The Whiteflare Archive

      Before nineteen years ago, a son was born to a middle-class family. As a mediocre youngling of a quiet, suburban province--not too far from the metropolis, yet seclusion from the chaotic urban frenzy, he was raised. During the first few years of his life, the interval perhaps when his characters most vitally realized, he was all alone. In spite of his being absolutely aware of the unconditional affection from his parents, there was space that a happy family alone could not fill. Inevitably, he emerged inferior to humanity. He lacked the courage to step beyond the Utopian impregnability to the less omnipotent dimension of human inter-relationship.

      He did not recall when was it that he heard, let alone grasped the meaning of, the word 'friendship'. Nonetheless, he reminisced impeccably that question about the eccentricity of accepting an individual, completely unrelated either by blood or by duty as a close companion who shared his most delicate thoughts and vice versa. In his largely immature logic and reasoning, the relationship had no particular significance although by then, he had already been told by people the wonders of companionship. They told him how a comrade was there for them in the direst hours, how they fought united through and through, and how no matter what happened their invaluable bonds remained. In those chapters he never once doubted, not their validity. However, the scope of their perspective was a lousily deterred page in their touchy fairytales. Although it appeared to provide huge advantages and much-larger-scale an assumption of safety, mutual relationship was not a necessity. Sooner or later, each individual faced his or her, and strictly his or her, one distinctive destiny. Neither the feelings one had towards others nor the egotistical ones for oneself, the condition simply applied. Destiny was blind, and regardless of how one tried to avert, time would come when every man was his last resort. Friendship merely forged a false and fragile sense of security. And henceforth he believed.

      It must have been long he did so, so long that he felt himself rid of the slightest humanity he had ever possessed—pity or empathy. Through the years he had sharpened himself with icy reasoning and unshakable determination, without the most miniscule conscience, he turned into a demon he aspired—extremely self-reliant, decisive and certainly cold. Albeit never thinking of it as an ultimate accomplishment, he was satisfied. Nonetheless, the same sensation that blasted him years ago remained; this path, too, was fatally flawed. In this form, executions were swift and operations, thoroughly independent. In fact, it had always been this untamed freedom of a lone wolf he desired most, and he loved the feeling of its sole conquest. Fearful foes he could stand. Overwhelming forces he could subdue. Hesitations had never risen, not because of foolish narcissism but a strong uphold of selflessness. One could never fear once nothing was there to be lost. That was how he was able to hold his head high. Yet, unsettled he wound up. The reason was neither clearly written in resolvable equations nor complicated logic. It was purely a sensation—the one he got every time he peered at the mirror, into that gelid, haunted pair of malignant eyes. It was disgust, a far more horrible condemnation than horror itself. He disgusted those gelid sights of his own flesh, those horrid smiles and those bone-chilling utterances. Before he knew, he had become the very thing he loathed, and he desperately fled.

      Fortunately enough, he found his escape to be convenient, at least in theory. It was not to retreat; instead, it was to push as further beyond as the parity of self-reliance and mutual companionship. Years of perseverance had not been at waste. After all, a modest twist became the long-awaited cherry on the cake. He no longer designated ‘channels of acceptance’, no longer narrowed matters fundamentally to dead facts and reasons while neither did he take feelings more dearly. It was more a redemption from the heavy chain of reasons that had bound him. From then on, no more did he believe in sole supremacy of reasons; they were reliable instruments, but nor more than instruments. Feelings widened his methodology and relieved him off the monstrosity he had toted. Nevertheless, he wielded it with utmost cautions for experience had taught him better than letting himself be consumed by any entity, anything at all. So, in the condition, he thrived. With the newfound possibilities, freedom was stabilized because none was kept. All were through and through—logic, sentiment, hope, faith and love alike—as if tides of wind past feathers of a winged eagle.

      In retrospect, he learnt to always be nurturing the intricate balance of emotions. They are precise precautions but at the same time a very sensitive spot, too sensitive to be in matters strictly business. Therefore, never to display whimsical impetus he were warned—not the slightest anger to the dirtiest castigation, not the thinnest pride to the weakest quarry, not the lightest exasperation to the most annoying underling, not the lowest tone of fatigue in front of the most challenging task. He maintained his discipline where needed.

      However, as much a perfectionist as he had always been, the smallest gap could strike hard. The same way he treasured other virtues, the friendship—a used-to-be nonsense—was treated as divinely. Literally unbarred by any mental barriers whatsoever, he wore friendship as one of the closest to the core of his being. He demanded nothing more than sincerity and nothing less than trust. His comrades did not oblige to return favors; all they had to do was to honor their friendship. Of course, there were a few times when the ideology proved wrong and it was when things got personal, very personal.

      He always visualized vividly days of his childhood, when he were younger and much more reckless. He remembered, in surprising details, the days he was striving to put off his dangerously stupid hot temper. He was also aware that it would be what he would not hesitate a second to wear again in a personal dispute—no matter how stupid he looked and no matter what would be lost. He could have been impassive, could have acted cool and let it past. But when it came to his most revered friendship, everything was personal, too personal for businesslike temperament. He would become foolhardy. He would become unreasonable. He would even become bestial. He would lose himself to the most ravaging rage that arose. Not because he could not hold it back; on the other hand, because through meticulous deliberation, these matters could never, must never, be discussed in such dishonest manners. After all, he was more human than that—a fact that even astonished himself. He would be as immature, as impulsive and as what the whole world might label him because he could not afford to make a callous face towards the humanity within. Let the whole universe call him the biggest jackass in history. Friendship had been too important. It had been what he had always dealt in deepest verisimilitude and it would always stay that way.

For the inner flames,

Cebril Whiteflare