Years after I had last seen him, I awoke one morning with a strange sensation that led me to go upstairs and rummage through an old box of papers I hadn't touched for years. In this box was a brightly colored book - orange with shades of blue and purple. Inside, its pages were blank, and worn around the edges. Upon closer examination, etched into the cover was a scene bearing a strong likeness to where he had vanished, all those years ago. Soon after this observation, I heard a strange sound from downstairs and turned towards the door, straining to hear anything else.
When I turned back, there was something different about the cover of the book.
Each time I looked at it, a new detail would emerge. Something would shift – there is no way that this could be etched. I flipped though the book several times, always going back to the cover. It became clear that this familiar scene was not etched, drawn, or even printed. It was just there. I am not sure how, and surely I was not hallucinating. Sometimes there was a rose. I had not seen her before, but I knew he had.
On the inside pocket, there was a message that looked freshly inscribed, in a cheerful hand:
Here is this book.
In it, write
everything you can
remember. Nothing less.
Nothing more.
That writing was his own. I knew it immediately.
For years, I was not sure how in the moment (or right after) I could have adequately expressed how our adventures made me feel. I'm still not sure I'm fully capable of it, but one thing is clear - this book I found, in which I wrote out everything I could remember, even with the details I must have missed - reading those pages now - it works.
Perhaps I cannot say "I remember everything," but it is about those little nuanced feelings that come back as bright as day when I see the stars on the cover that look like they could be moving. When I read the note so clearly meant for me on the inside cover, and now my handwriting on those weathered pages, I remember all of the colors, and the feelings I had throughout that entire year because our adventures.
Every page is an excavation of a particular sensation -
How (despite the extreme chill of the air and my uncertain future) I had no local worries. Somehow he managed to make me forget all of this. Even as soon it was over, the only thing that mattered was that it had happened and that somehow he was still there. He must be, because he told me – long ago. And now here, in my upstairs room as a person who has aged enough to have lost count of the days, months, and years it has been.
The joys, thrills and nerves of our short time as each others best friend managed to brighten my world beyond its moment, and has since informed everything I've looked for in those who are closest to me here, where I have come to age, and thankfully avoided a fate like those men we saw in such strange and fantastic places.
I remember him even better now, like looking up at the stars in search of the one that got away, after only appearing moments before.
Those stars (one is his own) are on the cover of this strange book. And his words, as well as mine, are inside.