Imagine

17. Clouds

The weekend was annoying, mainly because of the fact that most of the students were still coming down from the adrenaline high of the sports week. The members of the overall winning team were still gloating and throwing unnecessary jabs at their friends or roommates in several unrelated circumstances. It had almost caused some immature heated argument between a few people.

'Seriously though, how long would it take them to realize that sports week was over and the main point of it was to release stress. Also, exams are coming up next week', I thought as I walked past two angry looking girls and the mediator standing between them.

I got to my room to find Raina in the same position she had been in since we had returned from school on Friday: sleeping. The previous week must have really drained her. I looked at her for while, shook my head and proceeded towards my bed.

"Engraved in your heart yet?" She interrupted my movement without moving an inch, I almost thought I had imagined it until her fluttered open. She stared at me lazily and I chuckled.

"Sound the alarm people, Beauty is finally awake" I said in an exaggerated whisper. She rolled her eyes, still in the same position.

"Girl, you seem dead. You haven't moved an inch".

"Why? You like seeing my body move?" She questioned and it was my turn to roll my eyes.

"You wish. What was that you were saying about engraving?". I asked with confusion as I remembered her first statement. She finally moved, slowly rolling into her back and stretching her arms.

"Well, you were staring so when you stopped, I was wondering if my face had been properly engraved on your heart". She moved her shoulders in what was supposed to be a shrug but in my opinion was a completely failed attempt.

"Again, you wish" I sat on the lower part of my bunk to give her my full attention. "You should stand up. You know, move your legs a bit before they forget how to function. You've been like this long enough, you couldn't even stand properly during prayer" I advised seeing the exhaustion on her face. I wondered if it was still just the stress from last week or if something else was bothering her but I'm never one to ask. We've been friends for years and she knows I'll listen whenever she's ready to talk...
She was unresponsive for a few minutes and there was pin-drop silence since we were alone before she finally got out of bed to stretching in some weird positions and let out a monstrous yawn.

"Atta girl. Now I'm certain you're alive" I said with amusement laced in my voice. I left my position to put some things in order in my bed and my school bag and all the while I could feel her gaze in me.
"If I was the least bit normal, I'd say you're creeping me out but I'm not, so stare as long as you want. I know I'm breathtaking" I told her without looking back.

She scoffed, "I was just wondering what exactly you're preparing for. You look rather serious".

"Oh yea. The deck is open so I'm going up there with these books to get some peace and quiet since these idiots will not stop going on about last week. I mean, it's over guys, get over it". I turned around holding two books that I was fairly certain I wasn't going to open.

"Oh, ok. Have fun detaching yourself from society" she replied and I could have sworn there was sadness laced in her voice but I shrugged it off, patted her back and walked out of the room. On second thought though, I turned back, popped my head into the room so she could see my face and said, "You know, when you feel less like a zombie and more human, you can come join me. I'll have snacks".

She raised her head, smiled at me and said, "I'll find you" like it was a threat. I walked away feeling good for inviting her and even lifting her spirits high enough to make a small joke. Just because I love my own company doesn't mean I don't love my friends enough to recognize when they need me. I wasn't expecting her to take me up on the offer though.

As I took the first step leading to the deck, I could feel the clear reduction in unwanted voices and annoying decibels, that I couldn't help but skip the rest of the way up there. It was a warm day plus a few clouds scattered around the sky. I sighed in happiness, spread my arms, closed my eyes and stayed like that for a while before I layed on my back in the middle of the rough surface. As I layed with my eyes still closed, I could feel the breeze coming from the almost non-existent trees, the sound of cars as they danced on the not-so-smooth road, the sounds of motorcycles zooming past carelessly disregarding the bumpy road, the fading voices of people in the hostel and around it, and the singsong voices of birds. I opened my eyes and saw that the sky was a bit scanty of its normal passengers, and clouds were moving very slowly, almost unnoticeable to an unobservant pair of eyes. I stared at the different shapes and sizes of the clouds, and one by one I created an image to match each of them

The one directly above me was very wide and densely packed so I stared long enough untill all I could see was an elephant with it's trunk raised, it's right tusk barely holding on to what seemed like an infant human baby by the neck of it's shirt. I almost shot up in alarm before I remembered it wasn't real so the baby definitely wasn't going to fall. It's probably one of those babies that was raised by animals, I shrugged and shifted my attention to the right.
This cloud looked like a cub trying to catch a ball that seemed to be stuck in the air. 'It is gonna be a long day for you Simba' I thought as I shifted my attention to the left. This one looked like a human with a head the shape of the sun trying to split the wood on the floor with the axe in his/her hand. I scrunched up my face and returned to my elephant only to find that the shape had reduced so my previous picture didn't correlate anymore. I frowned a little and decided to form something else.

As I kept forming and reforming stuffs with the cloud, I heard the footsteps of someone that thought they were sneaking up on me but I didn't bother acknowledging the noise.

"When you said you were coming these books, I assumed you wanted to read" Raina said, standing above me using air quotes when she mentioned the books.

"You assumed wrong. Now, go away. Can't you see I'm playing here?" I grumbled at her.

"Dude, you are laying still on your back, staring at the sky. Since when is that translated to playing?" She asked with crossed arms.

I grinned at her, patted the a spot beside me, "Come on, join me. You'll find out"

She did as I said and before she could ask, I started to explain my self designed game with the clouds and within a few minutes, she had gotten the hang of it and started forming her own images.

We spent what seemed like hours just laying there, arguing about what image made more sense for a particular cloud form. When we got tired, we decided to enjoy the silence until Raina broke it, "I came here to talk but I actually feel a lot better already". I turned to my side and smiled at her,
"You're welcome. I'm glad you decided to join me. And you know I got you if you still need to talk".

"I know", she took my hand in hers and held onto it until we decided it was time to return downstairs.

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Who else plays with the cloud? You should try it sometime, it's comforting.