Simple Pleasures

"I like hanging out with you like this." she said. Seven little words. But they meant more. So much more to her, I thought. 

Tempted to revise history as he searches the memory ridden shell of an old abandoned restaurant, Darren must decide which moments turned his life in the wrong direction.

Ghosts appear and fade as his impressionable youth is played out again and again in myriad variations. With each little change, an entire lifetime plays out, but how to know which one to pick?  

The gift of hindsight becomes a curse as knowing the original outcome turns the pursuit for perfection into an obsession. But these moments, so important in time but so easily overlooked in the present.  

Does it do any good at all to look back with such manipulation? Is anything set in stone? Perhaps, perhaps not, but he is taken back again and again to one moment. Nothing unusual, so he thought. Just a quick drink with a friend, her hair dusted with evening breeze, her eyes asparkle with Milkyway stardust, her intentions lost on the idiot-child of young manhood.

What had she said before she walked away?

"Simple pleasures please only the simple."

----

"A strange and compelling coming of age story that finds itself turning back from middle age. Sad and sweet it leaves the dreamer wondering about their own past, their own decisions. 

Packed with nostalgia, this tale begs each of us to take those simple moments, hold them up to the deep starlight and see what shines through."

-Layne Awake