The Duet Rule: A Story by Eli Sadoff
It was the night of June 6th, 1998. A warm summer night, with a light breeze, in Cancun, I was standing on the beach. Alone, I watched the waves as they crash against the shore peacefully. It was the night of my sister’s Quinceañera. While everyone was inside the hotel, partying, having a good time, I was outside. I felt like something was wrong, something had escaped from me. Nothing bad had happened to me; in fact I was preparing to start university soon at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México in Mexico City, one of the most prestigious universities in all of Mexico. I convinced myself to suck up whatever was wrong, and go to the party. However, soon at the party I noticed people doing things, which normally would seem normal, but at that time seemed so foreign to me. I was wondering why all of these people were here to celebrate my sister’s becoming 15. As the night progress, I, like almost all other people who have 18 years, became quite inebriated. The more drunk I became; the less joyful I felt. This was the opposite of what had always happened before. Drinking was a time of joy and having fun. Instead I sat questioning why we drink at all and why we derive pleasure from losing complete control over ourselves.
I had thought back to a moment, earlier that day, where I was sitting on the beach during the day. I was tanning, and flirting. Having a good time it could be called. I met this girl, but this was not just a regular girl. She was special in every way possible. Beautiful, smart, yet funny, not too serious and down-to-earth, she was perfect. I talked with her for a while. At the end of the talk she and I had exchanged numbers, so she and I could speak with each other again. I wondered if knowing that it was unlikely that I would see her again made me feel this way. In my sadness, I called her wanting to speak to her. She picked up and said, “Hello, Rafa. How are you?” (As a note my actual name is Luis Rafael Munoz, but I dislike the name Luis so I tell people that my name is Rafael or Rafa for short). I was relieved to be talking with her and felt happiness coming back into my body.
This happiness was not coming back in the normal way though. I saw streams of happiness, which look like a ribbon of yellow twisting around itself, entering my body, through my eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. It was an amazing sight, something I would never forget. I told Evita about this. She saw the same thing but it was not coming into her body yet leaving it. She told me that it was entering into her phone. I looked, and learned that the source of this happiness and these ribbons was my phone. I tried to give some of this happiness back to Evita but this transfer did not work as I do not know the science of transferring happiness. Me and Evita, we decided that the only way that we could fix this is meeting again. So I scheduled to meet her tomorrow on the beach at 2 PM.
I spent the rest of the night over joyed, and happier than I had ever felt before. Evita’s happiness has made my life amazing. I did not want to be obliged to give it back to her, but otherwise, I convinced myself, I would have felt as if I stole her life from her.
After the party ended, I went out on the beach to continue the amazing night I was having with other people having a nice night. My sister, the sole reason for the event, got tired at around 2 AM, and headed upstairs to her room in the hotel. At this point, if I can recall correctly, it was around 3:30 AM and everyone was having a great time. We all were dancing on the shore until the sun started to come up. At that point we all went up to our rooms to sleep off that night of drinking and partying.
Waking up at 10 AM, I realized I only had 4 hours left with unlimited happiness so I decided to do things that I would normally be sad doing but could be happy doing with this unnatural and unlimited happiness in my body. I decided to go to a soup kitchen to volunteer and help people. This soup kitchen, in one of the poorest and most depressing neighborhoods in Cancun would have normally made me cry to see how little care is being given to these people; however, I stayed happy the entire time. I left at around 1:30 PM to go to the beach to meet up with Evita.
I reconnected with Evita on the beach at 2, as planned. I saw as I was with her there was a sharing of happiness going between the two of us. I walked away for a few minutes and saw all of the happiness went to Evita and I started feeling quite sad and depressive again. I realized that when separated only one of us can have this happiness, but together we share this happiness. When together, we were the two happiest people on the beach. We realized that we needed to be together. However, needed not in a sense of I loved her and she loved me, needed so that we do not become either very happy or very sad. We started doing everything together. The times where we could not be together such as, going to the bathroom had become a severe challenge for both of us. Going to the bathroom super happy or super sad are both odd feelings.
As this togetherness progressed, we started developing feelings for one another and began dating. However, this was by no means a normal relationship, as we always needed to be together. So in addition to being boyfriend and girlfriend, we were also classmates, and roommates. After we graduated from University, we got a job together and I proposed to marry her. She said yes.
We married on June 6th, 2003, four years after our first meeting each other. The ceremony was splendid. We have now been married for almost 10 years. This all due to a transfer of happiness.
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