Then There Was You

I had left Izlude for almost three years to train myself as a Blacksmith in Alberta. I have of course tried to keep contact with most of my friends back in Izlude. There's this one friend I always wrote to. She had been my friend since forever and she had taught me many things in life, one of them was to love. I could never gather up my courage and tell her what I felt for she only saw me as a brother she never had.

I was assigned to deliver something to Prontera one day by a higher ranking Blacksmith. This was a good opportunity to surprise my friends back in Izlude. For sure they'll be glad to see me after all those years.

As I arrived at the docks, I saw my best friend sitting on the old bench reading his Bible.

"Kairos," I called out to him, slinging my duffle bag over my shoulder and picking up my delivery. Kairos was an Acolyte, for how long? I don't remember. He looked at me curiously, he hadn't recognized me. I walked up to him, as I did I saw his eyes widen with shock.

"Damn," he said. "Andrew? I didn't recognize you back there!" True, I looked very different from three years ago.

Kai walked me around Izlude, nothing much had changed. It was still the same Izlude I knew. One of the reasons of my visit was also to see her again, to gaze into her deep blue eyes, pretending to listen like I used to do.

"Do you know where...?"

"Ah, she's not here right now," Kairos said reading my mind.

"Oh," came my reply.

"Don't you worry, she'll be back tomorrow. I think she's in Payon right now," Kairos said.

Nothing else was said about her after that. Kairos offered me to stay at his place in Prontera since my old house was sold. Kairos was a very talkative fellow. He told me things that happened through the three years of my absence and indeed many interesting things had happened.

The night sky fell upon us as we were walking back from delivering my package and buying some of my stuff. Kairos lived in a house with two other occupants. We shared the same living room, the same kitchen, the same bath. The other occupants were not that good to see me, I couldn't blame them. I just occupy their valuable space.

I couldn't sleep that night. I couldn't help but think of her and how she would look like after two and a half years. I got up from my bed, opened the window and lit a cigar. I just stared out at the starry dark sky smoking about two more sticks before deciding to go to sleep.

I welcomed the morning, I was seeing her today. I looked around the room and saw Kairos helping himself to my cigarettes. It was a filthy habit, but we weren't in the age restriction anymore.

"I'm a bit nervous," I confessed as we were walking down the path to Izlude.

"Don't be," he said. "It's not like you haven't seen her once."

It was partly true; I haven't seen her once since I left. But he did have a point, it was like I wasn't her friend at all, my nervousness was uncalled for.

We arrived at her house where her father, a high-ranking official at the Prontera Chivalry welcomed us. He told us that his daughter had not yet come back from Payon, but it was soon that she would. Kairos and I waited outside for her return and it wasn't long before she came home, but she wasn't alone.

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Hopefully that was alright. See you next chapter.