Homage

[sinclair_furie]

You didn’t want to leave alone, so I offered to come with you, that day- but wherever I go there are complications We couldn’t take the taxi because I wasn’t allowed so you drove there with me, to the train station and made me promise I’d be careful on the way back. It was your car, and you didn’t seem to care, but still it was only twenty minutes there anyway. I still remember my girlish pride the first time I lied about it.

So it was that we sat in the car, me in the shotgun at last, in perfect silence.  God knew what webs you weaved in your mind but I did not; so I wondered.

And I wondered where that ease, that eloquence that I so often saw in your writing went. I knew you through your writing, really, through the furtively emailed Word documents and the ink-intensive editing: your heroes and their downfalls. I knew you through your journalism and your editorials and your in-your-face English essays that were explorations of language in themselves. That Kay, I knew; but the silent one, the one that sat quietly and brooded about girls… that one was a complete stranger to me. Sometimes I even wondered if you knew even less than me (remember how we were both always the last to find out?)

With that thought I got out of the car, barely having said barely more to you than “hello”, and then “shall we go?” You went on and confirmed your train ticket, the magic scarf, the silver bullet out of this place and to the real world where you would study and write and become great, undoubtedly, but all I could do was remember. You hardly noticed me, most of the time, doing your history homework but you complimented me once, and I still remember it. You gave up your seat, playing Risk, and then when he demanded why you gave it to me, and not him, you said “because she’s beautiful, and you’re not” and the memory makes me smile.

I remember.

But now the time for remembrances has ended, or paused momentarily, because your train will come in two minutes and we crave our farewell. You are my friend, I tell myself, but the proverbial cat has my tongue in a death grip and would rather tear it out viciously than let go.

“I guess this is it,” you say. And I nod, and you gravely shake my hand.  “It’s been good knowing you,” and I wonder what kind of parting this will be.

“Sorry,” I manage finally, and it’s a plea. We are both lost. Now again I remember the time when they were all talking and I was so confused and I told you, “I’m lost, Kay,” and you replied “Don’t worry, I’m always lost.”

Those, I suppose, were the days. And I’d hug you impulsively, but we know that won’t happen so I smile and say only, “Keep in touch or I’ll kill you myself.” Your train arrives, and we wave to each other, and thus the chapter of our friendship is ended.

At least I’ll always have the stories.