Work Text:
She was walking alongside the river, engulfed in her coat to fight the cold of that year's winter. The sidewalks were covered in snow and the skies were gray.
She was determined to do this and not let her nerves get a hold of her.
Once the building stood before her, she took a deep breath and pushed the door, climbed the stairs and knocked on the door she know too well. A last breath before noises could be bearded behind the door and keys turned in the lock.
“What are you doing here? He exhaled looking breathless at the sight of her.
- Just came to get back my scarf, the one I was wearing at your sister’s house? When it was really cold you know ? She did not ad that it had felt like home somehow at that time.
-Oh uh yeah okay come on in. I probably have it somewhere in a drawer.
She waited by the door as he left to his bedroom to search for it.
He came back with the scarf in hand, looking hesitant about something.
“Can we talk please?
-What? Why would we talk ?
-I know you don’t want you but please, just a few minutes, so I can maybe tell you how sorry I am again ?
- Fine.” It was still too fresh, she couldn’t resist his sweet disposition. She was getting flashbacks after flashbacks of them singing in his car and getting lost. She could still picture the autumn leaves falling down, like pieces into place.
“I know it’s long gone and the magics not here no more but I really hope you’re okay.
- You know, I might be okay but, I’m not fine at all because when I dream it’s like here we are on that little town street again, when you almost run the red remember? Cause you were looking over to me.
-I remember, the wind was in your hair. I was there.
I just remember it too well.
-I just can’t get away from that one evening at my parent’s house.
-When your mum talked about you as a kid and showed me the photo album? We were all standing around the counter
-Yeah.. That one
-Your cheeks turned red when I saw the photos of you as a kid, with your glasses and sitting in a twin sized bed. Your mother was telling stories about you on the tee-ball team.It was the night you taught me about my past.
-Really thought you were my future you know ? I tossed you the keys when leaving.
-Yeah ‘fuck the patriarchy’ keychain landed right on the ground right?
-I remember, we’d always skip town.
-You know I was thinking at that time you were gonna say it was love, you never called it what it was? At least til we were dead, gone and buried.” She checked her pulse and sweared it was the same after three month of this in the grave.
“Yeah I wondered where it went, all that live, to as you reached for me.
-You known, in that moment, all I felt was shame as you held my lifeless frame, even though you should’ve been the one ashamed.
-Again, I know it’s long gone, and there’s nothing else I can do but I’m sorry. I really am.
-I did forget about you long enough to forget why I needed you so..” Once again flashbacks of then dancing in the middle of the night under the refrigerator light, down the stairs of his sisters house.
She just remembered it All too well. She couldn’t help feeling angry and stop herself from making a face and feeling all the emotions she’d been holding.
“There we go again!
He says after noticing the sour head.
-What?
-You're doing your ‘You did something bad’ face. Like when I told you nobody had to know about us, when you thought I only kept you like a secret.
- I kept you like an oath, I could’ve made sacred prayers for you.
-We’d sweared to remember it, I didn’t do anything at that time.
-Maybe we got lost in translation or maybe I asked for too much, I don’t know...
-We were a masterpiece I remind you, it was beautiful and glorious.
-Yes until you tore it all up.
-I was scared, I run. I know it’s bad to leave running soldering we’re afraid of..
-I know I was there, I remember it too well! You called me up again after that and broke me to pieces, like a promise. Like the promise you made. You were so casually cruel.
-It was in the name of being honest!”
She remembers laying there like a crumpled piece of pape, on her bed. Crying, sobbing and just feeling so alone.
“You know my friends did say all’s well that ends well..
-But I’m in a new hell every time i think about you and what I did..
-You are the one who double crossed my mind! You lied and made me believe I was crazy! You manipulated me. When you said ‘if we had been closer in age maybe it would have been fine’, that made me want to die… It was like the idea you had of me, who was she?
-Well never needy and ever lovely.
-A jewel? Whose shine reflects on you ?
-One who’s not weeping in a party bathroom.
- Some actress asked me what happened you know? It was you, you happened! You who charmed my dad with self-effacing jokes. You were sipping coffee like on a late night show. You know my dad, who after that had to watch me watch the front door willing you to come on my birthday. That night he said: ‘it’s supposed to be fun turning twenty one’. Can you believe all of the things you’ve put me through?” After that night, time couldn’t fly, she felt paralyzed by it. She was still to this day looking for her old self again.
“After plaid night shirts, and nights were you made me your own, you mailed back my things, just a few days later. You just didn’t care. You left me to walk home alone in the snow. Didn’t even give me my scarf back.
-‘Cause it reminded me of innocence and it smelled like you. I didn’t even remember I still had it until now.
-But you couldn’t get rid of it. Because you remember it all too well.”
And in his dreams late at night, here they were again when she loved him so, back before he lost the one real thing he’s ever known. It was rare but he was there and he remembers it. He remembers the wind in her hair, down the stairs, he remembers it all.
“You know I was never good at telling jokes but I made a joke not long ago at a dinner. The punchline goes: ‘I’ll get older but his lovers stay my age’, pretty funny right? It’s about you.
-Is it from when my Brooklyn broke you? When you felt out of place about that? That was ridiculous.
-I am a soldier for having lived through what you did and I’m returning half my weight.
-Oh? Did the twin flame bruise paint you blue? Did it really, because I feel like your exaggerating babe.
-Do not call me that ever again. I just want to know one last thing? Did the love affair main you too?
-In this cities barren cold I still remember the first fall of snow and how it glistened as it fell. I remember it all, letting you leave and gusting you like that.
-You didn’t answer my question though. Did the love affair main you too? Just between us do you remember it? The wind in my hair, down the stairs, and my sacred prayers? Do you remember it?
-It was rare and I remember it. I’ll never forget it I think.
-It was rare, you remember it.”
She left after that, she did not take her scarf. As she left the building he was still on his couche, red scarf in hand, dreaming of when she walked through the door with him as he watched the snow falling through the window.