, and you had your life put together, even if you personally didn’t feel like it. You could walk alone in a mall without your mother, and to them, that was cool enough. The little girl didn’t know anything about you, but she had judged you worthy of yourself. You didn’t have to invent any part of yourself. You just had to be.

You would remember this for the rest of your trip. Even on the plane back, when it would resurface in your memory, your mother would ask what you were so happy about. You wouldn’t give any details, but you reassured her that this trip had boosted your confidence.

“That’s good,” she said. “I’m glad you liked it.”

From the beginning, I knew your destination. I wasn’t worried about you. But during these important parts of your life, you were almost lost, and you hadn’t yet drawn your card. From my vantage, I can see the nights where you cried, the days where you felt alive, and everything in between. Some of it has already happened, but most of it hasn’t. It’ll be there waiting for you on your path to this living room at 5:00 PM. Or I suppose it’s been half an hour since then, and you’ll be about twenty pages ahead in your book in the future.

Whoever she is, I just want you to look back at your old self and recognize her. Remember that all the way through your life. I want you to still recognize her when you’re walking down the stairs of your home, a handbag on your shoulder, a book under your arm, your playing card bookmark tucked in between the pages of your story, a story you’re finally sure on the ending of, on your way to meet me. That’s when I’ll be there.

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