Chapter Text
“7 years,” Tighnari bemuses, causing Kaveh to wince in (imaginary) pain; adding a defeated sigh in return, he confesses, “Yes, gan’yan nga katagal.”
“Tang ina, may balak ka bang maging martyr?” his friend chokingly laughs, trying his best not to sound insensitive to Kaveh’s current situation, but alas, his blunt nature persevered. The architect could do nothing but roll his eyes. “Hayop ka! Nago-open up nga sa’yo ‘yung tao.”
“Okay! I’m sorry. I’m just taken aback by how long it is already, like, hindi ka ba napapagod? Si Al Haitham ‘yan oh,” Tighnari retaliates, to which he emphasizes the name, indicating a negative connotation; that the said man is difficult in nature, therefore the imposition that he is automatically difficult to love, and be with.
However, Kaveh only responds with silence, followed by the immediate act of drinking whiskey that once sat on the table, untouched— gulping it whole without any hesitation, leaving the raven-haired man in great shock.
Truthfully speaking, Tighnari has a point. Whenever Al Haitham’s name is mentioned from every corner of every conversation, courtesy of his detested existentialism, he isn’t reminded of his inescapable predicament; rather, he’s reminded of his petty grievances, which was propagated by a series of annoyances that transpired in his day-to-day life.
He does not initially remind him of the all-encompassing entity which is love, rather he’s reminded of his unprecedented nagging, an element in his berating demeanor, which successfully embeds itself within Kaveh’s line of consciousness that tantalizes him every waking hour; his furrowed eyebrows that speak immense volumes in every situation (that’s oftentimes comforting, depending on the context, but most of the time a pain in the ass); followed by his dirty laundry, scattered books, and dusty shelves to which he painstakingly cleans all the time; and lastly, as if adding insult to injury, he’s reminded of the times wherein he’d get locked out of their shared apartment due to the incidence of Al Haitham ‘accidentally’ taking his keys.
In summary, Al Haitham’s an ass, and he does correlate him to one. Yet, despite his uttered grievances and declarations of war, the feelings that he has do not dissipate. Instead, they grow stronger as each day passes. Upon realizing this at first, Kaveh was flabbergasted at the paradoxical phenomenon. (Dreadful, even.)
Eventually, though, his aggravation finally quiets down when he realizes one thing, that the opposite of love is not hate, but indifference; and that love and hate must go hand in hand, for they can hate the people they love the most.
And after a few minutes of deafening silence, Kaveh finally speaks, softly.
“Pa’nong mapapagod? Si Al Haitham ‘yan, ‘e.”