Oneirataxia

Part 2

Part 2

I felt that tugging again. The proximity of her question scared me. I tried to remind myself that this was the same person I had spent most of my life with, playing pranks, laughing at the silliest things, inventing new pastimes, attending classes as well as bunking them- both of us together, always so similar, yet so different. We were both without any other friends, marked as the weird, eccentric one, the daydreamer- and that brought us close as best friends. We would do the wildest things, creating bucket lists, and fulfilling stupid dares.

When the seclusion became unbearable, we would create a whole new imaginary world of dragons and faeries, and kings and queens, out of thin air, and have thousands of adventures. In the last few months, though, the kingdom’s cavalry chief had been searching for the lost princess in vain. Now that she had been found, she wasn’t the same anymore. I didn’t know what to say this now Paheli, who had grown up so suddenly- though I knew my Paheli was still in there somewhere.

You couldn’t see it, maybe, but doubtlessly it was there- like the sun shining in full glory behind the storm clouds, I could bet. But now, saying something would be like walking over the lake in front of us, across a thin sheet of ice, underneath of which the freezing water flowed, unharnessed.

‘They’re talking.’ She spoke, her voice so familiar, yet so alien. ‘About how I should be friendlier. Make more friends. The doctor says I keep imagining things which are not there, and that I talk to myself. Something I am sure you would relate to... and people in the school – they are friendly, and nice.’

You know when everything you have had inside you- other than flesh and blood and bones, something which makes up your whole life, your entire being- is suddenly snatched away from you? What would that make you?

Empty.

And that’s what I felt.  The air was turning cold, but it didn’t affect me.

‘I will be spending time with them. I won’t be able to- you know,’ she wasn’t looking at me. I wasn’t even sure that she could see me anymore.  It was getting darker, the sun plunging into the horizon, fast- like my heart.
 
‘I understand.’ I said, and I guess I did.

It didn’t seem fair in any way, and I didn’t want to accept it- but I understood. She stood up, dusted off her clothes, and started to walk away. I sat there, realising, what it meant to love someone. When you love someone once, you keep loving them forever. Not when it’s merely a crush, or an infatuation, or a fling, or whatever people have these days. You don’t fall for someone’s looks, but the memories you create with them. And these memories never fade. It doesn’t matter if the person changes with time, or shuts you out, or goes away somewhere far. They won’t take away your love with them. It will stay with you forever, warming you from inside.

We both fathomed this in silence.
She walked farther into the trees, as the wind picked up speed, and sky turned completely gray- I watched as she disappeared. Suddenly, Paheli ceased to exist.

What happened next was inevitable. I had known that it would come, right from the beginning, but I had still chosen to live.

I rose to my feet with difficulty- not in control of my limbs anymore. The wind came, and along with it, retribution.

I spread my arms, as the gust blew over and scattered the remaining of my essence into the dark- another cycle completed.

I too, disappeared forever.

A/N- okie, so- yeah. Could be interpret in many ways, but my fave is that the narrator is an imaginary friend. Also, a work from three years back, which I am putting up here because I wanted to put something up and there is this writers’ block paining me cranially. Hit that star button and review please! Would make my quarantined days better- Moons.