What started in Paris

Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

There was a lot in this world I truly doubted I would ever understand, example: why when you read a book about a sick or dying person you yourself feel like you have that sickness or that impending death weighing on you and you feel so tired before you realize how much of an idiot you're being and snap out of your completely fictional terminal illness.

Why as a woman there is nothing that makes a man more attractive then when he plays with children, even though you yourself have no interest in being a mother. Or why a memory you cherish so deeply one day can be a stab in the heart to remember the very next.

Why you can lie and tell someone you're completely happy for them and for a nanosecond believe that, for once, you are okay with it, and then break down in your kitchen the next hour, sobbing until you run out of tears. Crying for the unfairness, for the loss of this fictional feeling that was entirely one sided. Screaming redundantly how that simply wasn't done. Feeling so hurt that you feel as if your very soul is crying, flooding your chest with metaphorical tears.

Why you can think yourself fine, seemingly over a painfully real person or memory and be having a good day only to be shaking so badly from pathetic tears hours later, scared to death that you're not just hormonal this time, but truly going insane.

I devoted hours to torturing myself by playing these questions over and over in my head, dissecting the memories and trying to figure out why I said or did something, why I had to choose that action instead of the literal millions of other options I had at my disposal. I don't know why I did it, perhaps I wanted to believe that if replayed the metal movie enough times somehow it could have a different ending.

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"So, who is this friend we're supposed to be meeting?" I finally ask Adam, squinting against the harsh early morning sun as we continue down the black cobblestone street that was lined by outdoor café tables with wide, pale yellow umbrellas shading the early rising customers as they read their newspapers and magazines, absentmindedly maneuvering scrambled eggs and some sort of meat filled pastry from their plate an into their mouths.   

    "Tom Declan, you've met him." Adam says, his eyes still heavy and glazed with sleep, his hair and clothes equally rumpled from sleeping on the small sofa next to my comparatively large bed.

    "Is he the one who brought you your computer case, back in Paris?" I ask, sticking my hands in my pockets to try to shield my already white, cracked knuckles from the harsh, cold, wind.

   "Yes, good memory." Adam says, after he lets out a long yawn, smiling slightly and whipping the sleep from the corner of his eyes. I simply nod and bite my chapped lips; not knowing what to say next.

Though the sun is bright, giving the town a faint yellowish glow; reflecting off of the water filled potholes it did nothing but deceive you into thinking it was warm, only to overzealously greet you with a blast of freezing wind when you thought that it was beginning to be bearable. Café napkins float along in the strong breeze, littering the streets one blue and white square at a time.

A girl who couldn't be more than a year older than me sat on a door stoop, the smoke from her cigarette blowing around her freckled face as she huddled in her well worn purple jacket and sock hat. Her dyed lavender hair whipped at her face as she watched us pass by, her hazed over brown eyes holding an emotion I couldn't quite decipher as she pulled the cigarette away from her cracked lips, slowly blowing out smoke that quickly disappeared as another gust of wind came by, making me visibly jump a little in surprise. She laughed when she saw, making me flush from embarrassment and nod awkwardly in acknowledgment, willing myself to disappear as fast as her second hand smoke had.