Being in Love: The Canary

Hi. My name is Zachary Tomlinson but people like to call me Zach. I am twenty four years old and working as a lawyer in a law firm, Berkshire, UK but I’m originally from Chicago, US. When I was seventeen, I met my first love, Natalie and I let her go. And that is, by far my biggest regret in life. 

 

It was the summer after I graduated from high school when I met Natalie in the city park. I still remember the time when I saw her. She was sitting on the bench in a canary yellow summer dress reading ‘The Notebook’. Her hair was of a beautiful gold color and her eyes were warm brown.  Something about her reminded me of the canaries my mother and I had watched when we had gone bird watching this one time. They were my favourite and I always used to love those beautiful little birds. Something about them was always so innocent and sweet. So I decided to go over and talk to her.

 

Turned out, Natalie’s uncle lived only a few blocks away from my house and she was there visiting him for the summer. She was also a newly graduated senior and a future Princeton student. She wanted to major in Literature. We talked for a while and she agreed to go out with me on the following night.    

That night, I picked her up from her Uncle’s place and we went to watch a movie. It was nice sitting next to her in the movie hall occasionally catching a glance of her innocent face. Later we had dinner and I told her about how I had gotten into a fancy college in UK to study law. We talked about ourselves, and our families and friends. She told me about her life back in North Carolina and I told her about my high school. She told me about the books she found interesting and I told her about my favourite songs. She kissed me on the cheek before I dropped her at her Uncle’s place and it felt so right and so beautiful. I remember that night as one of the best nights of my life.  

We dated for some time. I took her to amusement parks and movies. I even bought her home to meet my parents and she introduced me to her uncle. One day, when we were walking on the side walk, she told me that she was in love with me. I froze in that moment not knowing what to say. I had never considered the idea of falling in love with her but in that moment, I realized that if there was one person I wanted to be with for the rest my life, it was her. The girl in the canary yellow dress who was reading that Nicolas Sparks novel. I told her I loved her, too and she fell into my arms. She was the most beautiful girl. And from that day, she was mine.

When the summer was coming to an end and she had to go back to North Carolina, she told me that she wanted to go to UK with me and that being with me was all she cared about. She was willing to give up her dream of going to Princeton but I refused. I wasn’t good enough for her and not worth the compromise she was willing to make. I loved her but I told her that what we had, was just a summer fling so that she could somehow move on. I thought she’d cry or hate me but she told me that she understood and walked away.

I never saw her again, after that. Not on the streets of Chicago and not in the city park. On the day she was about to leave Chicago, I realized that I had made a big mistake. That I had given up one real thing I had in my life. I mean, I could’ve done a long distance relationship. So I bought some flowers and wrote her a letter telling her how much I loved her and how sorry I was and went to the train station to meet her and to tell her that this could work. That we could work. By the time I reached the station, her train had already left and I stood right there by the track with a note buried deep in my pocket and the flowers dropped next to my feet.

I thought that the universe was asking me to move on. To let her go. So I tried to forget her. I tried to forget that girl in the canary yellow summer dress. I went off to UK after that but I always missed her. I couldn’t get myself into one single serious relationship because the whole time, I was still in love with Natalie. I used to dream about our days in Chicago and wake up lying in an empty bed with a hole in my heart. My regrets were killing me and a year after I graduated from college, I went to see her. Her uncle told me that she had moved to Oklahoma after completing college. So I packed my entire life and took a plane to Oklahoma hoping that Natalie would be right there, waiting for me on her porch. I found her address in the city directory and decided to drop by, one night.

It was seven o’clock in the evening and I was standing in front of her house. I wanted to knock her door and hold her close in my arms. I wanted to tell her that I’d never let her go again but something caught my eye. It was the girl in the window dancing with another man. My sweet Natalie with another man. He was smiling and whispering something, probably sweet nothings, in her ear and she was throwing her head back, laughing. That day, I realized that she was really gone.

Sometimes I wish I could just go back in time and change things, but I can’t. I miss her all the time but I know that I have to let her go. She has found another man, who is not coward like me. I had my chance with her. A chance to keep the one real thing in my life forever but I screwed it up. The girl in the canary yellow summer dress is gone. My Canary has flown away. I let her go and she flew away.