A few years ago, I fell in love. I’ve always prided myself in being a pragmatic person who enjoyed practical gifts over things like flowers (though, I still like being bought flowers). I fell in love with a special gem. It was 7.1mm in diameter and the gem shone like no other. You could even say it was love at first sight. I’ve never been much of a jewellery person, so it seems silly to say, but I could tell it was special.
From the first time I saw it online, I thought it was beautiful. Even though it was merely a bunch of pixels on a screen, it meant something to me. And that peach tourmaline sat in the back of my mind for a long time. It’s embarrassing to admit that I was pining over some shiny rock, but I was still worried it would be snatched up by someone else.
Two years ago, I reached out to the jewellery-maker who owned the gem and she sent me different images of the gem. By this time, I was in a serious relationship with a promising plan of marriage—serious enough that we’d made plans to purchase the tourmaline and have the ring custom-made. The peach tourmaline had my heart. It really did. Depending on the backdrop of the photos she had sent, the gem glowed a little differently each time.
And finally, I saw the peach tourmaline in person for the very first time. While I had my ring size measured in the lobby of a modern apartment building, I saw it sitting in a small box. The hexagonal box had a clear lid and the tourmaline sat on top of a black velvet bed. It was a marvellous orange colour and was different to the images I had seen. I told Fairina I didn’t want to spoil the surprise and that I’d see the ring eventually, but I had caught that small glimpse of it. I was elated.
Before it first came into my life, I was happy. I would have been content without knowing you existed. I didn’t know I needed something like you, but you entered my life and made it a whole lot brighter. It seems so silly to say that I’m heartbroken over a little thing that means nothing in the grand scheme of things. But it was one-of-a-kind. It’s not like diamonds where they’re like carbon copies of each other. No two tourmalines are the same.
I guess it just wasn’t meant to be. Not once did I ever see that ring—the peach tourmaline again. That is, until after we had split. After the many, many months of uncertainty, I no longer had the strength to fight your double-minded thoughts. I succumbed to the whispers that we just weren’t meant to be and lost hope. I was convinced you never really went through with buying the ring.
I really, really loved that gem. It truly is beyond all understanding how I felt about it. And in an egregious act of desperation right after the breakup, I went onto Fairina’s Instagram page hoping I wouldn’t see it there. Because it would mean I was right. It would mean you never had the ring to begin with. And for the very first time, I had seen the completed ring in all its glory.
You really didn’t have the ring.
I didn’t see it in real life like I had imagined in my own proposal but in a reel dated two weeks ago. I think I would have cried a lot if I wasn’t already so emotionally drained. The peach tourmaline was the centrepiece of a rose gold solitaire ring. And it was beautiful. The orange gem I had remembered so vividly in my mind for years looked so different when paired with the band. It broke my heart.
I thought I still had a chance—that Fairina still had the ring and I could at least see it and wear it just once. I was a fool. At every turn and act of desperation, I broke my own heart over and over. She said the peach tourmaline was no longer available, so I couldn’t even say goodbye. My hope of buying out the tourmaline was shattered. I wish I hadn’t looked at her Instagram page and seen the ring that was meant to be mine.
That ring… it was everything I wanted and much, much more. So it devastates me that I’ll never ever get to see it in real life—I’ll never get to feel it on my finger and admire it under differently-coloured lights. And it devastates me all the more because I know it would have been a perfect fit. After all, it was made specially for me.
In my grief, I wonder who may have been the one to come in the night and steal away the ring. I wonder if it was an impulse buy or another case of “love at first sight”, but I doubt anyone could have loved the peach tourmaline more than me. No other gem ever compared to you. I don’t think I’ll ever fall in love like I did with this peach tourmaline again.
I guess it’s just the way things go. A poetically fitting end to my hopes of seeing the gem on my finger and… to us. Perhaps that’s a good thing. Because if the ring ended up in my possession, I’m almost certain all I would think about when admiring it is you.
And I really wanted it to be you.
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