a solid mix of both

What I absolutely did not expect was what happened next.

Your eyes locked onto mine.

For how long? I don't know. I've spent hours trying to measure it. Five seconds? Ten? More? Less?

The person sitting next to you touches your elbow in a silent "Keep going," and your hand comes up to silence any unnecessary interaction.

I'm looking straight into your eyes, and you're looking straight into mine.

I'm absolutely ridiculous because I literally start studying the pattern of your iris. Just in case I ever need to recreate it in a drawing, sooner or later.

Are you recognizing me?

The way I "recognized" you six years ago?

That night is etched into my memory as if it happened yesterday.

My son is asleep beside me. It's two in the morning, and I'm scrolling through Instagram.

I had already seen you, you know? I knew who you were.

Your face was "just" a handsome face.

Then, completely by chance, I hear you sing. My eyes practically pop out of their sockets.

I remember whispering to myself, "That's impossible. It has to be lip-sync or something like that."

Within a few hours, I find out everything there is to know about your voice.

And I see you.

I see you differently than I did before.

And in a way, I recognize you. But who are you?

Before, I knew who you were. Now I don't anymore.

I listen to you sing, and I cry. I can't stop myself. Like a fucking fountain.

And I can't make sense of it, because yes, I like music, but I've never been moved that much. Never.

The following evening, I make my first pencil portrait of you.

It's as if I want to capture your voice and put it onto paper.

It looks like I'm celebrating your beauty with those portraits, but that's not it. I'm desperately trying to put into black and white what struck me that night at two in the morning like a bolt from the blue.

Six years later, you're looking at me that same way: "But who are you?"

All I can do is smile at you. I feel like saying, "I don't know. But who the hell are you, then!?"

You smile, but you also look puzzled.

I get it. I'm puzzled too.

How many seconds have passed?

The person sitting next to you touches you again, and you lower your gaze. Someone taps me on the shoulder, and I move toward you. I leave you one more thing. Then I walk away quickly. I don't want to take any more time away from the people waiting in line.

I spend the following months wondering what happened. Whether what I saw was real, or whether my brain filled in the gaps.

I keep wondering what happened during those seconds. Maybe I'll never know. But that moment stayed there, suspended, while everything else kept moving.

Then a second moment comes.

The moment when I wonder whether Jung, that one time, was actually right. Or whether I'm the one seeing something more.

Did you already have that speech prepared?

Am I the only one who sees the similarities, or do you see them too? Are you seeing them? Did you see them too?

I feel dizzy, and I wonder how it's possible.

I wish I could ask someone, "Did you see what I saw?"

But I can't.

It all feels so absurd.

I just needed to shout this into the void, because it will never be possible to tell you.

And... You probably are just living your life as if nothing happened. Of course you are. It's totally fair. And normal.

But I. I don't feel normal anymore.