Enduring

I remembered you in the patient at the ICU who was experiencing weakness on the right side of his body, from his facial muscles to his legs and toes, after his brain bled unexpectedly. And then I saw someone peeking through the ICU entrance, looking on to him with concerned eyes but not flinching a move or breath to overcome the distance from the door to his bed, being as invisible as she could ever be to his sight. I found out eventually that the one bearing stealth was the patient's ex-wife who, after years of being annulled, continued to fund for the patient's treatment, saw to it that he is alright, and encouraged their children to visit him often.

I looked at him and I remembered you, and then I turned to her and I remembered myself. I remembered us. I remembered the unspoken string that endured between us across time and distance and the different lives we decided to lead since four years back. How did it endure, really? What kept us somehow intact? What is this unspoken string in the first place?

I ask myself those questions everyday, for everyday I think about you. Everyday, I try to accept that you are not holding your end of the string anymore. Or are you, still? I hope that you are. I trust that you are, wherever you may be. The perseverance of our good friendship through time, the strength of sharing our first real love and growing up together--these are makings of endurance. 

You are still here with us, with me. You are enduring.