A Season of Firsts

Chapter 23 - Handcuffs and Consequences

Before December 31st

DANIEL

Through my smudged, dusty window pane, I see Cleo arrive. She wears a maroon beanie and a cream coloured scarf. The car that dropped her off leaves soon after she has gotten out.
I wasn't expecting her to come, not really. Not after my last encounter with her and how I've been ignoring her.

But I'm glad she is here.

I leave my room to pound down the stairs to the first floor, grabbing my jacket on the way out. There's no doubt it's freezing outside.

I used to love summer, but I feel ready to embrace this coming winter, the already icy temperature when I walk outside singing in tune to something cold and hard deep inside of me.

As I walk along the sidewalk to where Cleo's petite figure clad in winter wear stands, looking up at the building of flats with her back turned to face me, I make up my mind to approach quietly. She has always scared easily, and the urge to creep up on her and give her a fright the way I used to when we were little kids is inviolable.
Tiptoeing up to her, I hold my breath.

"Good evening!" I yell, grabbing her shoulders from behind.

She lets out a squeal, twirling around underneath my hands to face me, eyes big. When she sees who it is, she shoves me away. "Daniel, you dimwit!" she snaps, but it's so easy to tell that she doesn't mean it from the twinkle in her eye and the way she's trying not to giggle.

I find myself grinning, but force the childish smile to leave my lips when I do. For a second there I felt things were the way they used to be.

But that's dumb. It will never be the same and I shouldn't be allowing myself to be thinking like that. I let my hands fall away from her and I shove them into my pockets instead.

For what feels like an eternity, we stand looking at each other in the dim glow of a nearby streetlight, our breath clouding the space between us. I try to commit every detail of her face to memory, against my own will. I take in her features for the trillionth time in my life, but more slowly than I have before. Her thick, ebony lashes. Her almost heart shaped lips. Her button nose covered in little freckles. And the dark chestnut brown hair framing her pale face in waves.

Her eyes run over my face too, but not so much like she's observing, more like she's searching. Maybe she thinks there's still a little bit of the old me somewhere.

Too bad she'll be disappointed.

Cleo speaks up first, banishing the silence with her slightly husky voice. "So...why this? I mean, why did you want to see me?"

I think back to the other day when I almost ran over a little girl. "Because I needed someone to talk to."

She waits for me to go on, but I don't. She seems a bit anxious. I feel there's something else, too, an underlying sense of dread or distress. She's attacking her bottom lip with her teeth, something she would only do if something bad was going to happen when we were younger.

I tried so hard to forget Cleo, but apparently I still know her all too well.

"What's wrong?" I ask, breaking the second void of words between us.

"Nothing," she responds, far too quickly, as she absentmindedly tugs on a string of her hair. I don't feel the need to say anything else. I know her honesty will best her soon enough. "You're still able to tell when I..." she lets the rest of the sentence drift off.

I know what she means. Not that it's hard for one to see Cleo's emotions, but I am so familiar with the way she is that I can pick up even the most buried or hidden sentiments of hers.
All of this time, I've been holding on, I've been remembering. And I hate myself for it. It will only cause me more pain.