Lovino stared blankly out the window, the drops that swirled down the pane giving way to an opaqueness that seemed to blockade him from the outside world. He shook his head as if to rid himself of something before falling back on his twin-sized bed, continuing to focus on the gray blanket that lay over the sky. Some summer this had turned out to be. His first day of high school was fast approaching, and he didn't feel any more secure about it than he had at eight grade graduation three months ago. It wasn't that he hadn't gotten pep talks from his brother and his best friend and his brother's friends and the like, and it wasn't that he hadn't had anything to take his mind off the impending school year over the summer, but he just didn't feel up to it. He could never have Feliciano's sunny outlook on everything, nor had he ever possessed the ability to easily adjust to things.
He could also never forget.
He could never forget the one person to whom he had told everything, to whom he had poured out his heart, whom he had saddled with his worries, troubles and fears. The one who had just disappeared three years ago.
Lovino remembered everything about him in painful detail. His deep brown hair and forest green eyes, the way he always smelled like spices and tomato leaves. He recalled his happy-go-lucky personality, the tendency he had to talk a little too loud, that irritating semi-lisp he had at certain times. And of course, his love- his passion- for tomatoes. Much like his own.
All of that and more, so much more. Every little impertinent detail jumped out at him like poppies in winter. They had haunted him ever since the other boy had vanished just before their sixth grade year. Lovino hadn't seen or heard from him for three years. And every day, the possibility of maybe seeing him again clawed at him relentlessly, refusing to allow him to move on and make ready for the future.
The young Italian sighed and closed his eyes for a few long moments, precious moments, before blinking them open again and sitting back up. He glanced over at the large wood-grain desk in the corner before his eyes darted away again. They slowly crept back over, eyeing the small, open, blue book that sat in the center of the relatively clean surface. He scowled a bit deeper before slowly standing and making his way through the cluttered room to the desk and sitting and picking up the pen that lay beside the journal. The words already flowed through his head, and they flowed out of him and onto the paper from the pen, his writing like liquid emotion. His heart in simple black ink.
The night is black
Through the blackness, a light,
A sound, or just the rain
Brings out of the lonely darkness
Your face to me again.
If only in my heart,
With the sound of each raindrop
My memories of you start.
The hum of the train
Your laugh to memory calls.
The touch of your hand-
As the raindrop falls.