u p h e r e ↬ m.f. & s.m. [completed]

RED VASE

CHAPTER THREE

Mon. 22nd August 2016

"We live in time – it holds us and moulds us – but I've never felt I understood it very well. [...] it takes only the smallest pleasure or pain to teach us time's malleability. Some emotions speed it up, others slow it down; occasionally, it seems to go missing – until the eventual point when it really does go missing, never to return."

-Julian Barnes, The Sense Of An Ending

How long does it take one to fall in love? Or, better ask, how long does it take for that one to realize he has fallen?

For Jack it took exactly 2 weeks. It was when he unwrapped some packages, to reveal pictures and vases with which he decorated his flat, yet he realized that it did not help him to make it feel like home.

Taking a good guess, he picked up one of the vases, one that was as red as the hair of the person he was about to give it to, and walked up the stairs to 'his' roof. In some kind of way he could already call it his roof, for he was more often up here than any other person, yet always tried his best to be unnoticed.

His footsteps were heavy on the metal but this time he did not care if he would be seen. For he could hear the boy he looked for from afar, talking to himself in a poetic way. Maybe, Jack thought, he is not talking to himself but to nothing at all.

It was nighttime, 11:47pm to be exact, carefully he carried the vase up to the roof in the other hand his cell phone as a light source, for in the past two weeks the fact that there was no light up here, other than the red one on the other roof, did not change.

"Mark?", he asked in a voice that was supposed to sound confused yet happy, for it should be as innocently as possible. Jack did not want to explain why he came looking for his new friend here. Yet, he knew that he had to, for he had no lie in mind that would have worked out.

The voice on the other side of the abyss stopped talking and the boy the voice belonged to first tried to hide himself behind the small room he always leaned against. But eventually he decided that it would not make a difference if he showed himself or not other than the next day in school would be less awkward, at least that is what he thought.

"What are you doing here?", he asked. His voice mixed with confusion, disappointment and just a little bit of happiness and joy, his eyes though, told a story completely different from the one his tongue spilled out. His eyes were filled with anxiety and happiness, which was a combination that did not cause the boy to understand his feelings any better now.

Jack, on the other building, could only hear what the tongue spoke and not what the eyes told, so now he questioned why he came. His feet already guided him back to the stairs. He wanted to act like nothing ever happened for he did not want to disturb something personal and seem reckless. But his mind did otherwise than his body.

"I-I, uh, wanted to give you some-", he coughed. "-Something." It was the first time he stuttered as long as the boys knew each other. As he said it, he held out his hand that hold onto the red vase.

"A vase?"

"Yeah, guess I took away the surprise, but I'm kinda out of wrapping paper, ya know?"

As much as Mark wanted to stay serious and, for some reason, act like he was hurt or mad, he could not hold back the chuckle that wanted to escape his throat so badly.

"It matches your hair!"

On the street beneath them the cars rushed louder than usual and more fast. It caused the red haired boy to not fully understand what Jack had said.

"IT MATCHES YOUR HAIR.", he now screamed, maybe he little too loud, yet he was not too embarrassed for he knew that no one heard it, except Mark, and he was supposed to hear it anyway.

In Mark's mind were dozens of questions he wanted to ask, but he kept them to himself for he was too afraid of all the possible answers. How did you find me?

"OKAY, THROW IT HERE.", he screamed just as loud as his friend did, even if it was not necessary at the moment. Stepping forward to the edge of the building, holding his hands up in prepare to catch his present, Jacks' jaw dropped in disbelief. "No way, ya goof! I'm not throwing your present, I've seen you catching balls men, I'm not that insane."

"Well, that hurt."

Jack let out a laugh and clutched tighter to the vase in his arms, he already shoved his cell phone back into his pocket, meaning he nearly stood there in complete darkness. He took a few steps backwards. "So, how are you planning to give it to me then? You seriously gonna walk all the way down your building and all the way up mine?"

"I have a better idea."

Tus. 23rd August 2016

Midnight.

As he started sprinting, the vase still clutched to his chest as if it was a wet shirt, Mark's jaw dropped in disbelief and fear. Time seemed to stand still as he watched the green hair get even more messed up by the wind that played with the boy as if it was trying to hold him up.

Shortly after he caught his friend, who had just jumped over the abyss.

"Call me insane once again, and imma punch you in the face.", he gasped, pulling the other boy into a hug, grabbing on his shirt as if he still feared him to fall.

And that was the moment in which Jack felt like he was home, a feeling no decoration could ever bring to him, that moment would last forever and no one could take it from him.

And so he knew that he had fallen in love.

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