Lemonada

Tuefall

A fog had set low in the city, and now everything and everyone was veiled by an opaque sheet of grey. The weather must have lowered everybody's sprits because there were only three people out on the streets, of whom one was the man.

He held his face in his hands, deep in slumber, unaware of the condition of the grumpy streets. Once he had awoken, he realized that nobody but Tom and one other peddler was present on the street. 

The merchant was curiously picking at something in his grasp. A lock of hair was hanging astray, isolated from the rest of his head of obsidian hair. Even though the man couldn't exactly see what Tom was doing, he knew right away: the merchant was crafting another sandglass. The only thing he did wonder was the design that Tom was going to choose. 

The man put on the cap that he was holding, back on his head with one whip of the arm, and cautiously stood up. Inching towards the stand, he imagined himself being one with the fog: invisible, inaudible and gone. 

"You there," a husky voice called out somewhere from inside the fog. The man continued creeping towards Tom, thinking himself unnoticed. 

"You over there, that always spies on my work". The man scanned around him for someone else lurking amidst the fog like he was doing. 

"I'm talking to you. Who else is here? Only you, my friend," the voice clarified. The man was extremely startled. The inconspicuousness that he had built up had finally been torn apart, and now he was naked to any spectating eye. 

He took a step back, alert like prey about to be devoured by a ravenous predator. The voice however, beckoned him forward.  

" Don't be wary, my friend. I bear no ill. I just wish to make cordial conversation." A finger materialized right in front of him. Then, a full hand. And then a foot, an entire leg, a torso and at last, a wrinkled face.

"My name is Tom, and I work at this ol' stand over there." The merchant had on a stiff smile as he stretched out a hand to offer an handshake.

The man stood stationary, motionless. Be careful of strangers, he reminded himself. 

When he could see that Tom was willing to wait patiently for his response, the man relaxed a little. This was indeed a man of admirable temperament. He tentatively shook his head but the man interrupted him. 

"But, you know who I am already. And I know who you are," the old man noted, clicking his tongue, as if he was identifying the man. "Come, come, I'll show you my newest piece," he muttered, leading the man homebound.

The man had never dared to venture this close to the merchant's stand. From up close and personal, he could see paint stripping off of the ends of the wooden stand like curls of decorative chocolate on a cake. They reminded him of the chocolate cake that his mom had bought him for his fifth birthday. It had had two thin slices of spiral-shaped chocolate ornaments, and a thick, oozing layer of chocolate icing that had a name starting with "gan". That was of course the last time that he had experienced such a delicacy.

A muddied rug was sprawled right below where someone's feet would be if they were sitting in the merchant's chair. It too looked like it was part of an overly used collection of antique items. 

He had never noticed it but there was a shelf right below the display shelf. This one protruded inwards towards the merchant, and had at least a dozen unfinished sandglasses. He had never seen these ones before. 

"Do you like them? These are my work-in progress," Tom explained quietly. "I've lost inspiration for them, and I guess that I am waiting for some sort of incentive or genius idea". The merchant shook his head with an inconsolable half-smile that barely resembled a smile. 

The man muffled his yawn, and craned his neck forward, eyes squinting. All of the unfinished glasses had two details in common: a navy blue base and a miniscule red lobe in the middle of the blue sand, in the shape of a foot.

"All same," the man blurted out unexpectedly, pointing a finger at the glasses on the shelf which he inwardly referred to as the merchant's shelf. 

Tom shifted his weight onto his left leg, pensively leaving the silence to go on. The man narrowed his gaze onto the sinister dolphin and the perfect dolphin sand glasses. He had grown fond of them, and desperately wished that they would not be sold even though he knew that this was very selfish of him. They were meant to be together just as darkness and light were entangled in each other.  

The merchant stared at him blankly before pursing his lips and asking, "do you like this one?" He held up the alluring dolphin with the good colour scheme. 

The man hesitated, then shook his head haltingly. He instead signalled his interest in the lumpy, murky dolphin.

"Interesting choice," Tom commented, rather inquisitively. "You can have that one if you'd like," he proclaimed warmly. "That is also the one that is dearest to me. You have good taste". 

Before the man had time to protest, the merchant packed the dolphin in a metre of bubble wrap and put it inside a paper bag, folding down the opening like one would do to a lunch bag. 

"Here," he said as he held out the scrunched paper bag, "take good care of it". 

The man thanked him with a nod of the head and grabbed the bag, being extra prudent not to accidentally shatter it. He was sad to see it part with its more aesthetically-pleasing twin but he couldn't refuse what the old man had offered him. 

And plus, half of him was ecstatic to possess such a prize, and he wanted so desperately to cuddle it in his arms. He refrained from doing so in front of the merchant, for he could see how desolate Tom was to be parted from a glass fragment of his soul. The lighting and the angle made his eyes look cloudy, like someone experiencing deja vu or a memory from the forgotten past. 

"Ever since that day... I needed to look for that man. I needed to repay him somehow." Abruptly, the merchant started speaking, his eyes starting to tear, and fixated on the ground. "I was so occupied that day. So many things had happened, and it was just so difficult to pay attention to anything else. I saw a man in a hoodie notify the police about... The accident but unfortunately, I couldn't get a good look at his face." 

The man's heart beat faster, he could feel the blood pumping through him as his breathing rate quickened. 

Tom paused to take a breath before continuing. "You probably aren't aware of what happened because you weren't there but..." He heaved a sigh as a hot glittering tear fervently rolled down his cheek. "I lost my one and only daughter". Silence. "I.. I named her Jewel because she was really the only precious thing in existence." He slammed a fist into the merchant's shelf, causing two glasses that were near the edge of the shelf to come spiralling down to the end of their lives. "I couldn't even look after her. Even though she was my everything!" 

The man froze in place, unsure how to react. 

"Go," the black-haired merchant commanded him, still unwilling to make eye contact.

The man complied, hastily walking away, tripping every two steps that he took. 

"Wait!" A mighty cry shook the ground. The merchant came out of nowhere, hurtling forward like a bullet. "I've been holding it in too long. I need to let it go." 

The man stopped in the process of taking another step, one foot still in midair. 

"I know it was you. I didn't know before but I can tell now. I remember, it was you."