Closer

Ask me why I’m recounting memories we share, and I will have no answer to it. Should I have one? Okay, that came out wrong. Let me rephrase that: Are you expecting me to have one? This entire letter is, so far, void of any purpose imaginable. With that being said, I think expecting a reason for this is a bit of a stretch. Logic dictates that you won’t be looking for a fully-furnished room in a half-built house, so the same principle applies here…more or less. Maybe I’m unsure of whether you remember them as vividly as I do. After all, you have an amazing gift for ignoring and forgetting things you don’t want to remember. But we’ll get to that later. For now, let’s go on with the narration. 

 

Anyone with the tiniest quantity of common sense could see how close we were. Be it friends, mere acquaintances or even teachers, everyone saw it, albeit on various levels. Do you remember our Economics teacher bursting out in the middle of class? “Mind stopping the couple love for a moment?” he had asked in an irate voice, eyebrows raised, “I’m trying to teach you people something here.” Almost immediately, we launched into a tirade about how we were just friends, you with blushing cheeks and I with a look of sheer disbelief. Even then, through the rosy flush, I could see that same shy smile that sent my heart doing back-flips, and I couldn't help but break into a wide grin myself. I've lost count to the number of times you had invited me to your home every week, with your mother treating me to my favorite chocolate fudge and your younger sister fawning over my height and tan complexion. This was always followed by my saying - or teasing, rather - that your complete lack of cooking skills acted only to reinforce the truth that you were better equipped to be a boy, ignoring the obvious “lady parts” (sic), and you would immediately have an outburst, saying how you helped out in the kitchen on a regular basis. And as anyone would expect, laughter came soon after. 

 

We must have been the two most ignorant people on the face of the earth for not seeing that what we had was more than friendship. I had even, in your knowledge, discouraged a friend to approach you with romantic interest. Call me selfish, but I could not bear to see you with anyone who was wrong for you; after all, I had to protect you, although we both knew it was more possessiveness than protectiveness. Whether we were too emotionally illiterate to see the true magnitude of our deepening...connection, for lack of a better word, or whether we simply chose to ignore it will lay shrouded in timeless mystery. 

 

Speaking of memories, I find it surprising that my mind draws a curious blank when I think back to our activities when alone, save the aforementioned ones that hold so much importance to me. Don't pass it away as my careless memory, though. I have not forgotten them; rather, they are buried under other memories. Yes, I do remember quite a few details about you: how you used to tilt your head back so your curly locks would clear your face and cascade down your back, how your forehead creased in annoyance and then cleared again as you rolled your eyes when I teased you, how your eyes gave away your smile far before your lips did. There were even times when I made observations about you that even you were astonishingly unconscious of yourself. Nothing you did ever missed my attention, for it was focused solely on you.

 

As more time passed, we grew closer and closer together. The word "friendship" would do great injustice to the bond we had. Days formed weeks, which gave way to months, and we were happy. For that one moment in the eternal stream in time, everything was perfect for us. Personally, I was happier than I had been in a long time. But then, things began to go wrong…horribly wrong.