Infidelities

Andrea started jogging on a Tuesday. It was raining then.

She used to belong to the college track team but she smoked too much so she was kicked out when her lungs gave out. She decided to start jogging when she was 15 primarily because she was overweight. There were also other more humane reasons. She liked the feeling of the wind on her face She liked how its carelessness elbowed out the madness that she felt stealthily growing in her because of latent loneliness. She does not recall why, inspite of her being loved most of her life, she always felt like a marooned ship that was always far from knowing home.

She has gone a long way since those times when she felt so insecure that all she could eat were tomatoes. She preferred them ripe and red and ate them all the time. She stopped consuming them when, during a Physics class review, she fainted deadaway. It was the heat she mouthed pleadingly to her crying mother. I wasn't trying to kill myself. It was the heat.

That Tuesday, she decided to take up jogging again because she felt the same madness crawling on her skin, then eventually they found a way into her veins. She stopped wringing her hands for awhile to suit up before she went outside.

She loved jogging on pavements. Every step made her feel hurried, always moving towards something. Most of the time, when she ran, she never thought about a particular destination or a stop. The road that she was on was enough to keep her going, to tell herself to move without precaution nor doubt. The road was all she had.

This resolution actually stemmed from the picture she saw. Girl, mid-20's, with legs that went up to her armpits. Found it pressed in his copy of "Of Mice and Men." She laughs at how fittingly ridiculous it all is. At the back of the picture, enclosed in asterisks was the word Remember.

She wonders why he always seemed to prefer ordinary women. Women who were stunning until they opened their mouths. Women whose eyes made one drown in the sheer magnitude of unused space. Souls bursting open but are always as opaque as moonlit walks and talk over wine.

She is arrogant enough to acknowledge that there was nothing common about herself. Published at 16, she was a wunderkind of sorts in literary circles. Many tried to copy her writing style, her effortless way of putting things in a more practical, less sentimental light. On her wall, she has positioned framed commendations that she likes to look at from time to time.

It is comical how she has fallen flat on her self-worth. All of it meant nothing, after all. She seriously doubted if that woman, whose sensual mouth forms a constant O , even reads anything other than the oppressive women's magazines.

Her friend tells her that maybe the reason why he kept flitting from one paramour to another was because he was bored with her. Bored. The word left a dry taste in her mouth, the way you would feel after you drank so much gin and forgot to brush. Her resolution was her noose, her salvation.

She jogged twice everyday since that Tuesday. Tomatoes were again everywhere- on baskets, in the crisper, on the kitchen table. She went to the gym everyday. And everytime she weighed herself, she smiled a secret smile that told him nothing.

Tom, as usual, was perfect. He lacked nothing, therefore wanted nothing. He never lacked giving out the right words at the time whenever they were needed. They were his versions of chocolates, cinnamon,candied apples. And she would just smile and told him to wait. Wait until I reveal my true self . She smiled like a Madonna she'd seen in church once.

While jogging, she met someone. What drew her to him was his insolence. Tom would never be insolent, nor raggedy-looking, nor mediocre. Paul, he never accomplished anything in his life. No stage play productions, no ladders to fame. And everyday, he fell in step with her while she ran and they talked. His words were blankets for he was never condescending nor expected anything of her. Why would you love me? I've never been loved before. Why would I ask you to take on the impossible?

And at times, he would mumur, You and I, we're the same sad story.

You and I. Words that tasted like tomatoes. Tom always used the pronouns I and you separately. It never dawned on him that linking them would be appropriate. Right.

And she would listen and nod her head and feel sorry for his lamentable ordinariness. She would watch him want her. This interests her for she hasn't been made love to for quite some time. She realizes that it's almost 6 and she still has to prepare dinner.

She and Tom were invited one night to a soiree. She doesn't like these stuffy bores. She always feels, when she walks into one of these parties, that she has grown an extra arm. They seem so silent, so watchful, like cats hunting.

She tries on a black dress and puts on her pearls. She is now 94 pounds- no longer chubby or any cutesy adjective. That Tuesday, she weighed 120.

Tom looks at her. She tells him she won't go after all. She puts her hands on her head and weeps softly. All she can think of is that tomorrow, she and Paul are going out to eat chocolate mousse. He promised he'd bring strawberries.