Colours

Blue

It was long ago since I have felt blue like before. Yes, interesting to say, "feel blue". Not as feeling down or nostalgic or sad, but actually feeling the colour. It was when I didn't even know what love is. My priorities and wishes were a lot different back then, 5 years ago. Funny, it was only 5 years ago, but for me it seems like it was 10 or more. Sometimes like it never even happened. I never thought it would end that way. It seemed not so important, not even that much painful. In the end, there was only one feeling left; nostalgia. Nostalgia and longing for the old times, "good old times" when I wasn't aware I will ever remember him the way I remember now.

It had begun so long ago we both didn't even know it; with our birth. We had known each other actually when our lives had just begun. Laying next to each other in the hospital, him older only a day than me, we both didn't even know that 7 years later, we're going to spend so much time together in the same place, as well as 20 more children. Not only the same school, but even the same class, and years later, the very same bench. Well, now I should probably tell the story of how I got to the point when I'm feeling that blue colour. There's actually not quite much to say. It lasted for just a couple of months, not even three, and it was done for "the eternity". Well, not so real eternity because there always were moments when we had to collide with each other again, but those little things we had, were gone. I was forced to convince myself it's really lost and get over it.

We didn't really communicate for almost 6 years, so it's apsurdly to say that we were good friends, cause in reality we weren't. It was only that year and a half that I was able to say I kinda liked his existence, and even considered him funny and nice. After almost a year of sitting together, everyday talking, laughing together and even fighting, I suddenly caught myself thinking of him in a little different way. It was 6th grade when our teacher moved him to sit with me, I was one of the best students in class, and he was more of a class clown who never wanted to listen and study. Her intention was to change his behaviour as mine, and I wasn't very happy about that in the beginning. But we were still kids and our opinions were meant to change quickly, so it wasn't very long till I started to be very happy around him. He would make me, as well as the whole class, laugh till tears sometimes, and time spent close to him was my most happy part of being in that school. Of course, there were times that we would fight so much we almost started hating each other, but that wouldn't last long. Sometimes I even tried to beat the hell out of him when he would rip all of my nerves, of course I couldn't do it, he was taller and stronger than me.

The year flew by so fast in his company, summer came and I had spent two and a half long months without him. I had no one to ask how his weekend was, to share a sandwich with, to slap his face when I would get angry or simply laugh at his jokes. A strange feeling haunted me during those months and as I had too much spare time, I was thinking too much as always. The day we came back to school, the first day of 7th grade, for me was the happiest day after long summer. When I had finally seen his face, I knew that something in me changed. My heart started beating a little faster than usual, I felt something I never felt before and the feeling was good. I fell in love.

At first, I didn't want anybody to know, I kept it safe inside myself, because I wasn't even sure if I really liked him or maybe not. I had that luck that our classrooms on the first floor of that boring building, were flooded and then renovated for almost three months, so my class was moved to the basement. There was a small classroom with double benches, and the teacher set the sitting schedule once more, setting him up next to me again. This time my best friend was also sitting next to us, so the three of us had a lot of fun those few months together. Laughter was common on every single lesson, but this time I was looking at him a bit differently. I started staring at him during lessons while no one would be looking, and even though he wasn't so attractive and handsome boy, I found him beautiful. I didn't really expect nothing of us, I was perfectly satisfied with every chance for joking and hanging out with him, I never even thought of a relationship or something like that. I was still a child and the top of my fantasysing about us was an idea of sitting on the bench in some park, talking, smiling and perhaps holding hands. Nothing would make me happier than that by those times. It was that first and innocent kind of love, simple thinking about one silly smile or joke, and that warm feeling around my heart. I felt some kind of safety while thinking of how happy I am for only being that close to him, and it made me completely comfortable and fullfilled.

One day he came to school wearing a bright blue hoodie, blue as a summer sky, cristally clear of all the clouds. It was a day when I had a strong feeling that something important is going to happen, and I spent the entire morning preparing myself. Monday afternoon, and almost the very end of that year unusually cold November. When I came to school, the first thing I noticed was that new blue neon hoodie which seemed like a light in that grey and boring day. I was so incredibly happy for seeing him after weekend, and I got specially dressed that day, I had even put on make up, which I almost never did before. I even complimented his new outfit and couldn't take my eyes off him. That bright blue colour burned my eyes, but my opinion was that it was a perfect fit for him. A few boring lessons passed, when I took one of my friends to the classroom because we needed to talk. The talk was, obviously, about him. Even though I didn't tell my secret to anyone from the class in the beginning, one day after school I had literally spit that out cause I needed someone to know. She was quite good friend with him, he even told her some of his secrets and she was sort of my spy around him. I wanted to know if he perhaps fancied some girl, and inside myself hoped it was me. She was just explaining me that maybe I should approach first and start "the conversation", when I had made the biggest mistake. I loudly said his name and warned her I would never ever tell him I liked him first, and right then I saw her shocked face. She pointed a finger behind my back and whispered:

-He heard you!-

I automatically twisted around myself, just in the moment when a bright blue trace was lost behind the door. My heart started beating faster, my hands were sweating and the only thought I had was that I must have seen someone else. I tried so hard to convince myself that the boy in the blue standing behind the door wasn't really him, but it was useless. The word spread around class in only 3 bloody minutes, and very soon every single person knew that I was in love with him. My nightmare was ready to begin.

From that day, not only he had stopped talking and even looking at me, he even told the rest of the boys to do every single possible thing to make me feel miserable. And then the days of torturing begun. I got several new nicknames, such as "ugly", "fat", "stupid", even "clumsy" because I was terrible at any kind of sports, and also been called by names of fat animals such as pig, bear or cow. Every single day for almost a year. Till the end of the 7th grade there was only a day, or maybe two when I wouldn't hear those awful names. It wasn't enough, he couldn't stop even on that. None of the two, three boys who were smart and kind exceptions in our class, ever wanted to speak to me again. That didn't hurt that much because I generally didn't have any male friends back then, but it was still something I considered ugly and awful behaviour. I cried a lot while I was still trying to get used to everything, especially the first night after that catastrophical day. The worst part wasn't the fact that he had found out I was in love, but that we had lost that little friendship we had. It was harder for me to get used to never talking to him again, than to a so called "first heartbreak". Every time I would cry all alone wasn't because that day someone new called me a "fat pig", or a "clumsy bear", but because I didn't have him to make me smile despite crying.

Months and months slowly passed and another year was over. When summer was over and when our last year in primary school had begun, I felt that I got over everything. We never talked to each other again, even though in the last year there were a couple moments when we were forced to say something to each other, but at least those nicknames and laughing on my account was over or at least wasn't that common as it was in the past year. I was with my friends, he was with his, and it felt like we were never even close. But every time he would wear that bright blue hoodie, I couldn't look at him for the whole day. That colour kept burning my eyes almost till tears, but I would force myself not to cry. And I didn't, but I never admitted my heart would still sometimes skip a beat when someone would call his name or mention anything connected with our "ex-friendship". Even though I had forgotten him, I never forgot that one funny smile, that one terrible day, and that bright, burning blue colour.

XXIX.XI.MMX.