Drift

i. One of the Strangest Things

It’s The Day we’ve been dreading.

Summer’s ended, and school begins in a week. Only yesterday, Mom took me to buy all the necessary items for the new school year--a bookbag, writing utensils, lined paper. You offered to come with me, but I refused. It’s too depressing to think that you won’t be needing anything here, because you’ll buy all your materials in another place. Another city.

Already, the weather has cooled. Wind whips about me and tugs insistently at my arms, cinched around my middle. As I trudge down the street, I yank my hairband off and smooth my hair down around my neck. It’s thin, but a source of warmth, and will have to do to replace the scarf you gave me, the one I forgot at home on the dresser.

The scarf meant for the winter without you.

Meteorologists are predicting the coldest winter in a long history, based on the early onset of autumn. A blizzard is due in early December—I still remember how you really love snow. But this year, you won’t be here to watch the flakes waft steadily to the ground, or wake up to the pure whiteness that blankets the landscapes beyond the city, the ones we can just barely glimpse from our balconies.

So out of reach, the suburbs. Where you’ll be going, soon.

Soon. Tonight.

My steps relax across the rainswept pavement, and I avoid the neat stacks of leaves deposited at the curb. I frequent your neighborhood so often an old woman sitting out on her porch beams familiarly at me. I nod, affect a smile, though in my heart I’m frowning-

A strong gust of wind sends still-green leaves gliding to a rest on the ground. Soon, the leaves will die, and plummet. The lonely, branchless tree will wither beneath the wintry sun.

You’ll not see any of it, though. I will.

I will.

Mentally, I shake myself out of it. Don’t think about it, you said. Not until we necessarily have to. 

When will that be? In a few minutes?

All through the summer, we managed to do it, didn’t we? Not mention it, all but forget it. We pretended we had forever, that this summer wasn’t the last. That today wouldn’t be the final day.

Nevertheless, occasionally I’d catch you looking at me, as if trying to sear my image into your head. You wouldn’t be smiling, or frowning, just looking a little distant. Melancholy.

Whenever that happened, I’d tap your shoulder and you’d snap out of it immediately.

Only today, it’s me who needs to be tapped.

Another gust; the branches buckle and snap, spiraling to the ground. I stop to stare for a minute, then walk on. There’s no way I can save it, can I? I hate it more than anything, this feeling. Helplessness. Unable to do a thing except watch as my life twisted from my grasp-

And thankfully, into yours. 

You repaired me, put the pieces back together. You painted a smile on my face and taught me how to laugh again, because I forgot. You tried to cheer me up, effectively hiding me from the darkness. In a way, you blindfolded me. 

You told me I’d seen too much, so now you made sure I saw nothing.When anyone was harsh with me, you suggested we leave. Run away. Disappear from here; it would be like we never existed.

That was the thing, though. Running away never solves problems. 

At least we could distance ourselves from all the people that hate us, you told me.

Any time you spoke like that, your voice grew so sharp and piercing and your eyes would flare. Yet, if someone asked, “How are you,” you always replied, “Fine,” and smiled that smile, the one that assured everyone everything was okay.

That you really were fine, that you weren’t secretly falling apart.

And everyone bought it, everyone believed you because they weren’t around that day in the middle of the summer when you broke down and wept.

I was alarmed, because you never cried. That day, you did. And it seemed like you’d never cease.

It was because you’d had the nightmare, the one where everyone we knew had tried to kill us. Where we had both been betrayed, where you’d had only me and I’d had only you.

We ran, but were outrun. The nightmare ended with both of us in coffins.

You were deathly afraid of betrayal-

It’s one of the strangest things about you.

You noticed me, somehow, and through observing, saw what everyone else did. 

That I needed help, and badly. 

Unlike everyone else, you gave it.

You hazarded a lot, in helping me. By giving a part of yourself to me, you risked being taken advantage of, being betrayed.

Yet you still healed me. Made me feel special, inadvertently compelling me to rely on you. Depend on you entirely to cheer me up, to provoke a smile.

In a way, you weakened me.

During that process, you began to lean on me too. Began to need me as much as I needed you. Still need you.

The prospect of existing without you is daunting. 

Frankly, I don’t know if I can do it. 

I still remember the day you told me you were leaving.

I told you I hated my school, and dreaded returning in the fall.

At least I won’t have to go back to that hellhole, you said, smiling wryly.

You’re dropping out?

No, transferring. To an all-year boarding school in the suburbs, halfway across the country.

You always spoke so lightly; I could never differentiate between a joke and an admission . You weren’t joking then, but I hoped you were- There’s nothing I can do about it, you noted, so there’s no use moping.

That didn’t change anything, did it?

At the time, neither of us really gave a thought to what that meant about us. I suppose we thought our relationship was strong enough to handle long distances, but now, thinking about it, it still won’t be the same. Sure, you’d be at an all-boys school, and I’d be stuck here, but letters and e-mails can’t keep us together.

We both know that.

And I can’t help but think that you were right, when you said everyone pays for their happiness. A little bit of good means a little bit of bad later. “It’s the way the world is,” you said. “So it’s hard for me to be happy, because I know I’m going to hurt, later.”

I see what you mean.

I’m hurting now.     

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A/N: Vote? Comment? Left someone/had someone leave and still miss them like hell? I feel you.