Homebound

It was like a dream.

There she was, standing in the distance, her brown skin sparkling against the turquoise waters and translucent sands. Her long black curls were untamed, roaming wild as the wind blew slowly but swiftly. She stood in a white bikini looking out at the vastness of the sea. She looked heaven-sent.

I pinched myself and felt the sting. The jolt through my body reminded me this moment was real, not conjured up by my mind that often wandered astray, getting lost in the fantasy of what could never be. I took a deep inhale, held my breath, and let out a long exhale as I mustered up the courage to take steps towards her. Time does this funny thing when you’re about to do something life changing, it slows down and speeds up simultaneously.

I finally reached her after what felt like I had run the New York Marathon. The truth is I had never run it. Running isn’t my preferred form of torture. But I imagine if I did, I would be sweating, with heart palpitations, feeling out of breath. Her head tilted in my direction and she smiled to acknowledge my presence before she returned her gaze back to the sea.

My brain was in overdrive thinking about what would be the perfect thing to say, rehearsing lines over and over again in my mind as if I were writing a monologue of a Tony Award-winning play. “It’s a beautiful view,” is all that I managed to fumble out. Immediately I heard all the voices in my head cursing me out, 'Really? Is that the best you could do? The nerve to call yourself a writer… .' As I battled with both my mind and my nerves, the most angelic voice responded, “Very much so.”

“How long have you been here?” I asked, curious as to how she ended up on this island all alone. “Five years,” she stated in a matter-of-fact tone. “Wow!” I grasped. I secretly wondered how someone could survive so long on their own. As if she was a clairvoyant, she openly shared, “It’s been a blessing, perhaps one the Almighty forced upon me, but it’s given me the time and space to come into my own without the external pressures of those around me.” She paused to pull her hair back into a top knot. With her hair no longer in her face, another dimension of her beauty had appeared and it made her look more radiant than ever. My eyes were glued to her. No matter how much I tried to move them away, I couldn’t. I felt I had become one of those perverted men who stared at women like they had x-ray vision, undressing them with their gaze bit by bit. As soon as I had that realisation, I shifted my eyes from her to the sand. “I am extremely sensitive and adaptable in nature, so I tend to disappear into my environment. The past five years have given me the time to reclaim myself, to become whole,” she voiced. I resonated with everything she had said and felt we had lived parallel lives, only she was way ahead of me in her self-exploration and self-understanding. Through our conversation I learnt that she spent over a decade of her life working in recruiting, built and managed a successful career coaching business, and published a page-turner of a book. She was clearly well-rounded with a diverse set of skills. Not to mention, it seemed like everything she touched turned to gold. I appreciated that though she was accomplished and talented, she remained humble and playful. Not to stereotype, but most of the successful people I knew had a hardened heart. I believed it was because they let their ambitions exhaust them rather than liberate them. Her ability to stay soft and to make it look like everything good comes easy inspired me.

We spent the afternoon sharing stories, but there was one unasked and unanswered question that kept nagging at me: Didn’t she get lonely? In a moment of bravery, I confronted her, “Five years is a long time. Don’t you get lonely?” She laughed. It was the first time I had heard her laugh. It was the kind of distinctive, infectious laugh you could hear across a crowded room years later and know it was her. “People think this is what loneliness looks like, being stuck on an island on your own, but true loneliness is deeper than that,” she said as she looked directly into my eyes before slowly moving them back to the calm sea. “True loneliness is living in a world surrounded by people who can’t see you, people who take more than they can give and people who project their trauma on you.” She took a long pause, drawing circles in the sand with her index finger as I anxiously waited for her to finish her thought. Finally, she added, “True loneliness damages you.” She looked at me with her big almond-shaped eyes and flicked me a reassuring smile, oblivious to the sadness of the truth she had just shared. “Are you damaged?” I asked. She laughed and jokingly affirmed, “No, I am a tornado.” Every joke had an element of truth to it and I could easily see her being the type to light a fire and watch everything burn to ashes around her, only, she walked away unscathed. “Is that your form of protection? Inflicting damage? Does it make you feel powerful?” I challenged her. She was unnerved by the self-reflection required by my question, I could tell because she started coiling the ringlets in her hair. Body language is revealing if people knew how to read it. “Abuse is the only cycle I know…,” her voice trailed off as she looked down at her fidgeting hands. It was also the cycle I knew. I didn’t know if it was the empath in me or the fixer in me, but as we looked out at the sunset, I couldn’t help but impart the wisdom that set me free, “Do you know what’s powerful? Breaking the cycle.”

Perhaps it was the loneliness of being on a deserted island or something more mystical that brought us together, but since that first deep dive of a conversation, we hadn’t spent a moment apart. Together, we built a ritual. In the mornings we would plunge ourselves into the icy waters of the sea. She believed water to be divinely spiritual, the elixir that Mother Earth gave us to wash all worries away. The afternoons were spent foraging for tropical fruits and catching wild fish, always making sure to take breaks in between to make love. As the night sky fell, she would light a fire and I would watch her glisten in proximity to the flames. I was captivated. I was immersed in her authenticity, her beauty, her mind, her spirituality, her fluidity. All of it. Everything about her fascinated me.

After a whirlwind three week sober love affair, a rescue boat found us. A crew member came out to help us return home. “You must be so happy you’ve been found,” he enthusiastically proclaimed. “Me?” I asked, confused as to why he was referring to me and not us. “Yes, you. Is there someone else?” he asked, looking around, puzzled by my confusion. I joined him. I scoured my eyes north, south, east, and west, searching for her but she was nowhere to be found. Just like that, it hit me, in those three weeks stranded I met myself.