That racing feeling you have when you stick your head out of a window and watch the night city fly by. Taking a breath of the rushing spring air knowing you will never feel the exact same again. The cold feeling as it enters your lungs trying to savor every moment as you fly. Those were the feelings I had as I rode around the city with my friend for a week. She was a neon sign. Bright, beautiful, and filled with color. Smoke curled from her lips filling the car with a haze making it hard to see and think. Just like how smoke fades, she disappeared
All we had were some savings pulled together for gas and food, the clothes on our backs, and our addiction to be high on life. From the top floor of parking decks, we saw sunsets making the sky look like a watercolor masterpiece filled with lilac purples, dreamy oranges, and the final hints of red before the heavens turn into a kaleidoscope of diamonds strewn across a black canvas. We ran under glowing street lights until our throats stung from our breath, running away from reality and chasing our dreams. The girl I followed, watching her caramel hair glow like a golden hallo, the girl always in her bright blue car, warmed by her smile, the girl I watched grow up, outgrew me.
As we traveled and stopped, we met people. Often, we were mistaken for sisters due to our alike appearances and our mannerisms having formed to one another over 8 years. Boys with curly hair and golden chains and girls with piercing brown eyes and silver rings all laughed with us, dancing under colored lights hypnotizing us. Meeting them for an hour, becoming family, then losing them to a sea of people, because it didn't matter how many people we lost as long as we had each other. Despite all the people we met, she left me all alone.
Her blue eyes, looking at me and loving me, shine through the darkest of nights in my memory. The smile she would give, showing her two front teeth, bigger than the rest, but fitting her face, makes me smile back to a ghost. The same circular nose she hated, but I loved it because I could recognize her no matter how she changed her hair or makeup. Her arms used to fit perfectly around my waist as mine did her shoulders, pushing our frozen cheeks together. They are now a figment of my memory and nothing more.
The cold air bit into our bones as we shivered close to the glowing orange flames, our only source of heat. She smiled at me in her blue fleece jacket and New York hat. Taking a picture on my phone, I captured her before she left me.
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