First Steps

Do you remember the times we had spent together? No, I'm not going down the long, clichéd road to romantic reminiscence. Don't you worry about that. Frankly, I don't think we had much of those, anyway. It's funny how friendship can offer more memories than anything supposedly deeper...at least memories worth remembering. 

 

But I digress. As you may have already guessed, I am talking about the times we spent as friends. Quite a lot of history we have together, don't we? Moments spent alone in the classroom, when laughter was never scarce in our conversations. It was amazing, how varied the topics of our conversation could become. I remember one particular incidence, where we began talking about our IGCSE exams, and ended up arguing about which of Linkin Park’s song was the best, with everything ranging from food, the weather, books and Economics discussed in between…all in a span on half an hour. We never ran out of things to talk about, and even a second of hush would immediately be replaced with voices, even when the matter of discussion would be completely meaningless. It didn’t matter how pointless or mundane the matter of discussion was �" fact is, we didn’t care what we were talking about. It was the company that held the most value for us. I mean, let’s face it: which two people would argue incessantly for hours over something as insignificant as whether a clock was five minutes slow? The plain answer would be: two people who talk to each other not for the sake of talking, but for the companionship they provided to each other.

 

How about the times when you used to borrow one bud of my earphones so that we could listen to music together? I would always ask you to take two so that you would have a better listening experience, yet you always insisted that we share. Although yes, I must confess that whenever I asked you to take both ear buds, I secretly hoped that you would decline; chivalry, if you can it that in this logic, was prerequisite, but it didn’t have to mean I would have to like it every time. Your perfume wafted up to me every time, taking over my senses and blocking out whatever tune was being played through into my ears. I would, in a word, lost, in every sense of the word. Very little could pull me out of my trance, save the shrill squeak you let out when your favorite songs changed into perhaps a heavy drum solo or any of my heavy metal tracks. “Why,” you would say, “do you listen to that trash? They’re just noise pollution, if you ask me.” A retort would follow, and soon enough, we’d be locked in another one of those arguments I had come to cherish so much.

 

And oh, the teasing! I always did love teasing you, be it about the boy you thought was cute, about the time you mispronounced the word "modal", but mostly about your tomboyish nature. My favorite line was “Doesn't matter what you look like. You keep acting like a guy, so maybe you were meant to be one. You don’t even like girly things!” That never failed to get you riled up. Even though you hit me on the arm every time, there was always a coy smile playing at the corners of your lips, a smile that never failed to enchant me. There is something in a girl's smile that has the magic to outshine her most delicious laugh. 

 

Then there were the walks. I doubt there was any other part of the day I looked forward to as eagerly as the one when I had the sheer fortune to walk you home. I had always noticed how you took the longest route to our destination. Often, we would end up ambling on for hours to complete a trip of five short minutes. I didn't mind, though. In a journey in which even the silence held the most profound meaning, in which our footsteps unknowingly synchronized while we talked, teased and laughed, who in their right minds would complain?

 

Why you took the longest roads home, however, is beyond me. 

 

Was it just because you liked walking? Or did you enjoy the company I provided? Despite the questions, one thing I did know: the paths we took grew longer with the increasing depth of our friendship. And given the dislike of aimless wanderings I had back then, it was out of the question that I had ever loved such experiences with someone else as much as I did with you.

 

These were the only shreds of reality I clung to when we parted every night, only to meet again the next morning. You would not believe it if I told you the impact you had on me. It was as if I was living in a fantasy. Everything was going the way I wanted to. What my emotions were morphing into, I did not know then. And if I had known what catastrophe that would've brought us, I’d have backed off so fast, you’d be cursing me for vanishing from your life without so much as a moment’s notice.

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[IfThisIsLove_IDontWantT..]

I love this! I'm serious! It has me thinking back, and now I can't stop.