After

Marcus

Despair is a strange thing.

At first, you think that you are ok. You could be at home, or at the movies, or walking down the corridor at school to your next class. And then you might see something.

It might be a book, or a sign, or a smile, or simply a girl who almost looks a little like someone you loved and lost.

And you might delude yourself that it is her. You might stand still for a moment, stuck in place, staring at her, and she will look so like someone else that you run and you put your hand on her shoulder. And then she would turn, and it wouldn't be her. And all the things that made you think it was would unravel, all of the things your mind made you think you saw, the delusions, would pull away from you. And you would grasp at the threads, as if that could stop them from disappearing.

You would apologise. The girl would leave. And then you would stand in the corridor, much like you had when you first saw the girl who looked like her. And you would remember all the ways that the person you loved was different from the person you just apologised to. You would see all the differences, and wonder how your mind could trick you so, could make you truly believe that that person had been her when they were not.

And then you would remember anew that the person you loved was gone. That you would never hold them or tell them that you loved them or tease them or go to sleep with them, back to back, or held tightly in your arms.

And then the pain would hit you.

And you would crumble, right there, in the school corridor. The weight of the world on your shoulders because she was gone and there was nothing you could do about it.

People would look at you. People would stare as they walked past. Maybe gather in a loose circle to wonder at the spectacle of you crying, sobbing, shuddering from a pain that most of them would never understand.

And maybe one of them, someone who had glared at you, once, because they loved her just as much, maybe they would soften, see that the pain of the person sobbing in the school hallway was the same as their own.

Maybe they would shove people out of the way and crouch at your side. Put a hand on your shoulder. Perfectly controlled, always perfectly controlled.

Maybe they would put an arm around your shoulders. Maybe they would help you to your feet and lead you away from all of the people and into the parking lot and into an old, beat up car that smelled of chlorine. Maybe they would sit you in the passenger seat and get in on their own side and start the car and drive away, drive away from school in the middle of the day with no warning, no plans and no place to go.

And maybe, after a moment of silence, they would begin to talk. And you might quiet your sobs to hear them. To hear their voice, soft and rough with the memory of the person you mutually loved. With the anger at the world that you had so long been trying to hold back, because you did not understand it. With the comprehension that, even if the person you both loved was gone, at least you had the memory of her. And you could share it. Keep it like a treasure, something to remember fondly rather than sadly.

And it would hurt for a while, they would say, but as time went on it would hurt less and less. And, maybe, one day, you would remember and it would only hurt a little, the pain a trace of what it used to be.

You might realise that, somewhere along in the calm cadence of his words, you stopped crying loudly and merely sat, tears running down your face as you stared out the front window. And you'd watch the landscape slow down around you til you rolled to a stop on the side of the road. And the one who was so in control, moments ago, would get out of the car and lean against the hood, hands linked behind his neck. And you would get out, too, and you would realise that he was trying so hard not to collapse right there, for you, he was trying for you, and for her, because he had always been strong for her.

But then he would start to cry, and you would wonder how strong he had really been, wonder at it for a moment, and then wonder if losing her was what had broken him, too.

And you might realise that he was hurting as much as you were, but in a different way. And you might put your hand on his shoulder and wait for him to stop. Because he had loved and lost, just like you had, and you had both come out of the other side as shattered ghosts of what you had been.

And then you would both get into the car, and he would drive and drive and drive to nowhere before turning back the way he'd come.

And, the next day, you would do the same. Soundlessly, without words, because you didn't need them. Because it helped to ease the pain.

Because, with her help, you had unwittingly found a friend in someone you never would have imagined befriending. And now would never imagine being able to live without.