Remedy

Hot Air Balloon.

"So how do you feel about being twenty?"He grabs her lemonade iced-tea and places it on the grass. They both sit on the side-walk, doodling with pink and green chalks, laughing about the nonsensical shapes that just doesn't look as it ought to. Oh, but it was more than nonsensical, it was bright, colorful markings that would entice their imaginations and leave their memories bittersweet. 

"Like my passions were added color and color everyday, filling me up to my highest, and giving me hope. Like uh expanding my wings above the clouds that is filled with rainbows, but suddenly falling on the concrete ground, and waking up with bleeding knees and a worrying heart-beat. It's as if the car moves too fast for me to take my next step, and the world around me is too blurry for me to catch up..It's like-like as if the word "wait, I love you," to a stranger is too much to say. It's as if, it's," she bangs on the concrete ground, until her hands bleed.

"G-Gina, stop that! STOP," he grabs her hand and places it on his heart. "Feel that heart-beat? It's still working, and it has purpose," he nods only to find her shaking her head. 

"Don't you understand!? I'm just not ready to be twenty," she yanks her hand out of his, grabs the chalk, and draws an angry face with a tad of blood from her fingers oozing on it. 

"Okay, very artistic, now that's worth it," he nods and smiles.

"Shut up!" she cries. 

"Let's go take you home, this is not a joke is it," he reaches out to her hands to check if there is still more blood oozing out. 

"Stop! Don't leave please," she holds on tightly to his hand.

"Gina, I'm not leaving, I'm taking you home. We could have had a nice time doodling animals with chalks like a boss, but it led to you being psycho again..what, because of your brain that thinks everything deeply to the point it forgets reality. C'mon," he didn't let go of her bloody hand and as they both got up, his expression changed from a worried expression to a smile.

  "But- but I love this town Phil! I'm afraid to leave everyone behind...They gave me so much to remember.. I don't feel the same as I used to about leaving anymore..." she replies. 

     "Alright so what is it that you exactly want? God gave you a gift for crying out loud! It's time for you to open them. Why are you holding them back!?" His eye brows come together and he grimaces at her.     

   "I am not trying to hold them back, can't you see!?" She gently bangs on his chest. "I just feel like I have a lot to catch up on first, and a childhood to expand on before I set my foot on and call myself an actual adult. I just need some time, that's all," she says.     

"Hey, look there!" He points upwards to a hot-air balloon. She looks around and finally spots a red hot air balloon floating in the air. "See that? Even if we are living in reality, it doesn't mean we can't use our passion to fuel us for our future. Adulthood doesn't mean limiting yourself! It's not something gray. Look, your dreams scare you, doesn't that mean it's big enough? It can take you higher than that hot-air balloon, Gina. How will you ever know how much your worth unless you put yourself out there and expand beyond the horizons? You are alive, with a beating heart like this one..  We are never really ready Gina for anything all the time, our heart just says we gotta take it even if we're still kids. We just wake up and there, we are told to just let ourselves loose. How hard that can be..but we cannot give up," he says.

"IT'S NOT THAT EASY PHIL CAN'T YOU SEE," she sobs inside his chest even harder. His heart drops a beat as he wipes her tears. 

"Look, nothing worth it is easy.. Okay, fine.. Just follow your heart day by day, and watch the magic happen itself anyways," he says. 

"W-wait, but what about you?" She clutches to his shirt and widens her eyes. 

"Your hand is next to my heart-beat, which beats only for you. Why let those veins release anymore blood?"