Like It Was Yesterday

Part Thirteen

She got up and went to the kitchen while I just sat there looking around her house. She had a lot of stuff. It was very cluttered in her living room. I couldn’t help but wonder why she kept all of it. Most of it looked really old and beat up.

About five minutes later she finally came back, handing me a glass of something that smelled like fruit, but definitely didn’t look like fruit. It was kind of a dark greenish blue color. I didn’t really think there was any fruit that color, so it made me curious. I sat there debating whether or not to drink it for a few minutes, but decided I didn’t want to look rude so I drank it anyway. It was actually really good.

 “What is this stuff?” I asked.

Evelyn smiled.

 “It’s a secret. I’ve never told anybody the recipe. I only make it for special occasions. Like right now.”

Was this a special occasion? It didn’t seem like one.

 “Oh. Well it’s very good.”

 “Thank you,” she said, smiling again.

We sat there and talked for a while and then I told her I should probably be getting back home. My dad was most likely starting to wonder where I went, and I didn’t want him to worry. Luckily when I looked out the window I saw that it had stopped raining. I sighed in relieved and then stood up to leave. Before I went out the door Evelyn stopped me to say one last thing.

 “I promise you you’ll be together again no matter how long it takes. You will find her. I also know that someday you’ll learn to use the power I gave you. You can be whoever you want to be, and as old as you want to be… and you’ll have that power as long as it takes to find this girl. Trust me… you will find her.”

Confused by what she said I just smiled and left without saying anything back. I was kind of starting to think that maybe she was nuts or something. What could she possibly mean by telling me I could be whoever I wanted and as old as I wanted? It sure didn’t feel like I had any power.

-

For a long time nothing changed. I was still sad, still keeping to myself and avoiding people. It stayed that way for a few months. Then I started talking to people again, but I never stopped thinking about you. A lot of my friends from school thought that I needed to get over you. They never knew how much we loved each other, because we never wanted to tell them. All they ever though is that you were my best friend. That’s all we ever told them.

The days seemed to go by really slowly. I started keeping a journal so I could at least get some of what I was thinking out of my head and onto paper. The only bad thing is that now I don’t actually remember what happened to it. I think one day I was trying to hide it from one of my aunts that came to live with us for a while. She was a really nosey person, always sneaking around in other people’s business and she knew I was hiding something. So one day, after she had found out that I had the journal she wouldn’t give up on trying to find it. The only thing I could think to do was burn it. At least… that’s what I remember.

When I hit about “thirty” years old I realized there was something different about me. I felt different. A few years later I knew had stopped aging. I still looked sixteen. That’s when I realized that Evelyn White wasn’t nuts. Maybe she did do something to me after all. Now I had to go back and ask her.

I happened to be walking down that same alley again and saw that Evelyn’s house was no longer there. I wished I could’ve asked her what she did to me. When she told me that I had the power to be whoever I wanted to be and as old as I wanted to be did she really meant it? Whatever she had given me to drink gave me that power. That had to be it. That must have been why she wouldn’t tell me what it really was, or what was in it.

Now that I knew this I wasn’t exactly sure what to do next. People would surely start realizing that I never aged, so I decided I was going to have to make it look like I disappeared and randomly keep changing into other people every now and then so they wouldn’t notice the aging thing. I was also going to have to keep moving around. It would have seemed too weird if so many people started disappearing from the same place.

I also knew that there had to be a reason she would give that to me. It seemed like maybe she knew something that I didn’t. Why would I need to live so long to find you? Wouldn’t you be dead by then? That’s when it hit me. You already were dead, and Evelyn knew that. That’s why when I told her what your name was she offered me that drink. She knew that you were already gone and that the only way for me to find you was if you came back in another lifetime as someone else, but technically it would still be you.

I wondered for the longest time why she didn’t just tell me. Why didn’t anyone tell me? I didn’t like that fact that you were dead and I was just now figuring this out after so many years. Obviously Evelyn must have heard it somewhere and yet I hadn’t. I was thinking that maybe you just forgot about me, but now I knew that could never happen.

Now that I knew you were gone I didn’t exactly know what to do. I didn’t know how long I would have to wait for you, or how I would know if it was you when I did finally find you. I went on a lifelong search to find where you last were. I wanted to know how you died, when you died, and if you were still trying to make it back to me before you died.

As the years went on though, I found nothing. No one had heard what happened to you. Most people said that didn’t even remember who you were. I was hurt. How could they just forget someone like that?

I found this necklace one day while traveling around the world. It was supposed to be magic. It said that if you wore it, and you were looking for someone, all you had to do was give a ton of people the necklace until you found who you were looking for. When you did, yours and theirs would turn a bright gold. The weird thing was… the initials for whoever made it were E.W. It took me a while, but I figured that must have meant Evelyn White, the only magic person I knew, meaning this necklace was meant for me. Don’t ask how I figured that out. I guess I just had this feeling deep down and I knew I couldn’t be wrong.

It sounded like a lot of work, but I decided to give it a try anyway. I was going to need to get a better job though, or somehow find a way to be able to pay for all of these necklaces. After all, how many people would I have to give them to? That I didn’t know.

I bought the original one and a bunch of ones that were clones. Every year I would go back, but more of the clone ones I gave the more it seemed hopeless. None of these girls mattered. Some glowed a little, but very dimly and we never stayed together. None of them ever kept wearing them after the first few weeks or so. Some of them didn’t even know where theirs went after a while, but I couldn’t give up. I wanted to find you so bad. I didn’t care how long it took. One day I knew… I was going to find you.