When Love Swings Back

When I sat down on a golden-stained wood park bench, my once-usual one with the backing of wrought iron ivy branches intertwined like amorous bodies in the throes of passion, I never expected a single sight to sucker-punch me in the heart. No, I had no idea that settled down by this cheery playground, I'd observe the convex blooms of daffodil the colour of lemons in clumps on the grass suddenly leaving an acrid burn on my parched tongue, that I'd be powerless as a moment of relaxation in my hometown's pocket park transformed into my own soul hung upside-down, like I were on the monkey bars. All I could do was watch helplessly and breathlessly whilst I observed familiar dark burgundy waves, as indelible in my mind as they were when she slid away from my life two and a half decades ago, float their way across towards the gleaming climbing frame. My desert of a throat could only barely whimper when I attempted to cry her name.

“Michelle”

She didn’t look back, but even from my seat, I could clearly make out the profile of her face. Her high, prominent, patrician cheekbones still gave her the air of a fox delicately lifting its head to the powdery falling winter snow. Thin, invisible scrawls radiated from her beaming mouth, souvenirs of moments of joy – both those I’ve witnessed and those I’ve not seen. Her dazzling, deep aquamarine eyes still resembled the placid lake next to which was a wood and rope swing, the one where she and I had spent lazy summer afternoons talking about Leo Tolstoy, Leon Russell, and life.

“Michelle,” I bellowed again, this time with more power.

She turned around and studied my face, now scarlet from yelling. As soon as her large blue orbs gazed into mine, her mouth flew open in surprise.

“Dan? Is that really you,” she asked breathlessly, almost like a whispered prayer.

“No one else.”

“It’s so good to see you here. You have no idea.”

She deftly walked over to me and immediately enveloped me in her arms. Her proximity to me filled my lungs with that pleasant, fresh perfume of white tea and ginger that had always intoxicated me twenty-five years ago, an aroma that made my pulse ping-pong inside me at that very moment.

“I…I was afraid you wouldn’t recognise me,” I sputtered out.

“Oh, Dan, that’s impossible,” she responded before pausing. From this close, I saw her aquamarine eyes free a solitary, timid teardrop. “You know I’ll always remember those hazel green peepers.”

For five minutes, we just stood there lost in our own thoughts, tangled as children’s limbs on a jungle gym, not knowing all that time passed without a single word spilt out into the air. Suddenly, in my periphery, I spotted a pair of rubber tire swings painted a jovial marigold. A vine of a grin crept on my face whilst my head whirled to the woman I once called my best friend.

“Hey, do you want to? For old time’s sa…”

“I thought you’d never ask,” she replied, breaking into a sunshiny smile that made my insides revolve like a merry-go-round. She bit her lower lip, as if she were nibbling on a ripe and juicy peach.

“Well, there is one thing missing,” I declared.

“I have some beer in the car. I just came from the supermarket."

“That’s perfect!”

“You know who’s…,” Michelle trailed, her face crumpling before stopping her sentence. “Never mind. I’ll get it. ”

Watching her take step after gazelle-like step, her ethereal salmon dress clinging on her toned legs as she strode, I imagined the prominent flipbook in my mind --- the one that’s been stored in there for over two decades, the one full of pictures of my seventeen year-old school friend and her marine eyes scintillating as she discussed another film she loved in this very playground whilst we glided up and down in the air on the old, rusty metal platforms attached on chains --- being opened once again.

“Does she even know...," I susurrated to myself whilst my mind continued playing a million images of Michelle's signature ponytail swaying in the breeze whilst giggling on a swing.

“I’m back, Dan,” Michelle’s melodious voice hummed, her oceanic orbs on my hazel ones. “Shall we…?”

“With all the pleasure in the world. Really,” I responded, my stomach seesawing and flipping at the word “pleasure”.

As we made our way to the swing set and cracked open the aluminium cans, I felt my insides turn into talcum sand in a box, both gently and rapidly at the same time. I sensed my eyes dart towards Michelle’s fox-like face every few seconds, two balls tethered to the pole of her regal presence. When we reached the apparatus, I tried to open my mouth, attempted to release even a drop from the floodgates of my soul, but it felt rusted shut like the gate to an old playground.

“Michelle, I…”

“Oh no,” she exclaimed as a paperback with pristine ecru pages flew out of her coral handbag and onto the dewy grass. I picked it up from the ground and beamed when I saw the two sisters in sumptuous 18^th Century garb, their copper hair slightly wild.

“You still love ‘Sense and Sensibility’ after all these years, aye,” I teased.

“After 25 years, yes,” she managed to say through a head tipped back from chuckling heartily. “How can I not love it, though? The restrained, slow burn romance between Edward and Elinor is just captivating.”

“I know. I still remember you discussing that book all the time with me when we were on the swings back then.”

“It’s a great novel, though, I mean…”

“Elinor and Edward are proof that you can find passion despite the strict mores of society,” I stated in unison with her, which made her cock an eyebrow in confusion before breaking into a symphony of a laugh.

"Your favourite quip," I commented.

“I guess I’m as predictable as I was in secondary school, am I not. Ha!"

“Well, there was one instance I wished you….” I muttered before stopping myself, straining as I gripped on the chain on my swing. “I..don’t think you’re predictable, Michelle. Just dependable. Very dependable.”

She lifted her aquamarine eyes and stared at me.

“Is…that a good thing?”

I felt my breath catch at the question. Throughout our twelve-year friendship, Michelle’s responsible nature, sturdy as the steel on a play area's climbing frame, had always served her well. She often walked to the swing we earmarked as our meeting place resplendent in gold medals. Indeed, her dependability had been fantastic.

However, it was anything but splendid when it came to...

“Yes, yes, it is,” I answered, my stomach sliding down. “I mean you were always elected prefect for a reason.”

“Well, I guess,” she uttered, her blue gaze focusing on her rose-coloured wedged heels. She smoothed her skirt with a delicate hand for a minute before looking back at me, her face now a joker card of mischief.

“Though, I’ll have you know, Dan, that Little Miss Prefect sometimes takes a change of clothing, some dry shampoo, and bottles of water in her car so she can camp out overnight and be the first in the queue at Blackwell’s bookshop. Oh yes!"

“You? Michelle Alexandra Addlington," I droned, cajoling her. Of course, I couldn't quite force my mouth to mention...

"You're the girl who colour-coded the notes you took in class. You would willingly let your hair go greasy? I mean, sure, it’s for literature, but really? Impossible!"

“Oh, haha, Daniel Frederick Grayling, yes, I would if a particular title really interested me, especially when this certain author, whose work I adore, releases something new.”

“And who, pray tell, is the lucky novelist whose tomes get to grace your shelves? The one who makes you do preposterous things like queue up overnight?”

“Well….uhm. Well, you, Dan,” she sputtered out, her aquamarine orbs peering into mine. “I’ve always bought your books as soon as they’re out...Uhm, just so you know."

All verbal prowess I possessed careened away from me in that instant. All I managed to let out was a pathetic moan as Michelle sunk her pearly whites on her peachy bottom lip once more and cupped my brawny hand in her elegant palms.

“Look, Dan, I’ve always told you I admired your writing and that I knew you would create bestsellers. That’s never changed. I still love... your work. Especially now."

“I…I don’t know what to say, Michelle,” I whimpered, gazing at her pelagic eyes. “Thank you. You didn’t have to.”

“But how else am I going to support a dear friend?”

“A dear…friend,” I repeated as my mind spun on a merry-go-round anew. I forced my facial muscles to form a smile, even one as thin as a twig. Apparently, it was enough to mask the thrashing of my heart for she beamed back at me and retrieved a copy of my latest book from her pink purse.

“Do you mind signing this, Dan,” she queried me. “I…I just want something from my mate, the one who became a hotshot writer, the one who once upon a time, let me read his tales first.”

“If it were up to me, you’d get more than…,” my mouth vomited. I clutched on the swing chains yet again as a way to stop myself, an attempt to calm the tempest in my soul. “Michelle, I’d love to. Anything for you."

“Great!”

She slid over the tome to my lap. As she extended her hand, the inescapable sparkle of a white gold band with small pave diamonds on Michelle’s left ring finger pierced my eyeballs…as well as my innermost core.

“How’s Richard,” I managed to formulate as I attempted to sweep away the image of the society page photo I stumbled upon two decades ago of my secondary school best friend in an ethereal white dress and a cathedral-length veil slapping me across the face internally.

“He’s…He’s okay,” Michelle answered, her eyes glued to the grass yet again. “He’s at an architect’s conference in New York this week.”

“Okay, uhm, I want to ask…”

“Want to ask what?”

“I want to ask,” my neurons only barely managed to fire out into my brain. “Uhm, how is he like as a…?”

“He...he makes me feel... safe," she stated, her smile only a wafer.

“And…uh….is that why you love him? I mean I never thought back then you'd hurtle into marrying someone a mere four years after leaving school. He must be such a great catch."

“He makes me feel safe. He's...nice, solid," Michelle responded, her blue eyes' attention sliding quickly towards the acid yellow daffodils on the opposite end of the playground, the same ones she had always taken five minutes to admire during our school days. "At least, that's what everyone told me. I'm...content."

"And heard? Inspired," I followed up, my musings barreling out of my mouth as if on a slide. "Does he make you feel like home...you know like you told me I...sorry."

"Well...," she sighed. "Besides, my dad had to retire early, and the design firm...you know the drill."

“Then, why did you…?”

I watched Michelle’s shoulders heave up and down, almost bouncing like a toy horse on a spring. From my spot, I noticed her aquamarine irises glistening with fresh tears.

“Look, you’re a writer, Dan. You know very well how important words are, that you can’t assume something unless there's actual verbal confirmation,” she stated. “It was easier to say yes to what was sure. I would have chosen differently if..."

"If?"

"If...," she said. Next to her, I could see her mince her response until it was finer than sand. "Well, if you...I mean do you....?"

"Do I...what?"

I observed her gripping the silky material of her dress, her knuckles turning a stark white, before lifting her fox-like face towards me.

"No, never mind. You probably don't," she suspired. Teardrops formed like an April shower in the sky of her blue eyes.

The merry-go-round in my spirit twirled once more at her declaration. However, for the very first time ever, my mind’s eye saw it as something more colossal than shiny new play equipment is to a toddler: a turbine, a source of power to finally let words I’ve guarded for a quarter of a century be as free as a child at play.

“Michelle, look, I'm sorry it took twenty-five years. I’ve waited for so long to tell you this but I lo…”

Ring ring!     

Both of us stared the vibrating mobile phone in Michelle’s handbag. As she fished it out, I noticed her entire body slump, like a little one tired from an entire day of running.

"I'll have to get that."

"Of course."

From right next to her, I watched Michelle's tremoring finger slide across the screen displaying a photo of an adolescent girl with Richard's stick-straight chestnut hair and cocoa eyes.

“Hello? Yes, honey? Kaylie’s family had a bit of an emergency, and they can’t drop you home? Oh…okay, well, I’ll come. Give me twenty minutes. Yes, I love you.”

Michelle lifted her head towards me. Her eyes fluttered shut as she parted her lips to take a deep breath.

“Look, Dan, I’m so sorry to cut off our time together but…”

“I know,” I replied, internally commanding my voice not to tremble. “Responsibility calls once more. It's okay. I completely understand."

“Such a shame. I truly loved hanging out with a friend today,” stated Michelle, her eyes swinging slowly towards the rock wall of bravery that is my face. “And honestly, well…”

“Well, what?”

“Well,” she sputtered out. “Yours is the most precious friendship I’ve ever had.”

I gazed at her --- the beautiful woman I spent countless hours by the lakeside and on swings talking about anything like carefree children, the best friend I’ve missed, the woman I’ve always loved --- and let my mouth break into a sliver of a smile.

“You know you’ll always have it.”

"That's great," she purred, her regard not once leaving my blanched face as she gracefully rose from the swing. "Don't be a stranger. Please, Dan?"

In that moment, the carousel of thoughts rotating furiously inside me came to a total halt. A peaceful clarity overcame me like the gentle breezes of those youthful lakeside days I was blessed enough to share with my captivating secondary school best friend.

"I won't be. I...can't be," I responded, beaming. "I'll be here. Whatever role you want me to play for you, I'm here."