Bonds unbreakable!

Memories are a thing you know. They stay with you all your life. Whether you like it or not. The whole idea of living a happy life, therefore, must revolve around having happy memories. But then, is it always possible? Cathy let out a heavy breath in despair and felt if only she could turn back time…

Accidents happen. Some are good and some are bad. But this one Cathy could not define. It is not because she was incapable of her best judgment. But life, unfortunately, is never linear. Experiences can sometimes be mixed in that even if on the surface they appear to be bad they help you become the better version of yourself. And then the sole task that remains is to segregate and retain that better version of yourself that has evolved in the process without going back to the painful memories of the experience. That's tough!

These days Cathy would try to remember all the good that she had gained in her life because of her friendship with Lin while letting go of the unpleasant memories. But that was not her problem. It was to decipher if she wanted to really separate herself from him in this way. He was one person with whom she had always been herself. She really loved him but at the same time felt conflicted in the knowing that he was probably not the right person for her especially after the way he had ill-treated her. That is where they both had started drifting apart.

Cathy had known Lin for a very long time in her life. Precisely 9 and a half years. And although they had never touched each other besides a brief handshake what she felt for him was irreplaceable. At least that is what she felt. But the hurt after their dispute was too much for her and she did not want to go back to him ever. At least till the time she understood the truth about why he had betrayed her and left her to ponder in the dark?

Lin had closed upon Cathy in a very cold manner and she had later realized that he was two timing her with his girlfriend Sharon. She definitely felt hurt because of that. But what was more hurtful was that he lied to her. Had he trusted and confided in her about his existing relationship, she would have never been the presumable obstacle in his life which he felt she was.

Cathy felt sad that her friendship with Lin was lost to mistrust and a feeble misunderstanding. And that, she could not bear. She valued all relationships in her life and being the people’s person that she was, it was very difficult for her to sustain this alone time in her life. This isolation, which was forced upon her by Lin and his friends who, in their need to save Lin’s reputation after Cathy had realized he had cheated on her, had projected that Cathy had trust issues and that she was characterless when nothing of that was true, was totally uncalled for.

It wasn’t that Cathy did not fight it. She did. For a good ten months she struggled with Lin who messed with her work stuff in her absence and projected that he liked her when everyone was around and loathed her when everyone was gone. It confused her completely. Later she realized that he was only trying to save himself by proving that he was genuinely involved with her and wanted to be with her and that it was Cathy who was not responding to him. Cathy never had hard core feelings for him. Her love was just blooming, but it was intense. However, his lies were something she could not deal with at the time.

Despite all that was not working out between them, Cathy tolerated Lin's friends and co-worker’s eve teasing her, bullying her, sometimes indirectly verbally abusing her, talking ill about her family background, passing comments about all that she did right from the way she dressed to the way she looked. All this only because she respected her obligation to her work and understood that she could not let her personal life get into the way of her professional life.

Things never changed for the better. Cathy’s life at her workplace became increasingly difficult when her supervisor also got influenced by Lin adding fuel to the issues that already existed between them after which she finally gave up. But that was hard for her as giving up is not what Cathy could ever do in life. Her decision tormented her even after three years of having left all that had brought a huge turmoil in her life.

A humiliated and broken Cathy was disappointed in Lin, her surrounding environment which had become way too toxic for her to sustain, her stagnated career trajectory and most importantly herself in not being able to make things right. She wanted to finish her PhD which she was pursuing along with Lin and others and then take up a job but nothing of that had materialized. As if life was not harsh enough, her mother had suffered from stage three colon cancer and only to god’s grace recovered without the need of a chemotherapy. Despite juggling her personal and professional life in the best possible way she had failed. Her entire life plan was destroyed and fallen apart on all fronts, personal, professional and social. It was too much for Cathy and she barely understood what she should do now to build her life from the ruins of her past.

There were times when on being asked about her life and career preferences by Lin, Cathy had explained her stance of her wanting to develop her identity, but he did not respect that. In fact, he questioned why she even wanted to work, trivialized her passion for work and used his friends to humiliate her on her abilities which she was brilliant at. She ignored all of that knowing that he was probably jealous and incapable of tolerating that she could have a different opinion of herself than what he had of her. After all, they were not even close friends so there was no question of delving too much into each other’s lives.

There were times Cathy felt Lin had some brewing insecurities which needed attention but she refrained sharing all of this with him or anyone else because she felt each person has a phase of growth in life and probably Lin was going through that. But quite unlike the empathetic way in which she had responded towards his immature behavior, Lin had projected Cathy’s need for work and getting ahead in her life as her being a feminist which she wasn’t. He even used her ability to voice her opinion against her by calling her names and provoking others also to do so. Sometimes Cathy doubted if she even knew Lin.

Cathy believed in equality and she was deeply hurt and frustrated by Lin’s convenient, selfish and domineering stance that only respected his own needs as an individual, never hers. After all, she had worked very hard to get to where she was in her life and not because she wanted to prove something to the world. It was her love for her work and her need to be able to express herself through it that had always kept her going. But Lin did not want her to accept her as a whole. He wanted bits and pieces of her, maneuvered to his own needs and that irked Cathy because she was ready to accept him as he was and he wasn't.

As surprising as it was, despite all that Cathy had been through with Lin, even after she had left her workplace and the common group of friends, she wanted to clarify things with him, reach a resolution and be friends again. But she never shared any of this because she felt it would make her appear weak. Especially now that she knew that Lin was at fault and felt that he needs to be cognizant of it. Cathy needed to be strong because her dreams were as important as Lin in her life and she genuinely did not appreciate the way he treated her.

There were times Lin had tried to get in touch with Cathy through their common friends, but not once did he fathom the courage to speak up directly and that completely disappointed her. A point came she realized that maybe she was too independent for him and that it was probably good that it never worked out between them. But she loved him and that was the most important truth of her life.

In the time that had gone by Cathy had broken way too many times and now had come to believe that although she had experienced failure and had not achieved all that her batch-mates had, she had not lost. Cathy would console herself by believing that just because she was taking longer than others to understand her life goals or achieve them, she wasn’t a failure. So Cathy stopped waiting for Lin and moved on with her work and life without getting affected by what Lin felt about it because they had reached a stalemate. Maybe Lin really did not need her or feel anything about her. And even if he did, now it made no difference to her. She felt enough in his absence. And that was when her love triumphed!