You who smiled

It was a breezy day.

Someone once said, ‘When I called her name, she came to me like a flower.’

Would you too?

One morning, like any other, I walked down the same road that we used to go as high school students. It was heading towards the school, which I had already graduated from a few years ago- but, it felt as if you were walking with me. 

I think- it was around spring? The tree I just walked past, you dropped your bag on the floor around there. I remember just confessing to you, and your cheeks flushing pink, like the colour of the strawberry cheesecake you liked to eat at the lonely town’s only cafe. 

Come to think of it, although you regularly complained about your ‘unusual’ brown locks that weren’t so common on our small island, I would regularly see pools of blue in your eyes, that shone brighter than the horizon of the sea when someone complimented your hair. 

And still, now, I’m reminiscing about the sunny days when you would drag me by my arm to the beach. The white sand is still as soft as I remember back years ago. You would watch as the sun fell into the darkness of the sea that seemed to stare at you as much as you liked to stare at it. 

Every night, you wanted to dream of the moon and you would often smile and say to me this: ‘Let’s run to the future until we run out of breath.’ 

‘Why?’ I would always question you; my mindset wondered why you would ever want to leave the peace of the moment and adventure to the future where nothing was certain. 

I told you it wasn’t safe but you always only pouted with your plump lips that made my heart beat furiously out of my chest. 

You can surely then imagine how confused I was when you suddenly blurted out: ‘I promise I’m going to stay here forever with you.’

By then, I had finally come to the realisation that you didn’t want to be tied up and was completely ready for you to suddenly abduct me away to your dreamworld -or where ever you wanted to venture, I was ready to follow.

‘Why?’ I questioned again. 

‘Just- because. I want to stay next to you.’ you said, looking away with your eyes that always looked somewhere far and never to me, ‘I think you already know that I don’t like you in that way… But I want us to stay together for as long as we can. Don’t go tonight. Stay with me.’

But I couldn’t. It was already midnight. 

‘Sorry, my brother wants me home. And I’m sure your mum is wondering where you are.’

‘Yeah, sorry -you’re right. I should go.’

Even at that last moment. You never looked at me but looked down and smiled.

Almost as if you were upset that I had asked to leave. 

After that, it was silent. 

You never said anything to me again.

 Well, of course, you couldn’t, I can imagine it would be hard to contact me without ever taking down my contacts and being somewhere where I couldn’t reach you. 

To this day, I’m still not sure where you went, where you are now -or even who you are now. As you smiled silently at me that day, breaking your promise and my heart- I want to wish that you are happy somewhere. 

Sometimes, I still wonder if you think about our old days, on the small island that only inhabited fishermen and a town that was stranded from most of the world, like on a cloud. 

I’m embarrassed to admit this but I’ve gone over and over the situation of 1 in 7 billion that we meet again. 

‘Hey.’ I’d say and smile, ‘You broke your promise.’

And that would probably be as much as my courage would allow me to say. 

But, really, I’d like to ask you this:

‘Do you still like strawberry cheesecake? Are you well? Do you have a boyfriend?’

Although, I’m honestly afraid to hear your answers. Would you be the same person I knew several years ago? 

I’m not. 

Or, that’s what I tell myself. I’m lying to myself but not admitting that I’m still the same person after 8 years.

Do you think if I had graduated with you, we would have been in a relationship? 

Now that I think of it -probably not.

That day I professed my liking for you, you immediately turned me down. 

You were always that type of straightforward person who never understood my hints.

I know it was ages ago, but I honestly still hold a grudge against you for disregarding my feelings so quickly. Though, after pondering it for a couple of years, I realise that it’s better to be in a relationship where both sides have the same feelings rather than being in a fake one. You were right in turning me down before I had time to turn my useless feelings into something more.

But, I doubt you know how much of my pride I had to swallow up to confess to you.

And how much the memories still haunt me to this day.

You probably don’t know that you were my only friend in that school. Or the first person to approach me without pity after my mother’s death. 

When you left, I felt as if something that had drilled itself into my conscience had suddenly disappeared. You didn’t even leave a note or anything like that. 

Have you ever thought: ‘Hmm… maybe I should leave a note to my friend of 2 years that I’m leaving forever.’ 

You know, it was really hard to concentrate in classes after you left. While the other students just knew you as a girl who hung around me and never really asked why you left in the first place, I found myself staring at the window seat you occupied for the time that I knew you. In fact, I found myself sitting in your seat quite a few times. 

My head was empty. But nothing could occupy the space you still owned. My teachers were concerned that I wasn’t performing like I used to. But how could I?

It wasn’t like it was before anyway. The change that no one took notice of, had taken ownership of my thoughts before I could realise it.

 So, take responsibility. My grades dropped a lot after you left. Come back and apologise to me.

‘Come back and see me’ was what I kept thinking about after you left.

I’m upset that I never got to see you graduate. Or leave. 

All you left behind was the taunting emptiness in my chest and the smile I never had the chance to see again.