Cygnus and Christopher

Untitled Part 16

Somewhere along the line I just ran out of energy. The summer with its circular patterns chiseled down some important part of me I didn't know was important until it's absence hung brightly in my sky. An asterism once so recognizable, now void all the way to the end of the universe. So I decided to take it real easy for the last party at Rick's house, maybe the last one I'd ever go to.

All my other friends took the opposite approach, pregamed the party hard in Christopher's basement. My glass filled only with bubbling soda. The beverage lacked the alcohol kick, but tasted good regardless of its reduced psychoactive effects.

Cartoons played on the television. No one really paid much attention to the brightly colored adventures of a humanised dog and cat, a rerun of the series finally. The show occasionally got dark and serious underneath the often ridiculous humor.

Thomas and Suzanne crushed powder, a stimulant of some sort, with credit cards. They talked excitedly about the various positive experiences an acquaintance of theirs had on the substance. Christopher drank from his mixed drink and listened to Thomas and Suzanne prepare for take off. Nicole and Alex thought about joining our pregame. In the end they didn't make it though, and just met us at Rick's. Christopher saw Nicole regularly throughout the summer, but I hadn't seen Alex since the first night.

The stimulant powder hit Thomas and Suzanne pretty quickly, and to ease the transition they went on a quick walk. This left Christopher and me alone in the basement. I felt the presences of something else though. All the patterns and memories of all the times I'd been here seemed to be crawling their way into the now. Perhaps they sense their own end, sensed their unbroken chain fragmenting into pieces, little bits of light from a supernova growing ever more distant

"Want to play a game?" Christopher asked. "Yeah." I said, happy to escape my gloomy internal imagery. We played several rounds of a fighting video game. I lost every round, came close a couple of times though, got Christopher's health bar down to a blinking red. He always came back though. I took comfort in that.

Right before we started another round, Christopher's phone rang. On the other end was Suzanne. Apparently the drug they'd taken had an extremely "errotic" edge and they were going to go back to her house and they'd maybe meet us at the party.

We hung around some before heading out the party. "Let's bike to the party tonight. I am going to ride the light up bike. Might be last chance ya know?" Outside the weather was calm and inviting. I agreed to biking to the party with little hesitation.

In the garage, I helped Christopher lower the bike from its hanger onto the ground. "Curious to see how this thing rides with all the lights and stuff." I said as I set the bike down. The bike didn't seem that heavy considering all the additions. Christopher eyed the bike, removed from its storage spot for perhaps the first time in a couple years. "Ya know, it's not even done yet." Christopher said.

I studied the bike. I suppose some spots looked a little bit bare in comparison to others. "Yeah, we kinda slowed work on, and slowed, and slowed, and well you can only go so slow before you aren't doing anything anymore." The way he said it mirrored the worded content, with the space between words growing as he progressed from capitalization to period. "Might as well use it as it is, not sure how much, I'll be back around here."

The ride took longer than usual. Christopher pedaled leisurely. The whole thing seemed a bit off. I thought he would of rode as fast as could, gone till alcohol and exertion heated his body to the limit. But no, the pace was slow. I had no trouble keeping up, got lost again in the memorial hallway of my life rolling out alongside me. This time though I saw the cracks in the wall, saw the pictures fade, saw every late summer sun set cliche forming like moss on my dwindling day dream.

I wondered if Christopher felt it too. And he might have for a moment, then he looked to me and almost said something, but didn't. So some more time passed in silence then he looked again, speeding up, "Not sure how much future we got left together and well, let's spend it at Rick's party, not here ya know?" All I managed back was a slight nod.