Thank You

Bells

Pain. Ah, pain. Because all felt like pain for so long, she is the one who eases it all. She is right. The pain stopped the moment I laid eyes on her. It faded away, left space for wonder, admiration and... love ? All these things I feel when I am around her, even if sometimes it is fear and nervosity, anxiety or panic, it never equals pain. She has never made me feel any pain. Just like Romeo.

After her last few words, we both just stare at each other, and even without any sound, there is some sort of understanding floating between us. The feelings are real, for both of us. We both feel safe. We both understand how damaged we both might be, and what that entails. We know better than to rush things and end up getting hurt by our own words. Although, in this moment, I feel like all the words I kept inside of me for so long are ready to come out of my throat. Just knowing that she is on my side, and that she won't let me be alone gives me all the strength and courage I need to open up fully. I know she cares. Her words are sincere. She is.

"I was eleven. Going on twelve. Actually... well, it was the night right before my birthday. Just a bit over five years ago."

She is looking right into my eyes, all of her attention focused on me, on my voice and on my story.

"Ever since I had turned ten, my parents would let me stay awake the eve of my birthday so that they could wish me my birthday at midnight. It felt so exhilarating to wait for the bells to ring at midnight. My father had made these bells, I'm still not sure how, but they worked like an alarm, and they would ring on the birthday of everyone of us, at midnight. It felt special, to have bells that only rang on your birthday, and the ones of your family members, not for anybody else. I felt special. It was only the third time I had waited for the bells to ring midnight. I never waited again after that night. I threw the bells out. Crushed them. My mother probably did get them out from the mud and put them somewhere in the house where I won't find them, but I know for sure that they don't work anymore. I'm sorry, I'm walking away from the initial story..."

"It's alright, darling."

I clear my throat, my voice heavy with the weight of the memories, and my mind overwhelmed by the wave of nostalgia and sadness hitting me. The words do not take much to get out of my mouth, but they still hurt on their way out. They have been stuck inside of my head for long years now, and I am yet to figure out if what I am feeling now is only guilt, or also relief.

"So, I was waiting. It was already cold outside for the beginning of November. It felt like a month of January more than November really. The roads were frozen on some parts, many of us had slipped on the way to our car already, and we were already careful about wearing warm enough clothes not to get sick. My brother had this friend of his, his best friend. They had been friends ever since they were in kindergarten. This friend's birthday was just a couple of days before mine, on the seventh. And that year, this friend decided to celebrate his birthday on the eighth, because it was a Saturday. It was also the eve of my birthday, and my brother wouldn't have missed it for anything in the world, so he made my father promise that he would come and take him home from his friend's house before midnight. I remember Romeo fighting on the phone with his friend. His friend was upset because he had organized a big party for his eighteenth birthday. I can't blame him for being mad ; Romeo was his best friend, or so he thought. For Romeo, I was  his best friend. Then came that one friend whose party was on the eighth. So, my brother promised his friend he would come early on Saturday so that he could spend more time with him, but that he would leave at eleven thirty, that that wasn't even an option. His friend was still upset, I remember, but he agreed. I was upset just as much, I think. I wanted my brother to stay up with me waiting for the bells. I didn't want to wait for those bells to ring on my own. But I understood that I wasn't the only friend he had in this world, and that even though he saw me as his best friend, he also wanted to party with other people his age, drink, smoke and have sex with eighteen-year-olds, and not always play children's games with his little sister. He loved doing that, but he was like any teenager. So, I told him it was okay, that it didn't matter as long as he showed up on time, before midnight. And so, he left on that Saturday afternoon, with a promise on his lips, and a smile I could never forget."

"Did he show up before midnight as promised ?"

And suddenly, the weight of so many painful memories becomes too much to handle at once. I close my eyes, my lids tightly pressed against each other, seeing like a movie, a recreation of the events I still can see so clearly. I can feel the sweat in the palms of my hands and on the back of my neck, and tears start to well up. Tears. They seem to fall so easily whenever she is around me. Or maybe it just is because I have never told anyone this whole story. Maybe I would've cried telling somebody else. Only would've I been able to tell anyone else ? Could've I told someone else about every detail of that story, every little thing I remember, the smiles, the promises, the waiting, the bells. So many things, so many words and images, but I know I want, can and need to tell her. Cate. With her loving ocean eyes and her ineffable warmth. She is the one I chose to open up to. Not anybody else. Just her.

"He did show up before midnight."

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no i did not cut the story in pieces because i'm yet to decide exactly what happened to that good old romeo-