Fallen Friendship

Too late. I was already afraid. Consumed by a fear more terrible than the fate which awaited me, no doubt. But that was something I could never control. The heavy masonry loomed over me like a black cloud. All around where works of historic greatness, designed to impress. Extensive and marvellous grounds surrounded the site. But I could see little beyond the darkness as we steadily approached the gates. Where was the excitement of the past? Perhaps we really shouldn’t make every dream a reality, for some things dreams do not show. And I had certainly never felt like this. I always wanted to dive into the puddles, those which reflected the heavenly blue sky. I thought there would be a heaven beneath the surface, the reflection not a deception of the eye, but in fact a hidden truth. I never stepped in, though. I was too afraid of falling - particularly on the clearest days, with no cloud there to catch me should I choose to take the plunge.

I felt as though I had sentenced myself to imprisonment of the worst kind - that which we knowingly choose, and in this instance, without fully knowing why. All I understood was fate had lead me to this place, when no other offered a hand. But now there were too many hands, pulling me down and into a darkness I could never quite see. Part of me couldn’t believe it had taken so long to find such a place, but it was that same part of me which would suffer the most when the truth turned out to be something quite else.

Ironically, I was blind to the darkness.

The school was magnificent. A great institution for preparing young people for the vast and complex world. A place of fine education, a wealth of opportunity and a community unlike any other. A family of seven hundred students and teachers to guide. But I was alone. I could not adjust my ways to theirs, I could not see beyond the classroom what truly resided here.

I wanted freedom but knew not how to use it. Confinement alone did not generate fear in me, but the prolonged need to be in certain places and produce work by certain times - that was crippling. And misleading impressions frightened me yet more; those which are most important are always the longest lasting, and I did not know how to present myself in the necessary way. What it took me too long to realize was that simply being me was the necessary way. But it would never feel enough and self doubt preyed ferociously on my mind.

But there was one who took notice; one who saw the suffering inside.

I just wanted moments longer. Every time so little was said, and I so yearned to talk to him. My loneliness was less in company, but with his it even disappeared at times. Though, only from my senses, for there were as many times of grief as there were glimpses of hope. And the frustrations of a friendship taking so long to develop lead me into deeper despair. I needed to reach out into the darkness knowing there was a hand to hold. Then when I thought I’d found one, it was just beyond my reach. And whenever it drifted nearer...I forgot the need to hold on. So I thus lead myself astray, until I wandered entirely alone, but for the thoughts in my head and these desperate longing in my heart.

Where did it go? What became of the friendship, for friendship cannot die - even if it exists only in memories. In fact, in such places it is more alive than any other. But we still do not know. And writing these words is so dangerous a thing for me to do. The more I seek the more vivid becomes the dreaming and I find forgotten memories arising from the past which crave to be kept hidden. So few words. So much feeling. Too little time. Fear mounts and this sickness in my soul envelops my mind, till the thoughts cannot be contained. Now I fear I will break.

And yet there it was, my blank canvas. And I’m glad it was made the way that I was, because it complemented all I’d ever wanted in life. Simplicity.
I had left behind the classroom; to escape was all I could ask for and it was everything to be free. I just never knew when I was there the love would last eternally.