Day 73 Writing Short Stories

Meet-Cute

The universe, composed of atoms and laws of physics, has no match for the power of love. That was what I had always believed in: that finding the perfect match would cure all. Cure the heart that seeks comfort, seeks convincingness of who they are, and seeks that deep connection that creates meaning for all. You can call me a foolish romantic—one who watches all those movies with destinies and meet-cutes. I am and was all that. But the universe, with its laws and destinies, has a strange sense of humor.

My love never came as I expected it to come. Oh, yes, I had a meet-cute. I had all of that. I was swept off my feet and whisked away to other dimensions. There was all of that. It was just that those things happened literally.

I was knocked down and picked up by a highly apologetic alien, who reassured me that I wasn’t supposed to see him. The gray, huge-eyed creature with his ribs poking out told me that humans weren’t meant to have visitations, that his electric shield must have broken and caused the horrible accident of knocking me off my bike. He explained he couldn’t let me follow the impact, as otherwise my brain would have splattered on the pavement and I would have been killed. He explained that their kind could see every action beforehand and calculate the odds of any event—just not bumping into me — which made him sigh and talk about anomalies and how I had to be one.

He had no other choice but to break the laws of his kind and rescue me from himself. At the time, I didn’t understand that it was a meet-cute. I thought it as a horror that had taken over my life, forcing me to live a nomadic life in space with a species that looked like a highly kind and apologetic skeleton E.T. But, once I could wrap my head around traveling the universe and having an intelligent conversation with a person who knew more about connection and purpose than any other person I had ever known, he win me over, which he reassures that he never meant to do. He was just trying to make it right, as he had robbed me of my destiny as a mere human and awakened me to the fact that the universe was far more complicated and that life had more than one way of existing.

There was still the biological incompatibility issue staring us straight in the face, but we were unraveling the secrets of the universe to find a fix for it, together and happy.

—

Darn universe. I wasn’t expecting a romance story, but it had to come. The odds were there for it to happen again. I’m not completely happy with the premise, as love after a kidnapping is not something I want to advocate. In my defense, there are far more horrendous romantic comedy plots that, with a different spin, would be borderline madness and horror for anyone seeking love and happiness. So the story stayed as my mind couldn’t come up with anything better.

So what I got today was a lyrical romantic comedy written in the first person. The lyrical was not that present, but I forgive myself.

About love, connection, and meaning. The building I live in just turned 100, and we had a garden party to celebrate. There was this older man who was born in the forties, and he talked about how people used to pop into each other’s yards and talk to everyone and all. It is silly how our modern appliances have changed our lives. It feels like a strange era that never happened. Yet I can remember, as a child, running down my street to see if my friend wanted to hang out without calling beforehand. Okay, I can communicate with you from the other side of the world instantly and connect with others who share my interests—it’s amazing. Still, I wonder what we have lost by losing our connection to our physical immediate environment.

Thank you for reading! Have a day full of connections ❤