Empty Swing

I sat on a swing, feeling uncertain. Should I play or stand still?

It was a quiet night, except for the soothing low frequency roaming sound from the jumbos darting through the starless sky. I tilted up my head, trying to get some indication from the dark sky. No luck. No light was able to get away from the metallically dark realm, so was my indication.

I never sat on this swing, neither did I want to play before. But it didn’t mean I was not aware of its existence. Looking around, I discovered there was nobody around me, neither did the sound dare to intrude my serenity. Why? I didn’t know.

Pressure had finally taken its toll on me. I still could hear the constant and tireless nagging from my parents. How I wished to tell them to shut up, tell them to leave me alone. But their ghostly voice sounded hauntingly near to me tonight, ricocheting, nocturnal and rhymed with the jumbos’ silent protest.

I needed a break, a total break from my dilemma. But the woe I was facing was almost at my waist level, too late to dislodge myself from them and their mere existence was enough to choke me to death. Hence, I needed to sit on this swing.

Everyone told me to follow my heart but at the same time told me what should I do. Didn’t they all sense irony? ‘You are great, you have future!!!’ This was what I heard, frequently. Great? Wasn’t that an oxymoron?

I once told myself, success in life didn’t mean anything. However, the concerns my parents displayed on their face told me otherwise. Money, Family and Love.


Troubled and preoccupied, I commissioned myself to have a rest. That’s why I was now a this swing, feeling unsure of continue indulging myself in my realm of illusions or going back to have my revision. Light breeze caressed my face so did the tension that rain on my head. I couldn’t see them, but I definitely could sense them.

Few weeks ago, after garnering enough courage, I told my parents I wished to quit the university and set up my own business. I could still feel the handphone that was becoming embarrassingly hot while we were in the heated conversation. Situation spiraled into bedlam, not surprisingly, but shockingly rapid. My father warned me, my mother wept.

‘ Your father is going to retire in few years time, so he can still support you, think of us, please…’
‘ Your father hoped you can be a doctor…’
‘ He didn’t have chance to study in school, so he hoped you won’t be suffering like him…’
‘ He has worked so hard for you…’
‘ He has been telling his friends about you, can’t you just put yourself in his shoes and think for him?’

Enough was enough. After we ended our conversation, quite abruptly, this was the first question I thought of. Why always my father? Why?

Questions were intoxicating. I concluded.

Was the timing my sole failure?

I never got my timing right. Played online games before end-of-semester exam, made my confession to a girl while we were both having exams, sat in the park in the middle of night despite there was a test on tomorrow morning.

I felt stuck in a loophole. I felt trapped. I felt suffocated.

‘ Pray more.’ My friend advised me.

Maybe I should but for the time being, I was too distracted to even pray to God. That’s why I was on the swing right now, thinking of questions that Grey’s Anatomy and Advanced Biochemistry wouldn’t help me in answering. Sometime, a Holy Grail could morph into a blasphemy in a matter of a second, didn’t you think so?

Just like a relationship, ‘ The most beautiful story in the world’, according to one of my best friends, no thing would be spared of being a double-edged sword.

My family was always the core of my life but when our relationships turned sour, my family was like acid to me, eroding my confidence and ego. My heart was sore, unbearably.

Wanted so badly to forget, to forgo, to forgive, I stood up. The swing was groaning while I was standing up, as if it’s some sort of inaudible complains.

I wanted to hear something, something I had longed for. No luck. What I heard was just a mumbles from yesterday, shrieking from distance and crying from the past.
I shook my head, so did the swing.