It's been on my mind a lot these days, the feeling that I am forgetting something important. Something is whispering behind my ear most of the day when I do the most mundane things. When I'm washing my hair or brushing my teeth, when I'm cutting my leafy greens of when I'm blending my smoothie under constant noise. The construction outside of my window seems to never stop and the silence before that seems to have never existed. Everyday that passes I feel a part of me fading, thought I'm not sure if it is me or pieces of me that seem to be missing, running away, as if they don't want to be remembered, as if they are dying to disappear.
What would Eli think of all this? I wonder if he's disappointed in me as I am of him, if the thought of me forgetting will threaten his ego or if he never bothers to stop and think of that. These days I seem to keep trying to remember the day we met.
I was coming back into the city, I remember my flight was full and cold, the fake air circulating around the cabin and I didn't have a jacket in the middle of July. I'd been in a weekend bender for some days and was shivering all the flight, my head was pounding and my legs were bruised by doing god-knows-what in god-knows-where, I can't remember that. I rode to a new apartment that I had never seen, not even once, and got a room with no windows, which I remember made me depressed. "Theres a party, let's go, it's a couple of people's birthdays" and I went.
We met but we didn't really met, I met many characters that offered me everything I could want, and the party was off chart that we had to walk blocks just to find the music in a basement in the middle of the city. It was hot. I was sweating in my mini dress. We met but we didn't really meet. Our eyes were somewhere else, and I can't remember the words we spoke to each other, I don't think we ever got introduced.
I did however enjoy my welcome back into the city, the night life that awaited me for the next two years and the stories that I was going to be a part of, the mistakes and the dangers of them.
The next time we met, I remember it a little more clearly, though not that much. Another night of wandering eyes, they looked like big ink blots in my face. I always got anxiety but I still did it anyways, because that time in my life was not so happy and I was not exactly happy either. We were in the middle of the mountains, listening to who-knows-what dj playing god-knows-what music to a bunch of dancing zombies , swaying left to right and bumping their arms up and down, in front of the booth on top of the dirt. Some dust covered floor pad, might have been a broken hammock swing, was laying on the floor and we all sat on top of it. You sat on a far corner as if I would've bitten you if you got too close so I had to invite you to scoot. You did and we never exchanged more than 5 words. I drove my car that night and my friends slept in the back, you rode in the car behind me and some girls were laying out the window. I was jelous of a car with conversation while I was stuck in a car of silence.
I still didn't even have the faintest idea of who you were.
Not far along in the timeline, we met once more and it was as if we were meeting for the first time in the most unfortunate circumstance. I haven't the faintest idea who it was, but somebody invited me to hang out, meet up at your apartment. I knew not a single thing of you but I got there early like an idiot and you opened the door fresh out of the shower. I blushed and sat down to wait in your living room. I didn't know what to talk about once all these people arrived and we all left to a small concert near your home. We spoke of fashion and we spoke of music, we commented on the band and commented on the neighborhood. We bough drinks to go and we went to my ex boyfriend's birthday party, which I was not invited to but went anyways. I wanted to cause some sort of commotion and got just that when guys flocked to me as a shiny new toy, the girl who just got back, the girl who just dyed her hair silver and wore black tall platforms. I didn't really stand out in that crowd but I did that night. My ex boyfriend wanted me to stay over, his sister trashed talked me and I left before pouncing on her. I heard somebody had a threesome and I heard you got kissed out of force. You were asexual at that time and I respected that but not believed it entirely.
It's strange to think of all these past memories with a lack of fondness now, for I once did treasure these strange and particular instances we shared but not really . The beginning of this are not always exciting or charming, in fact, I believe we were trashy and plain sad. I was excited to meet you at some point, friends would say you and I would get along and I believed it. I always liked to make friends so I took it upon myself to approach you if we were in the same room and you looked as if you were far off somewhere in your mind.
The beginning of it all now feels like a burden, I do not know why, yet it feels as if it weights on my chest. I feel my youth of that time, though not long ago, as familiar yet alien to myself now.
I will speak of the progression of us some other time, but for now, I will take a moment to bask in what used to be mine and what now feels foreign.