A Short Story

There's this park bench in Browns Bay that i always like to sit on during my breaks while at work. It overlooks a small oasis with an artificial pond and a small waterfall, surrounded by flaxes and other native plants. I've been sitting there for as long as I've been working at Browns Bay, so roughly for the past 6 years. I always sat there alone, even though there was enough space for four. I didn't like having to share it with other people. I guess it was kind of my personal space, even though it was a public amenity.

During the holidays, sometimes I'd sit there everyday, lounging in the sun and enjoying the cool breeze. Sometimes I'd watch the sparrows bath in the waterfall. Sometimes I'd watch the ducks swim in the pond. Sometimes I'd watch the clouds roll by. Sometimes I'd watch the little kids walk along the paved rocks that lined the circumference of the pond. I used to walk along them myself, and jump across the middle where it tapered to about a metre wide, but these days I'd just watch other kids do it, and hold my breath every time i think they're about to fall into the water. Sometimes, I'd be watching nothing at all, just staring blankly into space as I retreat into the privacy of my own thoughts. I guess for me it was not only an escape from the monotonous and sometimes arduous activities of work, but also a chance for me to reflect on my own thoughts, allowing me to find words of self-comfort and reprieve from problems that have been very taxing on my mind. Sometimes I wouldn't be thinking about anything at all. I'd lie there in the sun with the clouds rolling by overhead enjoying the cool breeze on the park bench beside the pond where the kids played. And I'd sleep. I must've spent countless hours on that bench over the past years, and I've enjoyed every second of it.

So as I found myself once again in that familiar surrounding today, with the warmth of the sun on my face and the soothing coolness of the wind in my hair and the sound of children's laughter in my ears, a new thought that never occurred to me before occurred to me. What if everyday for the past 6 years someone had walked past that little reserve during lunch break or on their way home, and once a week during school weeks and almost everyday during the holidays, they'd see a solitary asian boy sitting there by himself on the park bench, doing nothing in particular but simply sitting there, staring into the water or at his hands. On some days, he'd be seen playing on his cellphone, perhaps texting a friend, but he'd always be sitting by himself. And week after week, year after year, as the faces of the brave kindergarteners that walk along the edge of the pond become unfamiliar, as the juvenile flax plants grow into towering adults, as the boy slowly matures into a man, his solitary silhouette can still be seen sitting on the park bench from afar. I wonder, how that would look to a passerby. I hope he or she doesn't feel too lonely.

And then i thought, how many more years will i continue to sit at this park bench, on a warm sunny afternoon with the soft breeze billowing by and the listless clouds floating past, beside the artificial pond where sparrows bathed and ducks swam and children played, as always by myself, staring at nothing in particular, lost completely in my own little world, untouchable by the outside world, despite being in plain sight of everyone else? Will i still be there when the little girl that desperately holds onto her big brothers hand for fear of falling into the water become a guiding sibling herself? Will i still be there when the little boy who gets scolded by his mother in Japanese for straying too close to the water becomes a father himself and takes his son to the pond to play? Will i still be sitting there, by myself, on the park bench in the sun enjoying the cool breeze, beside the pond with the waterfall where sparrows bathed and ducks swam, staring at the water or my hands or my cellphone or nothing in particular, lost in my own thoughts and smiling to myself for no particular reason other than because i can? I wonder.