Losing Us
Prolegomenon

The Aishalma Anara

When I was a teenager, when someone asked me what marriage was, I would say: Marriage is a thing that is done by two people with the aim of uniting the two contents of the head into one intact body. Walk side by side through the happy and difficult. Sharing tears and laughter. It is done with the person we love, the person we are comfortable with, who when we look into his eyes, we know that he is the person.

Years later, as I grew a little bit older and touched my 20s, my thinking remained the same. Because what I see every day is so.

I watched for myself how Papa looked at Mama full of puja, while Mama never stopped smiling to welcome Papa who was tired all day outside the house. Their hands clasped each other, their eyes looking in the warmest way I've ever met in my lifetime.

From there, I could feel how deeply they fell on each other. No one falls more in love with whom. No one wants more because both are at the same point. Both fell in love, both agreed to live together for a long time.

My environment is also pretty good. Of all the people I met, they brought stories about their families. And everything was similar to how I saw the marriage of my parents. I think everybody is too. I think all marriages should go that way. Because if it's not done with the real person we love, how will the marriage survive?

Let's say I'm naive, or stupid though. Its alright. Because I might be. All my life, all I see are good things. Either because both my parents wanted to show only their happy sides, or because my eyes were too blind and my feelings were insensitive to find out where the fault lay. What is clear is that as I grew by one year, exactly one month after the deaths of my parents, I realized that my thinking about marriage was not entirely true.

For now I am standing here, on the side of a man whom I did not know before. A foreign man who was somehow present into my life. Or perhaps, I was the one who had lost his way to accidentally enter into his life which I happened to pass on the way home.

His name is Arsenio Galandra, a handsome man who is three years older than me and is the only child of a relative who has not shown his nose for a long time.

Arsenio's mother and my parents were close friends. They make a close friendship like brothers, helping each other and supporting each other when one of them is falling. The story of their friendship I have heard hundreds of times, even though the figure of Arsenio's mother itself has never been seen in person.

Mama said they were separated because Arsen's mother had to fly out of town following her husband. But even so, they still often contact even though only through short messages at least once a week.

Then somehow, the news of Papa and Mama's death reached quickly in the ears of their good friend. The woman came to me at the funeral that had been deserted from mourners, hugging me so tightly as if I could have fallen flat on the ground if his hands were not firm enough to hold my frail body. While behind his back, Arsenio stood with a cold gaze fixed straight at me.

That day, I did not understand the meaning of that gaze. Pelt such a gaze by someone who is foreign is clearly something that is quite confusing, especially for me who was losing half sanity at the time.

Now, I finally understood why Arsenio was so visibly resentful of me that day. For that day, for the first time when we met, she had been told by her mother that we were getting married in the near future.

Matchmaking. Something I never thought about before, but actually I really have to live with now.

To me, his mother Arsen said that this matchmaking has been made for a long time, as a form of trying to maintain the fabric of friendship so as not to break up only between parents.

But the thing is, Arsenio doesn't like me. To him, I am a disaster. The greatest disaster that occurred in his life, made him separated from the idol who even though he wanted to marry also in the near future.

“Lo is a disaster.” That's what he said, and I, as time went on, began to agree with that statement.

I am a disaster. That's what I will keep on remembering, maybe even until later when my time is dead.

... 🥀🥀🥀...

The Arsenio Galandra

As a teenager, I was used to everything. Designing my own dreams and finding ways to make them happen one by one. I know exactly where I want to go to school, at which university I want to go to, in which office I will first apply for after getting my Bachelor's degree, as well as with whom I will marry.

Speaking of marriage, I've been thinking about it since I first started dating my first love in college. Her name is Flora Calantha Orlin, a beautiful Indonesian-Australian girl who in my eyes, charm can even defeat Aprodhite the goddess of beauty. Olin—so I call it—perfect, that's all I know, and I promise to marry only with her someday.

Five years into love, I finally found the right time to propose to her. That should happen three months from now. Yes, should. In reality, I married someone else.

I was angry, I was disappointed. But, I can't do anything about it because in fact, no matter how much I love Olin, it still can't beat my love for Mommy, the woman who gave birth and took care of me. Mother took care of me with great difficulty after Dad died three years ago, so it was not heart to reject his desire that I marry the son of his good friend when he was young.

“He's a kara, Sen. In this cruel world, Mother did not have the heart to leave her alone. Please marry her, so that Mother has a reason to keep her in place of her father and mother.”

So Mother said, the night before we flew to the city where the girl who was now standing next to me wearing this wedding dress was at that time. I can't refuse Mother's request, I can't bear it. So before we actually flew there, I first ran towards Olin.

The application that was delayed, I did that night. In front of her feet, with a trembling body holding back tears, I stretched out the ring I had prepared from a few months before. Olin accepted, but she ended up being an invited guest on my wedding day with another woman.

I felt guilty for Olin, but to let go of the girl after all the things we went through, I didn't feel like I could. So with selfishness so high, I asked him to stay. With arrogance, I promised her that this marriage would not be a hindrance to our relationship, she said, that I will not leave my heart open in the slightest to this now legitimate girl who is my wife.

Now, through the twinkle of his fragile eyes when he was required to sit on the guest bench on the front row, watching me tie the sacred promise before God with others who were not him, he said, I started to feel like I should have let him go sooner.

But now, it's too late. Letting go of him now would only destroy us both, so I thought, I just need to figure out a way to keep us from being destroyed.

“Gue sacrificed a lot to marry you, Anara. So I hope, that's enough. Please don't take anything away. Please let me still love Olin as I have done for five years.” Whisper me to Anara who is standing next to me.

I hope, he will understand, that until at any time, this marriage will mean nothing to me. Because she is Aishalma Anara, not the Flora Calantha Orlin I love.

Seriate