The nightmares had come and gone, leaving me feeling as though I were a hollow cedar tree.

We used to play around the one behind my house. One day, we got our fathers to put a swing up above a tall branch. We’d take turns pushing each other higher and higher. Those days felt like they would go on forever. When I would look into his face and see him smiling back at me. Always, I looked forward to tomorrow, pondering what new ways we would have fun with what little was around us. Once we started high-school I feared we would part ways. Some friends did that.

Not us.

He was genuine. A guy you only meet once in your life. The type that doesn’t let peer-pressure or trends dictate his motives, nor thoughts. His soul was his own. You couldn’t buy it. You couldn’t steal it. And for a time, I thought it belonged to me. Selfish, I know. Maybe somewhat stupid. But that’s who I was. The moon to the shining sun.

The sun was blonde, with curly hair that felt soft to ruffle up in playful roughhousing. The moon was narrow, in many ways smaller to the radiance that shone down. You couldn’t part them. Even on days when the sun rose up high above the sky, you would catch glimpses of the moon, never far behind.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

That’s why it took us all by surprise. It was unexpected.

You live all your life thinking the sun will shine long after you are gone. Yet that’s not what happened. I wasn’t prepared. How could I be? But instead of it hitting me all at once, I slowly descended into darkness that carried with it a crushing weight. Before I knew it I was unable to move.

Stuck in place, unwilling even to take flight. It was Bleak. Lifeless. Looking back, I don’t think I could have stopped it. Perhaps I had seen the signs. The dimming of the sun’s smile, the hesitance to reciprocate jests, but in truth, I only saw what I wanted to see.

The nightmares had come and gone, leaving me to look out at the dead cedar tree that stood alone behind the house. The seat in class that remained empty for the rest of the days I went to school. The dim light of my cellphone’s screen, where the name of the sun still remained, unable to hear the voice I got lost in every day. The voice of the one I had come to love like a brother.

I was all that was left now. A lone moon only daring to show itself at night, the only world I would know a shell of what once had been. A world with no light, nor warmth. Eventually, I found myself in the darkness of my room looking up at the ceiling only to realize that after all the suffering and grief, there was still no answer to my question.

If you had to go… Why couldn’t we have gone together?