Stargazing

We laughed a lot.

Everything had a bright side, nothing was as serious as the world made it out to be, everything ultimately made sense. And if it didn't, it didn't matter because we were all together. Even saying "forever" was ok, because rationality didn't hold up to the bond we knew we had. Perfect ingredients, notes splashed across a page of music and it all fit like we had been made for each other. Spilled milkshakes, rock slides, sunburns, killer science classes, and (literally) thousands of miles under the wheels. Special dinners and crowded hot tubs, late nights and pictures caught those years and smiles and adventures and tears and heartache and stargazing. Close enough to see the glow inside the others that the casual observer might miss and miss out on. We had the blond adventurer, the exuberent enthusiast, the artsy musician, the curly-haired dreamer, the driven athlete, the quietly fierce one, the incessent talker, the rugged outdoorsman, the laughing blue-eyed one, the talented designer, the ironic realist, and the crunchy granola one.

But forever is shaded a million different colors, and the wheels keep turning. Like the fourth of july firecrackers that spill out from an epicenter into long bright arcs across the sky, we traced different paths--different colleges, different countries, different worlds. The bond  holds but the immediacy is gone. And that still bites.

Grip as hard as you can, when you open your fist there are just a few dying sparkles left.

I got caught on this train of thought when I got home from Indo and turned on my cell phone. In my voicemail was a cheery call from the athletic one, just back from Gimbie and eager to talk to me. That was two days ago, and I ask myself why I haven't returned the call yet. Closest I can come to answering that is, I'm afraid. No, not afraid of her--she's one of my closest friends. But my subconcious remembers the months it took to adjust to the absence of them all, and even though I tell it that these precious people will slip right back into the holes they left--it doesn't believe me. And that would hurt just as bad.

Why am I so afraid all the time?