Champion

The feeling brings tears to my eyes. Perhaps we can take a step forward together.

And just like that, I am linked with him again, I feel the pulse of our bond and history and love through our hands, like a wave of magic, the return of a long-lost friend.

Then Day reaches out and touches my hand with his. He encloses it in a handshake.

For a moment, I think it won’t happen.

Still I wait, too unsure of myself to answer. I cannot take the first step. I shouldn’t. That step belongs to him.

Perhaps there is such a thing as fate.

His scars will never fade. I am certain of that much. But perhaps . . . perhaps . . . with time, with age, we can be friends again. We can heal. Perhaps we can return to that same place we once stood, when we were both young and innocent. Perhaps we really can meet like other people do, on some street one balmy evening, where we each catch the other’s eye and stop to introduce ourselves. Echoes of Day’s old wish come back to me now, emerging from the mist of our early days.

Day is so close, and his eyes are so bright. “I hope,” he replies softly, “to get to know you again. If you are open to it. There is a fog around you that I would like to clear away.”

“Is it?” I whisper back, my voice trembling with all the emotions I’ve kept hidden for so long.

“It’s you,” he whispers. There is wonder in his voice.