With a deep sigh I slump down on my couch, a hand draped over my forehead while I gaze at the ceiling. It seems to be raining forever and this isn’t a kind of weather I enjoy at all. At least I am on my own for a couple more days within this house since my grandfather is currently on well earned vacation somewhere in South-East-Asia. He’s all I have left to refer to be my family. My mother died from fever while I was still a nine month old baby and I never met my father at all since he was killed by a work accident two days before I was born.
I truly admit, the old man didn’t have the easiest time in raising me, but at least he managed to make it so far that I’m this close to get my diploma in linguistics from college with the end of the upcoming semester. Even though I am only twenty years young, there are lot of students envying me for my skill to browse through my classes with ease. There is one I really come along quite well. The two of us met in High School and since this day we are for sure known to be best friends within this small town we live in.
Slowly I sit up on the couch as I suddenly hear a knock at the door. Just who could it be at this time? I don’t await visitors at all. For a short moment I frown as I see Alma standing drenched right in front of my door and without saying a word I shove him inside the house. “Go upstairs and take a hot shower before you catch a cold” are now my words to him as I gaze at the slender figure shivering from the cold and with a short nod Alma follows my instructions. In the meantime I’m in the kitchen preparing tea and some soup so my best friend can warm up. I can think of only one reason he shows up during a weather like this.
During my years of High School I learned why Alma was mostly mobbed not only by his own class mates. Even though as a young man he awoke some interest within his female class mates, I found him mostly spending his days at the infirmary where I decided to help out since I wasn’t into brutal sports like Football, Rugby and Ice Hockey at all. So as I started to talk to him on a regular base, where he shows up in the infirmary, I simply learned Alma is unhappy about being stuck in the body of a young man and that he views himself as a young woman. This is why I vowed myself to always be there for the one year older one, even if that means for Alma to show up at 3 am at my door step.
As the tea is finally done I notice Alma entering the kitchen wearing the spare clothing he one day had left here while staying overnight. “T-thanks” is he only responding with a short sob as I hand him a mug with green tea, sit down next to him and lay my hand on his arm. Currently only Alma’s foster parents and I seem to be the only people around to truly understand in what kind of identity crisis Alma is since his ninth birthday. “I told you before, you can bug me with everything there is” is my response right now, smile at him in order to cheer him up and right there a short attempt of a smile appears on Alma‘s lips.
“Another cancelation for a surgery. Slowly, but surely I don’t know what to do”
“Damned, they have no right to simply deny your wish at all”
is my response right now as I hear why my best friend is so down and I’m holding myself back right now. Alma knows all too well how bad my language turned out to be after he was turned down the first time. The shocked faces of his foster parents were telling enough. Therefore I’m allowed to still stick around him, but only if I learn to stop using foul words around their precious child.
“Hey, don’t give up, Alma, we find for sure a way to turn you into a real beautiful swan” are the next words now coming from me to cheer up my best friend and I lay now my arm around him. Even if I have to take on at least five jobs and work until I collapse, I won’t let some stupid doctors constantly crush the chance of Alma being able to achieve becoming the young woman he sees himself. “Sometimes you tend to be embarrassing, Lavi” is Alma mumbling right now with a slight rose color on his cheeks appearing and the smile is still resting on my lips while gazing at Alma. So right now we sit here at the kitchen table, talk and eat our soup without even knowing in what kind of situation the two of us are.
Alma has fallen asleep right next to me on the couch. I lay a blanket over the two of us and brush gently a few of the dark blue strands aside as a certain uneasiness awakes now deep within my stomach. As if there is an invisible danger lurking around the house. I stay awake and let my gaze wander through the living room while I assure my best friend is still all right. “Alma, wake up” is what I say right now to him, feeling how this uneasiness is increasing even more and my instinct tells me to leave the house. I don’t know why, but my inner voice kind of forces me to stand up, grab my important things and leave.
“What’s wrong, Lavi?”
“We need to leave, now”
“But why?”
is Alma asking right now, looking sleepily at me and I can’t put into simple words what drives me to bring him out into safety.
So once the two of us packed a bag with documents and a blanket, I suddenly hear a crashing sound. Before I can even properly react there is suddenly water pouring inside the house. I quickly grab Alma‘s hand and run upstairs with him to escape the rising water. Sadly the current is so strong that we are minutes later immediately swept away out of the house. Damned. What kind of luck do I deserve to face such a catastrophe? At least Alma is with me. My best friend clings on to me while we drift in the swift current filled with parts of trees, debris and even some cars.
It is to be hoped that I’m going to survive this. Then I will ask Alma out on a date. First we need to get out of here fast. Suddenly without even able to avoid it at all, I bump hard against the wall of a house and therefore Alma slips out of my grasp. At the same time I shorty lose my subconsciousness due to the fact I hit my head quite hard. So this is how I’m going to die? Drowning within a swift river? Damned. I might as well should have asked out some of the girls trying to hit on me during my last year in High School. I turned all their offers down, so that I could still be around Alma.
As I regain my consciousness again I have to blink since it is quite too bright for me. Voices from afar reach out to me but I still see everything surrounding me as if I’m looking through a blurry veil. It is freezing and my clothing sticks to me like an unwanted second skin. Only slowly do I recognize the medics to rescue me out of the water while I cling on to a part of a tree. Blinking again somehow the voices seem to grow louder and louder until I realize that there is a helicopter to save me. ‘Alma’ is now going through my mind and my heart starts to race now.
Is my best friend all right? Were they able to save him? Right now, I’m afraid about asking where Alma is. Because, what should I do if I wasn’t able to save my friend at all? Closing my eye again, I struggle to fall asleep while being now transferred in the helicopter to the nearest hospital. The medic next to me talks the entire time so that he assures I stay awake since they don‘t now the degree of my injuries. The medics assume I might have some trauma to the head and therefore they don‘T want me to fall asleep at all.
Once in the hospital I can declare myself more then lucky to have survived. I got a bruised lung, a bruised back, some minor concussion, a sprained wrist, both bones in my left lower arm as well as the bone in my right upper arm close to the joint broken and some slight hypothermia due to my stay in the water so long. So this is how I end up in a hospital bed finally able to rest a bit until I can hear footsteps rush to the room I currently stay in. Right as I open my eye I feel like air is knocked out of my lungs do to how hard this embrace is and a short smile appears now on my lips since I know who this is without even looking. „Thank goodness you‘re still alive“ do I hear now these words being whispered and as I gaze now at the dark-blue haired figure I start to slowly realize why I was constantly turning down anyone else.
„At least you‘re save, Alma“
„Baka, you should take better care of yourself“
is Alma now saying to me, tears starting to show up in these blue eyes I always find so fascinating to look at and only now do I recognize the cast at Alma‘s left lower arm. I‘d like to pull him close to me but somehow this doesn‘t really work at all. So Alma sits down right next to me and explains me how he was saved by a firefighter in a boat. A short smile appears on my lips. I really mean what I said before. I‘m quite relieved to know my best friend is safe and mostly unharmed.
For a while we stay like this, Alma sitting at the bed brushing some of my hair aside and I simply close my eye enjoying this closeness. After a while even Alma‘s foster parents show up. They assure me to contact my grandfather after they showed me the gratitude of saving Alma. This is simply something friends just do. To look out and stick together. There is a promise we made once we started to become friends. To never leave the other one behind.
Once I‘m released from the hospital grandpa and I are allowed to stay for the time being with Alma‘s family since our house was simply swept away. From Alma‘s foster-father I learn that the two of us had been simply unlucky, because the pouring rain had caused the dam a few miles away from the town to break. Right now I‘m quite bored due to the effect, that even college had been majorly damaged by the water and therefore all the students have to stay at home. So I simply agree to help Alma with the works he still has to do for his own major and together we make a very important decision. Since no one here is even willed to help my best friend we want to head to Japan and search there for a possibility so Alma can finally be the woman he feels like to be.
