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“Memories come in waves, and tonight I’m drowning.”
— Unknown.
December 25th,
4:00 A.M.
Once again, the magical time of the year was back. December arrived and, with it, the small snowflakes slowly fell from the fluffy large clouds that spread along the dark night sky above the big city, diverse smooth white sheets of mushy paper started to form, without too much hurry, on top of the big dark green foliage, all over old roofs and across the oxidized copper lamp posts disposed on the side of the worn out stone road, which the old dim yellow lights vaguely illuminated. The various wooden and stone houses in the old neighborhood seem to never end, expanding until the end of the horizon with their vast bright green and red decorations, bringing the local area, usually lifeless and achromatic, into a momentarily warm and cozy life that walked alongside the lighthearted christmas spirit. A fog paired above the small city, cold and intimidating, opposing the joyful festive time, the morbid grey mist hid and washed down the small unique infrastructures, spreading its smoky branches through the streets evolving the brave ones that dared to step outside with its serenity, dancing alongside the strong wind and the light rain, like a old married couple that seemed to always be together. The rusty melody that echoed through the late night empty streets made the fragile glass windows shake and the halo places whisper the most beautiful conversations and mesmerizing secret tunes that nobody could understand.
The tired moon beamed shily, trying to perforate through the fogginess of the town. Lucky glints arched all across the city, accompanying the stopping pouring rain, and followed an irregular path until they reached the multicolored windows, which were broadened with yellow curtains, of an old wooden house on the outskirts of the neighborhood. The abode was different from the settlements in the center of the town, instead of wood or stone the original owners of the small house decided to built it out of white quartz and black and white concrete, giving it small iron finishes, which withered away with the longevity of their existence, an open garage that contained a few useful gadgets and two bicycles, one purple and the other red, and a beautiful well kept garden with flowers, specially dandelions, spreaded all over the stunning green grass that supported a old seatless swing, which decayed a long time ago. The rays of white light that were capable of going through the heavy window hangings sightly bathed the rooms inside the infrastructure, making the residence harbor a melancholic and nostalgic feeling, and in one of these light pink walls emerged and a squeaking cherry wooden floor spreaded, the compact area had a round messy bed with shiny purple and light blue silk sheets and a pair of medium red cotton pillows, all spreaded around in a chaotic way.
Inteerwinded in the comfy mess there he was, laying down, carefree with his back fully flat and resting against the soft mattress, sleeping peacefully with his golden colored hair stretched out in all the various directions and on top of the different pillows and covers in a disastrous confusion, his face and hair showered by the luminescence light of the moon reminisced the brightest star of earth's solar system. A tired groan echoed in the room, disturbed by the sound of the agitating windows, the crowned being woke up restless, rolling around in the bed, trying to find a new and comfortable sleeping position, until he was tired of it. Without any deep thoughts and avoided of any preoccupations, the long straight hair prince got out of the bed and careless lowered his feet to the floor, feeling the funky, but soft, tiger mat under them, and lazily got up, his eye analyzing, yet again the room that he was placed in. His brown eye, already getting used to the lack of any artificial lights in the room, scanned around, looking for new items that he might have missed when he allocated himself in the room but, after a while, he couldn’t find anything so he casually resumed to admire with adoration the vast paintings, which were hanging crooked on the wall, made by his friends like it was the very first time he had looked at them.
When he got invited to hang out in his friends house, he took the time to look around and appreciate the mesmerizing displays of creativity, even though, most of the time, he was surprised by the wild and crazy inventions his friends could come up with.
A small smile subconsciously formed across his face and his careless mind evaded itself to simpler times. His ghostly pale hand slowly moved, maybe because it was dawn or maybe just out of a nostalgic feeling, to the antique wooden bedside table and carefully picked up a lively grainy polaroid, a simple picture, consumed by time, friendship memories and warm smiles. Behind the mask of the polaroid, sappy contours of three medium height young kids silhouettes appeared, obstructing the stunning view of the dark green flora surrounding a crystal clear rocky lake, the people represented in the picture sat close together with their legs crossed and leaning against each other with fondness, their clumsy arms intertwined behind each others backs, casually posing for the photo, and a groovy purple picnic basket rested on top of the big and comfortable dark red duvet with flowers all over it, which was slowly losing its color. He couldn't help but to smile, he enjoyed these moments, he wished he could go back in time, not to change things but to relive the moment, to feel the motions, with his friends again.
And then he flipped it over, in a steadily mechanical movement, like the picture was made of glass and it would break at any moment if he turned it too fast. With a clumsy handwriting three small “Forever” and a “Until next summer” could be read lightly in the yellow stained back of the polaroid, his fingers lightly run over it, how he missed those uncomplicated and effortless times. He lets himself just stare at it for a bit longer, feeling that he could recollect all of the moments they spent together like they had happened yesterday, making the perfect movie in his head, where they were the main characters across the screen.
To be honest, he totally thinks they would e the best trio that the world has ever laid their eyes on.
He destractly recalled all his favorite moments and how, in most of them, they were there, present in them, spending time and laughing along side each other. He reminisced of how there wasn't a “next summer” , how that concept turned into the long night walks alongside the sea, catching up and talking about everything and nothing with the cold breeze and the starry night sky looking over them, instead of the beach days, the never ending hot days where they would buy popsicles and skate around the city streets until they reached the distant sand valley, or the cozy sleepovers, where reading and playing videogames together, making playlists for each other, watching movies, gossiping and never sleeping were the norm. Now, it was just drinking coffee together at the end of a long week, after their respective universities and jobs has taken all their time away, and texting here and there
His eyes immediately landed on the purple and red handwriting and everything hit him like a brick.
“Do you guys think we will stay friends?” his eyes calmly stop observing the long and distant sea waves, redirecting his gaze to his friend on his right, Ecorridor. The purple bonet announcer exhaled, taking in the fresh air of the night and continued “You know, with the uni and our jobs, and all that.”
“Why wouldn’t we?” Pentar answered quickly, playing mindlessly with the rim of his bright red hoodie. He couldn’t phantom it, the thought of losing his friends for something so stupid like being busy. It couldn't be possible. He would manage it. He would find the time. “Right Zam?” he turned to his shorter friend. The man in front of him didn't say anything, he sat comfortably on the sand next to Ecorridor, the yellow haired frowned, a mixed look of pity and sadness crossing his face, and chose to slightly nod his head in agreement, up and down.
It took a while for the happy conversion to start again but, on that day, Pentar stayed a bit confused, not understanding the fear that, possibly, both of his friends carried. Today they had spent the day walking around the city, going to the theater to see a horror movie and then they went to the restaurant near the beach, ordering take out and eating the food on the beach, observing the sunset, playing a bit of cards, talking and watching the waves. It was nice, everything seemed fine , but now he was left with a heavy weight on his shoulders and a worrying question.
Who was Zam agreeing with?
A long happy sigh echoed through the room, the blonde left the picture where it belonged before getting a hold of his christmas decorated mug filled half way through with camomilla tea and kept calmly dragging himself, being careful not to make any noise that would wake up his friends up, to the other side of the room where a big vertical window spreaded across the wall. When he arrived at the structure, his left hand reached out for the off-center golden handle, opening the casement up. The cold breeze of the deep night invaded the room, its tone had changing dramatically from when it bothered him, now it was gentle and cold against his warm body and carelessly entered the room as if she were a long-time friend, so well known but so distant, moving some papers and lighter clothes around, bringing a comforting and welcoming feeling to the passenger of that small old house. Taking a deep breath he enjoyed the fresh minty hair and put his tea mug on the rose-colored wooden floor, sitting comfortably on the sill of the huge window with thin white edges and carefully turning to face the outside view, letting his legs hang from the dirt stained frame, shaking them freely.
It was breathtaking.
His eyes quietly observed the moon hazy beams that were capable to cut the light grey fog and his small smile calmly started to stretch across his pale face, his arms, shielded with his confident worn out yellow hoodie, stretched out, cracking some of his joints, and he let out an soundless yawn. His left hand, covered with small residues of christmas colors pens and paints, stretched out to the sky, accompanying his legs outside, covering a bit of the clouds above him and feeling the comfortable and cold ambience that settled around, making his small yellow hair tremble slightly with the small crisp wind. The golden man calmly let the moon and fog watch over him, evolving him with an uncertain but familiar presence, his mind was complete radio silence, just taking in the view, but his pointy gold pierced ears absorbed the natural sounds around the neighborhood. The annoying symphony of the small crickets and the dichotomy between the distant polluted tune of the automobiles and the near passionate sea waves and other unknown gentle sounds crossed his ears.
He stayed there for awhile, minutes, or maybe hours, he couldn’t te exactly but once the sun was already in view and his tea was already ending, he clumsy got out of the sill window and left the room. The young man silently took the corner spiral stairs that led directly to the kitchen, where he got surprised by the view in front of him. Pentar with his red and white christmas apron walking around, almost dancing to the sound of an imaginary song, with a clean pan in his left hand and a pancake mix in his right one.
“Good morning!” He announced himself loudly, almost screaming, to his friend on the other side of the kitchen, while he was walking to reach for the kettle, in order to make more tea.
The approached one jumped a bit, almost dropping the items he was holding on his feet, guiding his hand to his chest, taken by surprise he breathless replied “Good morning Zam! Oh my god, you scared the living shit out of me!”
“I’m sorry.” he wasn't “Also I didn’t know you were awake, you usually wake up at midday.” The yellow-haired man answered, laughing a bit at the end of his sentence while he put the water and the favorite chamomile tea bag in the metallic pot “Either way, what's the occasion to be up so early?” Zam asked.
The other man looked at him with a funny expression, a mixture of curiosity and “you must be kidding” , probably trying not to laugh right to his face, “It’s christmas!” he announced with a big smile “Me and Ecorridor decided to eat some leftover cake, make some pancakes and watch some christmas movies. We were going to wake you up right now actually! See? The pancakes are ready and everything!” Pentar spoke with enthusiasm, taking of his apron and picking up the pancakes half way through his discourse, hurriedly pushing Zam to the vividly living room, ignoring all the complains and gestures that his yellow colored friend had, or made, because he was making tea or something, he really wasn't paying too much attention to what Zam was talking about.
When they arrived the living room, Ecorridor sat in the comfortable grey sofa, curled and wrapped around in his purple and dark blue blankets up to his head, with three hot chocolates and one piece of each cake that was on the table yesterday in front of him on the small glass center table.
“Hi!” the purple haired man greeted them. The words coming out of his mouth were muffled because of the covers surrounding him, making them all laugh. The movie “Three nights for christmas ” was paused on the big television in front of the comfortable furniture.
“I am not surprised that you chose this movie.” Zam said and walked to the sofa, picking up one of his favourite chocolate cakes with strawberry topics, which they made together two days ago, and planted himself between the comfy cushions of the sofa. Pentar quickly followed after, getting their favourite film rolling and placing a familiar red duvet on top of him and Zam.
The morning movie session quickly turned into a big daily watch session, between laughs and tears, reviews and new comers, cakes, sweets and potatoes, a tone of movies had been watched and reviewed by the three man, leading to some unserious bickering between the friends. The night was quickly to approach but no one dared to move, their dear and assigned sofa positions had been mixed up, legs thrown around on top of each other, food and pillows stolen, the remote lost and drinks spilled, but no one dared to move, a comfortable and nostalgic feeling washing over them.
As they fell asleep, a realization dawned on their distant and sleepy minds.
Nothing had changed . They are the same as they were all those years ago, they are the same kids that swam all the afternoon in the lake, the same teenagers that got sunburns on their backs on the hot beach days because they always forgot to put sunscreen, with the hurry to meet each other, they are the young university students that had long walks on the beach at the night and met each other for a coffee, and now they re the adults that pass the vacations, holidays and end of weekends together. And they will be the ones that the relentless stream time will try to pull apart and fail.
They’re a piece of every moment of their life, a piece of everyone and everything they ever loved.
The end.