An Odd Henry

May 13, 2006

Henry thinks I am a girl. Henry thinks I only like pink.

But I don’t think so. Henry is not entirely correct. And I am set to prove him wrong.

Henry thinks I like him. Maybe he is right, but to say that I am a girl is just so overrated. He devalues a lot of things, not to mention that I already slaughtered two chickens in my life. Henry is terrified of chickens you know. The feeling is mutual though: chicks are terrified of him.

Henry believes in destiny. I used to think he is my destiny, most especially when he is drunk. But I don’t think he thinks so. But since he thinks I’m a girl, I am more likely to think that I’m right. But whatever.

I think Henry likes my attention. He likes it when I hit his biceps. He laughs a lot when he hears me say the wrong things. He never did snub any of the cigarettes I offered. And when I tell him his polo is tucked-in messily, he let me fix it. I think he enjoys my service.

Sometimes, when I am having a bad hair day and not talking to anyone, he pokes my ribs. If I don’t smile, he does it again. But I don’t smile of course. I would rather hit him. When that happens, in order to stop my rampage, he takes out his cigarette and lights me one. Only smoking can make me still, he knows. And coffee, but that, he doesn’t know.

My father thinks Henry is cool. My mother thinks Henry is bad. Neither two is wrong nor right. I think Henry is both, and more. My father says I should be friends with Henry. Henry is a bully and father thinks I’m safe at school if we are friends. Mother thinks bad company makes bad people. She thinks Henry is capable of turning me into a bully. But my mother was wrong, the same way I was wrong to think I can change Henry into a pleasant person.

Henry likes my company. Maybe because he knows I know when to talk and when not to. I don’t talk to him after he gets into trouble. Henry likes to keep things to himself. He doesn’t like to talk serious things. The only thing we talk about him is his dreams in life. Henry dreams to be a chef, a real good one.

Henry sings very badly. He knows that I think he does. But I still play his favorite songs in my guitar. I let him sing the low notes and I hit the high ones. He always says he should learn to play the guitar. But in 15 years that we are friends, he only knows A, D and a lousy G. That is why every time we are drowned in beer, he only plays Leaving on a jet plane which is just a shuffle of A and D.

Henry sang Leaving on a jet plane on the night before I was to leave for college. He said I might never hear him sing that well. He sang it loudly, but I sense this deep tone of melancholy in his voice. I was laughing heartily of course, but deep inside I wanted to cry. I never spoke when he said I was born to achieve big things and those big things will make me forget him.

Henry said then that if I were a girl, he would not let me go to UP. He said that I am such a terrible sucker for something different. UP is a bastion of weird things, he might wanted to suggest, and that is definitely dangerous. Henry never spoke of anything bad about me, but it felt off for the first time when he said I am just simply too idealistic of everything. Maybe Henry was angry or somewhat close to it, but he was also drunk so it made no difference at all. He then said, in a highly derogatory statement form, that I should consider my scholarship at the local university where he was going.

I went to UP of course. I did not find enough courage to explain my side. And it caused a lot of awful consequences.

That night was the last time I saw Henry. But from time to time, I hear some news of him, all of them horrible, from high school friends. They said he never had a regular school, changing courses every other semester, and changing girlfriends every other week. Alcohol took the better of him, and I can only surmise he uses cannabis or something similar.

Sometimes, I blame myself for Henry’s bad portrayal of life. The many what-ifs play relentlessly in my memory like those ones in Butterfly Effect. What if Henry only wanted for me to stay and that since I wasn’t around anymore, things were pretty much slackened to make excuses for his irresponsible immaturity? What if Henry is only making a fuck you sign on my face, telling me that there can never be a world so ideal like the way I see it?

It is not enough to say that I miss Henry. For once, I can barely identify exactly which kind of Henry I miss. Maybe I would hardly know him now but only recognize the sad things that have happened to him while we were away after high school. Maybe Henry hates me now more than anybody else.

I heard from a visiting high school friend that he asked her about me a month ago. I already asked some friends to tell him I would like to pay him a visit one of these days, before I officially graduate from college.

On that day that we will meet again, I will tell him I fucked up. By that time, I would hopefully have a college diploma which he doesn’t have, but that never changes anything. I will tell him that he should realize no one can spoon feed his college diploma other than himself. And yes, I am still idealistic, but he should also look at the things which I have failed to do to fuel my idealism. I am still nowhere near it after all. And maybe, I changed a bit, but I still like beer and cigarettes. I don’t think he will ever question that.

And of course, I will tell him I am not a girl after all, and he should have realized it when we were circumcised on the summer of fourth grade. If he was just good enough to fix his life, I might think that he still has the balls of a man, just like the rambunctious smart kid I grew up with.

That is why it makes me think that Henry is a girl and not me absolutely.