Goodbye

Page 27

Despite how I felt, Emilia and I decided to meet up with the others to celebrate the new year together. Since we had a few hours left, Emilia and I felt like looking through some old pictures from school. It was kind of weird. I had already forgotten about them. As far as I was aware, I had burned them all. Nevertheless, I enjoyed looking at them together with Emilia.

"Do you think I would have fallen in love with you back then, even if I had been friends with Esra and the others?" I asked sincerely curious, as we looked at a picture from the last sports festival at our school. Salem got first place in judo. I remembered how the guys at our school had made a petition that Salem was not allowed to take part in the guys tournament because even they were frightened by her strength and technique. Obviously they did not want to lose against a girl in front of the whole school.

Emilia thought that no matter the circumstances, at least she would have fallen in love with me. She liked me even before she realised it. It was not love at first sight. She figured that she fell in love with me the moment we watched the stars together, as we lay in the dandelion field. I had to admit, I was the one that fell first. It was when she stood up for me. It was when she spoke, just so she could defend me. It was when I felt genuinely happy.

"I guess, what's meant to be, will always find a way. Besides, I still fall for you every day." I planted a gentle kiss on her forehead, before I got up to get some more tea ready for the two of us. The more time I spent with Emilia, the more I started to love her. Even if we had a different beginning, the end would always have stayed the same. I did not fall for Emilia because she stood up for me. Sure, it helped but it was not the cause. I fell for Emilia because of who she was. The young girl with two different coloured eyes that never spoke and was way more interested in plants than in other humans. The girl that was more than simply dense when it came to her own troubles and yet she could tell the truth through every lie. The girl that trusted me. The girl that understood me. The girl that believed in me.

Sometimes I thought that all of this must have been a dream. It was just too good to be true. The younger me never would have expected that one day I was going to date Emilia or that I was going to get along with Esra, Salem and Viola. The younger me must have been so proud to see me grow up like this.

When we stood in front of the door of the Thompson household, I felt a shiver run down my spine. Ringing the bell should not have been that hard. It was a simple gesture and yet it made more nervous than anything else. I knew that I needed to let go of my past. This was the first step to a new future. I held Emilia's hand tightly and took a deep breath. Then, with my hands shaking, I rang the doorbell and was instantly greeted by Esra, who instead of smiling, just rolled her eyes.

"Nice to see you as well." I announced eagerly. Even though Esra tried to keep her poker face, she failed the moment she looked at Emilia. In the end she could not help but smile. She invited us in and even took the freedom to mess with my hair.

"What's going on here? You changed your makeup." She remarked rather surprised.

"Well, I thought I should try out something new. It does not look as good as before but honestly I kind of feel more comfortable like this." Before I used makeup to make myself look older, more masculine and more mature. From now on however I wanted to use it the way I liked it. Who even cared about me having a feminine face? Emilia was even fond of it.

The others were already wanting for us. I noticed how Viola kept a slight distance between her and Bill, as they were sitting on the couch. I was not too sure if Bill did not notice it or if he just did not care enough about it to make a scene. Whatever the case, it calmed Viola down.

We all sat down in the living room. Esra made tea and coffee for everyone. In the meantime Salem showed us all the fireworks they had bought. Lisa had bought some as well but not as much as Salem and Esra. I believe they had enough for at least three hours. While Esra insisted that it was not that much, Bill joked about how we could have burned down the entire house with half of these fireworks.

By the way, Bill was absolutely not pleased to see Emilia and me like this. We held hands and I even leaned my head or her shoulder. Salem made a comment about how it took us long enough to start dating. Everyone at school used to know about us. We were both just too stubborn to admit our feelings for each other.

When Esra later showed us her origami collection in her room, I started to get a bad feeling about leaving Viola all alone with Bill. Luckily Salem decided to stay with them, since she was already fed up with Esra's collection. Besides, I had a hunch that she actually wanted to talk to Viola.

Esra's origami collection was impressive to say the least. She had made every animal you could have possibly thought about and even flowers, trees and other things. The last time I entered this room, I did not actually notice it on her drawer. I was way more focused on the issue at hand.

"And you really made all of this yourself?" Lisa asked in disbelief. Esra proudly nodded and even explained to her how long it took her to get the green crocodile right. Lisa's eyes were sparkling. She wanted to learn how to do the origami cat. I on the other hand was a whole lot more interested in that one flower. It looked just like jasmine. It reminded me of Emilia.

The moment Lisa and Emilia went back, Esra told me to wait a little. She handed me a letter, as I looked at her disgustedly.

"No worries, it's not money. Remember Irene? She is studying astronomy."

For a moment I stayed silent. I tried to think back and wondered how she got into astronomy, since she was not really any better at school than me.

"You're going to leave soon, aren't you? Salem got the idea, when Emilia gave you that NASA thing on Christmas. Listen, I don't know how much you like that job of yours but I know for sure that it was always your dream to study astronomy. You could give it a try. They took Irene, so why should they not take you as well?"

I held the letter in my hand. It felt surprisingly heavy, despite it being nothing more than a simple piece of paper. It was a burden I had to carry.

When I went back to the others, I noticed that Bill and Emilia were nowhere to be found. I asked Salem about them but she was not sure either where they could have been. Lisa figured that they might have been in the garden. She looked for them outside but they were not there. A little anxious I sneaked away to look for them. I opened every door to every room. Perhaps they just wanted to have a private conversation. Exactly, just a good old private conversation. Bill was not a bad guy. A little obnoxious, sure, but not a bad guy.