UNTITLED NUMBER 1.
August 30th 2009 13:13
There were often moments in the dark when I had pondered on things I wanted to feel, when I had urged myself to do certain things, but in the end, I merely lay on my futon (brown, electric, gave heat), and looked up towards nothing, really.
All of my friends flew away from Japan one by one. The second last to leave was Natalie. We hadn’t spoken since the day under the snow, and I had the feeling that we never would.
Natalie knocked on the front gate of my family’s house one morning, and as I came out, sleepy, surprised to see her, I quickly noticed the smile on her face and pieces of luggage slumped against her leg.
“Walk with me to the train station, Dean.”
I nodded. I walked past the gate, closed it, and started to walk. We walked side by side, talking, glancing at each other once in a while.
“So what I’m going to do is, I’m going to catch a train to Umeda, and then I’m…”
Her voice was floating and so was she. We stopped. A train arrived. We hesitated for a moment, and then hugged.
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m not.”
People were rushing about and the entire station was imploding but none of it mattered. I helped her on. She smiled. I wanted to follow her, but I knew how things would unwind, I knew myself too much. We looked at each other instead. She did not smile as she waved goodbye to me for good.
The last to go was Trevor.
“This is it,” he told me, as we met in Kobe and decided to spend a day climbing the mountain we once looked at. “Our last day, bro.” He glanced at a girl walk past. “Well, my last day, anyway. I’m so glad neither of us got herpes. They’re so clean here.”
We walked for about ten hours. We walked across streets, we walked besides countless stores, we walked under the sun, we walked under clouds, we walked through bland and grotesque and brilliant, we walked over dirt, we climbed, we sweated. We reached a certain tip of the mountain, I didn’t think about alcohol, and, sweating, we talked about jazz.
“I know nothing,” I said, and Trevor didn’t respond.
It was nearing midnight by the time we reached Trevor’s train station. Something important was about to die. We hugged, said see you in Brisbane, and separated; Trevor dissolved into a mass of people eagerly returning home.
| 48 |
| Vote |
Add To: 
subscribe to this blog