Isn't There

Big Fishes' Carnival at The Lake - Isn't There

“How would you describe yourself?”

Never before had a question from a simple English homework had thrown me into such dilemma. When I no longer heard the voice of my brothers’ scream upon horror movies, when the only sound I could hear was the sound of the gently but abruptly ticking clock, I decided to roll my pen over the whole page and jump to my bed. The homework wasn’t due tomorrow anyway. I still couldn’t believe that I had my eyes opened still for an hour or so thinking about myself.

I wasn’t really a strange person. I was just a normal student: waking up at 6, grabbing my breakfast of bread and butter with my jaws as I ran to the exit – for it just took so long to prepare for school – and attending lesson like normal people do. Well, my friend Pete would punch me unless I admit that I was smarter than your average seventeen-year-old boy, that I was talented in table tennis, and that I had a girlfriend (seriously, didn’t everyone have one?). Other than that, I think I was mostly a normal student.

As the chariot of fire slowly passing the realms of us humans, I pondered over what I had thought for ten years as normal, and only recently proven abnormal. I had talked to Pete about this and he said it was better, at least for now, that I didn’t tell it to anybody else, not even my girlfriend. Especially my girlfriend.

I mean, look at the Saturdays I usually spend with my girlfriend. It was always a trip to the amusement park: on Thursdays I would buy a ticket for two, Fridays for choosing a suit for the event, and Saturdays for following her and her limitless excitement of what we had experienced more than my calculator could count, with a kiss in her forehead as a parting gift for the day. I didn’t think that she actually mind if I was not enjoying myself all this while. Because I didn’t. It was just routine. The Saturdays felt the same, even when Pete was with me instead of her due to her emergency work assignment.

When asked, everyone got the answer they’re expecting: that I didn’t really like her. It was not like I had a problem with her, nor was she the problem itself. She herself was a nice girl: cute, sometimes angry but would forgive you in the end, always considerate to those she considered as people who “had yet to achieve their luck”. The answer to questions that follows the first question was, I would say, incomprehensible to others. Even to her.

She asked me the same question. I answered clearly. She followed what the rest had executed and I had her had the same answer. I really didn’t think that there’s a mistake in my answer, but I knew full well the consequences of explaining myself. Not long after she was merely a past, a previous partner, an ex. I should listen to Pete sometimes, I guess.

After all the reaction I’ve seen, I had come into terms that I was different from everybody else and no one would understand why. See, the thing was I didn’t love her. I didn’t love anyone in particular. I enjoyed the trip with Pete or Julia as much as I do with her. Who was with me didn’t really matter. People said it was wrong to go out with someone when you don’t love them. If that’s the case, I would be experiencing the life of a hermit crab.

It was generally accepted as normal for a boy my age to be attracted to the opposite gender, and it was true for most of my friends. Some admitted that it would be nice for them to have a girlfriend but refused to do so to focus on studies. Well, I wasn’t an academic-oriented model student or something, so I should have a  girlfriend. It’s just that, as I explained it to Pete, I felt no attraction to my girlfriend. I didn’t feel attracted to any girl.

Pete tried to confirm if I was gay, and for a moment I thought I was, but it turned out that I wasn’t attracted to guys as well. It was seeing people as just people, without distinguishing men from women, that he thought was awful and wrong. He concluded that I had no sexual preference, and to be honest, choosing neither would be me should the options were provided.

It wasn’t like I had some personality issues. Giant robots were cool. Hello Kitty were cute, but not really something to fancy. I chose paintball instead of tea time. I was a man, for the most part, and an extrovert who liked to befriend anyone. To most, I looked like a normal guy. Thing was, I just didn’t look for love. I was fine with the way things were.

How would I describe myself? Maybe it was just a normal guy that wasn’t attracted to anyone, boy or girl. A normal guy who didn’t look for relationship nor life partner, how rare that was. I should be proud of myself, yes?