White Nights, and I, if we were even comparable.

And so I have bought a few books, one of them being White Nights. I left Akutagawa halfway and sprung to Dostoevsky, wondering how he writes. White Nights didn't seem to be the first book that would be inroduced to people getting into Dostoevsky.

Reading the first story was a pain in the head and a mirror to my recent past, though I was still satisfied with the story in whole.

The narrator, the main character? A dreamer his whole life, touch deprived and in need of love. Has so much love for the world, with vivid imagination and childlike heart, he tells his story and place in Petersburg. Everyday like a hop and a skip, he lives his life with wonder. Then Nastenka appeared, and he felt like she was the one at first glance. I'm sure its absurd but it happens to not the best of us, just some childlike people, as was me, in 2023. I'd not delve further into the story, but my parallel and my own version of this 200 year old prime situationship story.

2023, last quarter, forgot the month, still traceable from my old instagram account's stories. 

I was almost single, in a rotten relationship that had love, just not enough, that revealed an unexpected affair in December. K had slept with my close friend at the time, Jack. 

At that time, I was still in college, while studying, I still get to do part-time in my passions, florals and coffee. The floral part ended taking almost 15 to 18 hours a day from me, whenever I had work. While the coffee part only started late into November.

Jack was a fun fella, we knew each other since he was 12 and I 13. We were online friends up until my enrollment to INTI Penang. we reconnected after more than 6 years of disconnect, he went through his complicated relationships, in social and romance, and evidently mentally ill, he was taking pills and seeing a therapist. I occasionally checked in whenever there was a thought of him, though truthfully one only opens up to whoever they wish to, not everyone. And so time passed and we are now 21 and 20. I still used my family sometimes from Kedah to Penang, I would always enjoy driving, a spiritually healing thing to do, given there isn't a jam. Eventually, we started speeding, amateur-race each other in the north of Penang, the road from Pulau Tikus to Batu Ferringhi,where another 'mountain road' exists. This route is the usual route for the people that do touges. I would bring K on a day, on a fun drive, going on a rollar-coaster ride I myself conducted. And so they met each other.

At this time we were a friends with benefits kind of relationship, where I really loved her as a friend, not a lover, nor wife. Jack approached me and told me he liked her, I said go on. this was April or May. They went out a few times, I felt slightly jealous, because I never knew what they did or when they went.

On a July 5th, K wanted a relationship. The kind of ultimatum that made me choose between an intimate and fun companion, or the absence of such a person. I was sad, but I chose to try, because I really enjoyed this person's prescence. We connect, but we also disconnect.

And so the days onwards we tried to live together in a room. As I was staying at K's place for many days, a friend happened to need a room, so I rented him my room, then K and I moved to a bigger room. 

I hate her messy room. I always cleaned the room, even when on days I worked, and my work was 10 hours the norm. But I liked this person, and then started my habit of getting used to sleep with someone in my arms, which affects my till now.

through a short 5 month, we had intense fights, we had bad times, but I still felt good to have her. And while writing this I have hesitance, as it starts to hurt again. But I have to, because the story that relates me to White Nights occured the next month, not me and K.

December 2023, on a weary night after work I asked my colleague to drop me off at a new cafe in town, which was something of a graffiti-themed cafe where customers are allowed to do graffiti. I loved the concept because i loved the style of expression that graffiti offers, its a raw, compressed, emotion from the heart. The cafe eventually became overwritten with instagram accounts and stupid words, which disappointed me deeply, and made me aware that the art scene in Penang is budding. Coming back, I had my order at upstairs, the cafe, lit with red and orange hues, hazy, upstauirs was filled with bean bags and floor seats. it wasn't crowded, good. I sat, I spotted a girl opposite me, not exactly opposite me, but adjacent. She was alone, too. And I knew body language, she was sitting facing towards me, I didnt paid it too much attention, after a long while on my phone and anxiously looking up once in a while, shee had moved to my opposite directly. And I gulped, and so I approached the girl. I forgot how the conversation started, or went, or what not. words like math rock and post rock were mentioned, bands like elephant gym, toe, were mentioned, and I was starstruck. For the many years in my life i hadn't met a person my age, a girl, that had the same taste in music. And so I. I would like to stop here, this was the best moment during the shitshow circus massacre. was an affair, fighting involved, embarassment, hatred, confusion, love. Lets stop here. that was beautiful, and that was that.

Okay yes, it ends abruptly, because it was found out, it lasted 3 days, and yes it was one of the most ugliest things i have done in my life, yet one of the most beautiful connections i felt.