It Would be Easier (If We were Young Again)

"Has it always been this cold here?" Has it? The thing is I don't know.

"You're cold?" As if it's not obvious by the way you rub your hands together, it made you chuckle. I follow the motion, rubbing my hands together to get my useless hands to do something.

"Yeah. You are not?" Am I? Again, I don't know. "Is it because I'm not living healthily? Well, both my college and job are draining me physically. I barely hit the gym."

I shrug, and at that, you chuckle. "Maybe you're just not used to the wind," your eyes stay up ahead on the road we're taking. The lamp street illuminates the cracked asphalt under us. There's a pit.

"We used to jump over every pit we passed by," says you as you jump with your slender legs that are wrapped with dark jeans. "Pretending there were sharks and sea monkeys there."

"Why sea monkeys?" I ask as I hop to the other side of the small pit before proceeding to walk beside you. The puddle left an abstract stain on my pants.

You snicker slightly before answering, "Maybe because they're not real. We were young anyway, who knows how kids' brains work?" The vast green field on the other side of the road we're taking stretches far out until my eyes can't make the end of it, looks like it's taking forever to reach it, spreading far until it reaches the moon. I want to try to take a walk there one day. To reach the end of it, someday. "Maybe because it's easier to think of it that way," you continue.

"How?" The noises of our steps slowly died down under the chirping crickets. Our breaths. The wind and laughter from some fields away. Some cows mooing, maybe it's their mating season. I refuse to fret over it too much.

"That it was easier to make something up to make a point, to feel like we might know something, and then we didn't have to deal with the not knowing. That we knew that they were not real therefore there was nothing to be afraid of," the smell of wet grass gets mixed with the oxygen I inhale as the breeze blows over us.

"I feel like I've read that somewhere," the amusement in your eyes as we pass another street lamp sends a buzz inside my stomach. How the sharp edges of your eyes softly turn into a crescent moon-like from how wide you are smiling. From how genuine it is.

"I was trying to sound all smart in front of you by speaking in quotes," another November wet breeze washes over our faces. My hands are tucked in my pocket because I remember how cold it could be here.

But has it always been this cold? I'm not sure. I have always been here for as long as I can remember, the changes in the town I was born and grew up in seem pretty impossible for me to pick up.

What changed?

What didn't?

Or

Who changed?

Who didn't?

"You always do," the dry leaf under your sole cracks as you step on it. "You always look smart to me."

"Always?" The word suddenly seemed a bit of a blur for me to make out the real meaning of it.

Always. How do you measure something up to the extent of that word? Does it have to be there forever? Presents there with you all the time? Does everything have to stay the same?

Because I'm not sure that the both of us are always---

That we are---

"From what I remember, I guess you do," our step came to a halt, "It's not like there's a lot for me to remember," says I barely a whisper as I sit on a bench.

You already walked towards the railing on the tip of the hill, hair flying backward from the wind washing over you. Hands spread apart as if you could hug every blow. As if the wind could also block your ears from the words I said.

"I forgot how refreshing it could be being here," I smile weakly as you walk over and then sit beside me. Your eyes are closed. The jacket you wore lays motionlessly at your side, my hand playing with the sparkling zipper at its side.

"Well, maybe because you're not always here," the words sting in my chest. Thinking, if I were to make something up between us, would it be easier for me? Or would it be more suffocating to stop denying the truth?

The thing is, I don't know.

I can feel your gaze bored deep into the top of my head, my own eyes keep on staring at the cool shiny metal on my hand because it was easier to look at it.

There's a sudden warmth beside me, and then your hand grasps the air as the jacket is lifted by the owner. The next thing I know my chin is tenderly lifted by the finger under it, and my eyes meet another pair of eyes.

"I'm leaving again tomorrow."

"I know," I reply, I don't even recognize the voice I let out. Sounds too much unlike me. Too fragile for me to believe that it's mine.

But at least this time, I know something.

The hand under my chin moved to my cheek, wiping it softly with your thumb as if I truly am something fragile. Maybe I let my guard down too much.

"Will you wait for me?" From the edge of my eyes, I can see the flickering light from somewhere below us. The smell from a fried rice stall right before the curve to reach the hill, filled my nose along with the smell of the wet forest behind us. Mixed with the smell of fresh coffee from you.

"I will," I think about the moon at the end of the vast green field. Think about sea monkeys. Think about always. About us.

I see the smile on your face, nothing but soft.

But the thing you do with your eyes shows me that isn't the answer he is looking for.

Another thing is, that the only thing I know I can do, is to wait. Like the moon waits for the sun so it can shine, even when they're in the same line it's nothing but dark. The moon still waits.

"Always."

It turns out that I know a lot, but it is easier for me to deal with the not knowing.