THE MANAGER NIM

33. BLUE AND GREY

The soft sky looks like a dreamy portrait with an endless frame, created by a celestial child who shambolically smeared the lucid hues of aesthetic blues and softest accents of whites. 

There, he stands in the exact corner where you met him last time, deeply staring into the stirring brindles of blues and greys while relishing the serenity of those pastel clouds vaguely sailing towards their inconclusive destination.

Struggling to curb the crazy rhythm of your heart caused by trotting up in the endless staircase rapidly, you halt your legs, letting your soul join the tranquil bliss.

The trace of Deja Vu induced by the spot you both are standing at and the alarm it prompted in your heart slowly evanesces into thin air and a sense of relief permeates your system as you continue to peer at the man ahead of you while huffing for oxygen.

Joe tilts his head even higher facing the densely blue and distant sky and hoists his arm towards it, trying to feel it against his skin. A lifeless smile fused with pain builds over his lips while a glob of tears glides down his cheek.

Some obscure element of that smile lunges a sharp knife through your heart. 

And that very moment you realise that you made a mistake. 

A grave mistake.

You should've been there to console him when his mind was visibly suppressed by his clashing thoughts. Instead of that rigid hesitation to break through the cold silence, a loop of warm pats against his broad back would've made him feel better about himself and his situation. 

To think about it now, his silence might've been the period he consciously created to witness your reaction and the way you continued the day with a muted mouth must've given him the wrong idea that you've turned your back on him after knowing his deep secret.

"Joe!" Your voice quivers as you choke on guilt brimming in your throat.

His head swivels in a flash, his eyes enlarge to a certain extent emphasising his astonished state. He drops the live cigarette emitting achromic smoke from his other hand and stomps over it while leisurely proceeding towards you.

Standing few feet apart from you, he tugs his hands into his trouser pockets and lets his eyes rove over your remorse engulfed face. His soulless, puffed eyes notify how he might've cried himself to sleep last night and the bitter tears of self-reproach start to accumulate in your eyes. 

"Joe, I'm sorry_" 

"It's okay y/n, I understand." His raspy voice interrupts your sincere apology and he continues, 

"I swear, I was not planning to shift my burden over your head. Throughout the day I was internally brawling with myself about disclosing my secret to you, but your kindness prompted me. Baring my mom who lost herself in the battle with destiny, leaving me all alone in this cold world when I was nothing but a five-year-old kid, no one has ever made me feel the magic of genuine, selfless love. In search of such compositions of compassionate love, I was constantly cruising over the vile ocean of greedy souls and sinful minds, which completely detached me from humankind.

But when you genuinely cared about a stranger with no expectations that day, that very moment your name got etched into my heart along with my mom's. You might think that as a simple help you offered for a helpless child, but that is the only thing I've been surfing for among humankind all these years. And that elicited my deepest secret to spill out to you. I do know I will lose the only friend I found for myself by letting my past out, but still, the heaviness in my heart prompted me to do so. 

Y/n, though it was a short period, I'll forever be thankful to you for eliciting my real smile after years and I completely understand and accept your decision to part ways with me. Thanks for yesterday and everything! But_"