The Letter

 

     Last night, a close relative regaled us with an office “love story.” A few days ago, a comely female co-worker (his subordinate; let’s name her Kate) came to his office and handed him an envelope. And since receiving documents was part of his job, he opened it and started reading the letter the envelope contained. And he was perplexed and a bit shocked when it dawned on him that the letter was a love letter written to Kate by a male co-worker (let’s named him Leonardo). It turned out that Leonardo had been courting Kate. They worked in the same department. He’d been sending him sweet messages through Messenger, liking, hearting, commenting on her every FB post, always the first one to view her FB Story, and giving her gifts (which she’d politely receive and probably recycle) until she revealed that the whole shebang was actually annoying her. She rejected him but the sweet Messenger messages and the liking and commenting on her every FB post continued until—well, this is going to break your heart—she blocked him on Facebook (which automatically also blocked him on Messenger).

     Dejected, he wrote her the above-mentioned letter, which detailed how he first saw her on the cover photo of a Facebook friend and how he was immediately infatuated. He was already an employee of the firm that time and she was not. And how miracle of miracles, he learned that she was going to work also for the company and they'd work in the same department. Serendipity! he thought. Oh, how the gods work to make two hearts fated to each other meet.

     But if you’ve been reading mythology, you will learn that some gods are just plain jerks.

     The letter also contained the magnitude of his feelings for her and how she was breaking his heart.

     But Kate would have none of it.

     She thought he was almost harassing her and told him to just go the fuck away. (*expletive mine)

     It felt bizarre while I listened to the story, no, not because it rarely happens, but because I’ve heard a story very similar to it, and I even know the protagonists personally and I can assure you that our storyteller is not aware of this story I know. A suitor can persist, yes, and a heart knows no boundaries and will always be ignorant of rules, but I’ve learned that being blocked on Facebook (after being rejected) is quite a solid sign that the lady is not into you and will never be into you, that the lady simply doesn’t want anything to have with you.

     It’s sort of a perfect trigger warning; that something distressing (to the suitor) will soon occur.

    “I know now why Leonardo,” our close relative said, “is acting like a zombie these past few days.”

     Well, he'd been sunk like the Titanic.

    Our storyteller still didn’t know why Karen (he refuses to name her and his ill-fated suitor although we really don’t know anyone in their office) gave him the letter. Would she like him to reprimand Leonardo? Why would he do that? What he wanted to do was buy him a few bottles of beer and offer him consoling words as his pulutan.

     Me, too, I am totally, utterly, thoroughly, unequivocally sympathetic towards Leonardo, though theirs is a tale as old as time, where one of the protagonists gets a lonely ever after.