She was the perfect girl for him.
He was the perfect boy for her.
(1989)
He was seventeen; and she, sixteen. Still a little too young to understand what “love” really means, but brave enough to try it.
He fell in love with her on October 21st. Brown, crisp autumn leaves slowly falling down in synchronization, sunflowers starting to wilt, winds becoming chilly. He watched her from the window, as she braided her long and wavy hazelnut hair into a side, (adding daisies which fell from the ground), on some of the sections of her braid. He looked at her with sincerity in his eyes, to him, she’s a question he’s willing to answer. He looked at his blue post-its, scribbled and filled with words and random sentences that one day will turn into a song, he thought, and she would be the first one to hear it – he made her life into a song.
Six months later, she caught him looking from his window. Then she started to notice. She smiled innocently, like your typical sixteen year old girl-next-door type. She went outside and tapped his window pane. Jarred fell from his chair.
He fell off his chair.
And he fell in love with her.
“Hi, my name is Lauren, Lauren Keith.”
She said her name was Lauren, and that was all he needed to know.
“Jarred, Jarred Kim.”
(1900)
Everything was perfect.
He loves her,
And she loves him.
“Will you love me forever?”
“Forever and ever.”
(Little did they know, that life is full of “sometimes”, and with “always”, and “never”, but not with “forever”.)
(1901)
Things were okay. They would fight a few times every now and then, realizing that they have more differences than on what they thought.
(1902)
Things started to change. Feelings started to fade.
(1903)
Everything, fell apart.
“I’m just a threat to your thoughts,” Lauren paused, tears started to fall down from her eyes. She tried her best to show a smile, “and you’re a poison to my heart.”
“Maybe we’ll meet again, when we’re older, wiser, and when we’re better for each other.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“What?”
“Do you still love me?”
Silence.
“Lauren, I– “
“It’s okay.”
In his hesitation, she found his answer. She stopped him, because she knew what’s next, that, that next is something she couldn’t handle, and she didn’t want to hear the rest.
“I’m sorry.”
She didn’t ask anymore.
(2014)
At a crowded train station, Jarred, now thirty and a producer at the same time a songwriter at a company, and Lauren, now twenty nine, and a professional interior designer, crossed paths. But the glow of their memories was far too weak and far too painful for them to remember, and their thoughts no longer had the clarity of what happened thirteen years earlier, and just like that, both of them, without noticing, passed each other, disappearing into the crowd,
forever.
