Diary Lies

Dear Diary

F called me two nights in the row. He sent me short messages from his mobile while playing Golf with his clients. He told me that he was, thinking about me.

I guess we are entering into a new territory.

“So you want to be chased?” on the phone he asked, “You want to be a princess?”

That’s when we started to talk about the Cinderella story.

Frankly I don’t believe it. I don’t want to be a Cinderella and I will never want to be one.

I often wonder what happened between Cinderella and the Prince.

What could they have in common? What could Cinderella talk about with the Prince? That a few drops of lavender with a pinch of lemon in the water would clean the stove stains really well?

I must admit at one stage I wanted to be taken care of financially. That was when I worked day and night just to support my university studies. When I finally finished my degrees I thought my life was going to change. But it didn’t. I still worked part-time at the same place doing the same thing. I came to the end of the tunnel and I couldn’t see the light. All I had, I thought, was my youth.

And I almost, almost, sold myself.

“I want to be treated like a princess. But not Cinderella.” I said.

After all these years I have acquired the lifestyle I’ve always wanted through my own effort. I no longer need anyone to spread some mercy. Comfortable and content with my little achievement, I do not need a prince to save me from anything.

That night when F walked me back to the hotel in Tokyo, he casually and jokingly said: “Why don’t you sell me your time? I will send you a two year contract and specify the services required.”

He named a price before he said goodbye. “Think about it. What do you want?”

What do I want? I don’t know what I want but I do know what I don’t want.

I whispered into F’s ear: “I am not a business.”

“ Don’t run me like a business.”

Dear Diary

I had a very exquisite dinner with F in Tokyo two nights ago. In a very exclusive Italian restaurant, with the restaurant manager as our only waiter.

F and I met a few years ago on the Gold Coast in a typical Cinderella manner. I was a part-time souvenir shop assistant trying to make my ends meet and he was a millionaire on holiday. He walked into my shop one day. I served him. We chatted. And he came back for a chat the day after, and the day after, and the day after. And that was it.

So there we were, sitting in that gorgeously lit restaurant, it was in fact the first time we went on a date.

He said “you don’t understand how much I feel for you.” He was right. I don’t.

The relationship we have, if you can call it a relationship at all, is a very strange one. I am not his lover, not his mistress, not his girlfriend, not even a friend. I am just a person who happens to be in his life by chance. And by a very thin chance that we somehow have managed to stay in touch during all these years.

So when he told me at the dinner that he had pushed me away because he was in love with me too much I could not comprehend what he was talking about. “I still have feeling for you.” He said.

I don’t know what it means. What experience am I going to embark from here?