The Five Minutes I Never Gave

When you called from the airport,
your voice tethered to the static,
you said your gate was closing—
asked me for five minutes.
I watched your name blink twelve times on my phone,
and ignored it because the night before
you forgot our ninth anniversary.
I had to make do with a four dollars chocolate bar,
picked hastily from a corner convenience store.
Meanwhile, I had seared your favourite steak,
scallops melting into the warmth of butter,
cherry-red wine shimmering in the glass,
velvet rose petals scattered on the floor
as if I could decorate disappointment.

When I finally picked up,
you said, I’m sorry, I’ll fix this.
But sorry doesn’t untangle the knots in your stomach.
Sorry doesn’t sit across from you
in the candlelight, where everything burns
except the person you prepared it for.
I hung up.

The last text you sent:
Wait for me. I’ll be home before you know it.
Another promise that slipped through your fingers,

like so many before.

Now I sit at the same table,
face flushed from the wine,
rose petals browned and crisped,

crumbling like old regrets in my hands.

I scroll through missed calls,
hoping if I stare long enough,
your name will light up again,
asking for the five minutes
I never gave.

But you took those five minutes with you
when you boarded that plane—
the five minutes I never gave

became the last five minutes we never had.

Sophie-Anne Lim-Chieo recently graduated from Nanyang Technological University with a BA in English Literature and a second major in Communication Studies with Honours. She currently serves as an editorial intern at Gaudy Boy, a New York City-based literary press. Her poetry and film reviews have been published or are forthcoming in Sky Island Journal, The Insurgence and Flickside.