As she stepped out from the boat and surveyed the scene in front of her, her lips curved into a most satisfying smile. Her eyes glazed as she looked at the tall buildings, basking in the warm twilight. The lights had started to be switched on and their reflections were twinkling in the dark sea water. As the clock tower in the distance struck 6 0’clock her thoughts suddenly wandered very far away from the present scenario. She remembered the tall building that was situated right in front of the clock tower. A light suddenly shone in her eyes and her smile widened as she thought about what that building had been to her. A sweet melody drifting from a house nearby pulled her further away from the present and took her twenty years back. ‘Well done Amanda’, her teacher’s voice echoed in her mind as she saw herself in one of the rooms in that building. It was her dance class and she had just mastered a very difficult dance step. Her friend Michelle started clapping for her. Michelle…another door in her memories opened. Michelle had been her best friend at that place. It was a ‘music and dance’ school and Amanda had met Michelle on her first day there. She had loved her vibrant personality as soon as she had seen her and their friendship had only strengthened by each passing day.
At first she had the school had only seemed like an escape from her cruel stepmother but as soon as she had performed an excellent twirl in her first class it became much more than that. It became her home and she knew that she had been destined to come here.
The praise that she got there, the time she spent playing with her friend Michelle and the cotton candy the sweet man outside her school gave to her were the only childhood pleasures that she remembered.
She had also met the man who meant the most to her at that place. A warm feeling trickled down her spine as she remembered the day she had been walking alone in one of the less frequently used corridors when a voice so angelic drifted out from behind one of the closed doors that she had been forced to open it. She had been mesmerized as soon as she saw the face that did complete justice to the voice. As the blue eyes had risen to register her she had become nervous and had tripped in an attempt to run away. As those arms had carried her to the nurse she had known that this was yet another gift the place had given to her.
His name was Baran and he had dreams of moving to a big city and playing his music there. His dreams soon made home in her mind as well and thus after five years they had both bid farewells to their beloved school with promises of coming back. Those promises had, however, been soon forgotten as they had become engrossed in pursuing their dreams. She might not have been here even now if it had not been for Baran’s sudden death in a car accident two weeks ago. Her life had lost its meaning as the blue eyes had lost their glint and the warm arms had gone cold. The smile vanished from her face as the memories of it came back to her. She had needed something to motivate her to move back to life and that had been when she had remembered her old school. She made up her mind to go back, to feel the floor she had first danced on, to see the room where she had first met Baran and to walk in street where she had played with Michelle. She had to go back to start life once again and this was why she was now standing here watching the sun set upon the buildings before her.
There was determination in her steps as her heels clicked on the road leading to her school. Her steps, however, halted as soon as she turned the corner to her destined street. The perfect picture in her mind suddenly shattered as she took in the scene before her. The open gardens had been replaced by ugly cemented pathways and shops dominated the once empty street side. The smell of sea in the air had now been replaced by that of grease and smoke. There was no solitude in the cries of toddlers and the car horns blaring in the street. She closed her eyes and covered her ears with her hands as if to block it all.
Mustering as much energy as she could she moved towards the school building. Maybe it could offer her sanctuary a second time in her life but she was out of luck. She almost failed to recognize the place as she opened the huge oak doors. The loud music coming from the rooms drowned the blissful tunes that had once sweetened the school air. With dead steps she made her way through the crowded corridors and the last strand of her hope broke as she saw that the room was now dark and covered in dust. The grand piano that once stood in its midst had been now replaced by broken furniture. Blinded by tears she ran out of the room, out of the street and still kept on running until she reached a quiet spot. This was not the home she had once cherished and remembered. How could she loose her home and her love all at once? Life was too unfair.
However as she calmed down a bit, she started to make sense of everything around her. Change was inevitable. Everything moved on as time passed. Maybe it was the shortness of something that made it so precious in the first place. Life wouldn’t stop just because one person did. The world moved on and she would have to move along too……
