The Perfect Valentine

By Bennet Thomas

February 13th,

11:17 pm

JB was just finishing up for the day when he risked glancing at his watch and scowled fiercely. He was late to have his dinner yet again according to the schedule that he had composed for himself. It was an attempt at changing his lifestyle for the better. In addition to that, working from home only led to him becoming more lazier as the days went by. As he stood up from his cluttered desk, which held a variety of items from an unwashed mug to a damp towel thrown haphazardly on the table lamp, he came to the realization that he was becoming quite heavy. Activities which used to be a cakewalk before, such as climbing the stairs to his apartment and getting up with ease from his beanbag, were now a trying chore. He pushed the thought out of his mind by vowing that he would do something about it later. Deep inside, he knew that making such vows had become so habitual that it was redundant at this point.

He trudged off towards the kitchen in his tiny studio apartment and switched on the lights just in time to spot an array of cockroaches scuttling away into their respective crevices. Sighing deeply, and trying to overlook the fact that his place was slowly turning into a dumpster, he scoured out his usual packet of instant noodles, and put the water onto boil. This had been his dinner every night for the past few months, and he was gradually beginning to despise it. He missed the taste of his mom’s home cooked food. Real food, compared to the stuff he consumed these days. Shoveling a spoonful of noodles into his mouth, he walked into the living room and switched on the TV. While changing channels, he noticed that most of it had romantic songs and movies on, with regard to Valentine’s day being tomorrow. He cursed internally, and switched off the TV in contempt, after trying to digest an overly cheesy romantic song with the lead pair dancing away without a care in the world. He had no patience for lovey-dovey stuff, or just love in general. Love, according to JB, was a luxury very few could afford. Time hadn’t been kind to him, and he was just getting over a broken relationship. She was his first love and he hadn’t been the same ever since it ended. This eventually led to him shunning away the concept of love entirely, and had slowly morphed him into a person who firmly believed that love wasn’t magical, but purely destructive. Everything was a pretense now. He put on thoroughly practiced plastic smiles in front of concerned well-wishers, and went about his routine as usual. Nobody suspected a thing, but he alone knew that it was a dark path he was heading towards.

JB turned off the lights to the living room and walked aimlessly towards his apartment window. It had become a daily habit now to simply watch the happenings on the street before he retired for the day. Not that it was a particularly appealing sight, with the neighborhood garbage strewn all over the street side. Ironically, the bin stood right in the middle of all the waste with a sense of stoic pride, practically half-empty. It was amidst all this that he noticed a stray cat strolling lazily along the street. At first, he paid it no attention but then the feline started grooming itself slowly by licking its fur coat over and over again. With newfound fascination, he watched intriguingly, as it cleaned itself from top to bottom. Something stirred inside him at the sight of this relatively common phenomenon. He slowly lifted a hand and scratched his beard as it dawned on him that he hadn’t shaved in weeks. After a while, the cat sauntered off, unconscious of the viewer she had just managed to captivate.

JB turned away from the windowsill, and walked towards his washroom. He entered, and firmly gripped the ends of the washbasin as he stared up at his reflection in the mirror. He looked ghostly. With his sunken and lifeless eyes adorned by his thinning hair, he could easily pass off as a person decades older than he actually was. As he stared deeply into his own eyes, he thought about that cat on the street and reflected.

If a mere cat could groom and take care of itself so well, then what was stopping him from doing so? As he continued pondering, he slowly started seeing a glimpse of the person he used to be in those eyes. Eyes, which were at some point in the past, full of life and zest. As he went deeper down memory lane, he flashed back upon the version of himself who was once fit, and had his life in order. The version who had a proper schedule and was deeply passionate about trying out new recipes to cook. He missed that version of himself. He missed it with every inch of his being and it struck him that the only thing stopping him from being truly happy was his own self.

He decided to join a gym tomorrow, first thing in the morning. He resolved to clean up his apartment and bring it back to how it was earlier, spick and span with everything in order. He made up his mind to go back and explore that old cookbook which his mother had gifted him with ages ago, and start cooking once again. And maybe, he would look up a spa, and get one of those massages that he secretly craved for. JB vowed that he would build his old life back, by slowly starting to love himself once again.

He fished out his phone and googled a pet store nearby. Suddenly, getting a cat for a pet seemed like a good idea. It would be nice to have some company, and might also serve as a reminder for today. The day he decided to change for the better.

The clock struck midnight when JB’s eyes lit up and a smile slowly grew across his face. It was a real smile unlike its predecessors, a smile filled with hope. As he continued gazing at his reflection, it occurred to him that he’d just found his perfect Valentine.

By Bennet Thomas