He saw his best friend get killed before his eyes. They were running across the street with Jimmy ahead of him but there was a truck they hadn’t hear coming. They had been going round the neighbourhood to see if something would happen, a custom Jimmy had introduced. They didn’t go to the park any longer to play football or meet with friends, they just took their chances on the sidewalk. That day they had seen a fire and a protest rally, quite a good score they agreed. They had been doing the last blocks running and when Jimmy thought he was outsmarting him they didn’t notice the gasoline lorry and he died on the spot.
The following weeks he did not know what to think. It was merely funny that Jim wasn’t around, like he had gone on holiday. But when the holiday wouldn’t end it became clear to him his friend was lost forever, that earth had become a different place from the world he until very recently had had a thousand plans for. He would forget what happened immediately afterwards - all the blood and the chaos in his head and around him - but he had been to the funeral and the body he stole a glance at wasn’t Jimmy’s anymore, just a stiff puppet with the wrong clothes on.
They had been pals for two years, Jimmy the kid who dared do anything, and he his lucky sidekick. They met on the first day of primary school and after a good fight decided to be mates. Jimmy showed him how to steal football league cards and he channelled the wild energy of his new friend towards more industrious undertakings as building shacks up in the big old oak tree in the park. They got into trouble more than once and his mother advised him to let go of this unruly backstreet chap, but the danger and excitement were far too appealing. He was seeing a bright future for the perfect blend of his own natural smartness and the bravery his friend gave him, and he wanted to explore that path till the very light, unable to imagine on a clear blue windy day their story was to be stopped in its tracks.
He would never turn back to the routes his parents once set out for him, he was way beyond that now, but he didn’t manage to stay on the straight path either. Without Jimmy’s presence he would choose different streets, not always peak his nose into everything, not get into trouble so much. There was some Jimmy left in him for sure, but it did not seem enough to steer his decisions. He would miss Jimmy dearly and he grew a heavy sadness in his heart all the time he thought of him, like a setting cloud that little by little began to darken the once bright images of their adventures. He was alone in the world he once had shared, no one to ever trust in the same way again.
Through the years the cloud consumed all his memories, and when the streets that used to be theirs had become his own he had nothing left but this foggy sadness. Life goes on, his mother had said after the funeral, and he had not wanted to hear of it, but when the mist he carried lifted over time, as fogs usually do, he must agree with her. There were days he not for a minute remembered his sadness and the days became weeks and only when he started to feel ashamed of his ability to forget he took the conscious decision to keep the remaining haze with him for the rest of his days. So he clung to the soft awareness of loss his load had shrunk into, a small empty hole which could weigh on him whenever he let himself be caught by the mood. His need had been turned into ritual, an honourable tribute to the murderous reality of life.
Chance carried him places where he made new friends and when he grew older he found himself a wife and they started a little family, sharing lots of happiness. Every now and then he would remind himself of the small empty hole he needed to concentrate deeply on to locate. He mostly convinced himself it was still there and when he did he believed he could actually feel it, knowing well he was creating his own full circle but what else was there to be done.
Then death crossed his path anew. His father’s time had come and after he had said goodbye to the corpse that wasn’t his forbearer any longer he expected to go through the same process of ritualising his sadness. He sought to give the remaining pain an equal place in his heart, next to where Jimmy’s somewhere must be, but his head full of memories wouldn’t allow him. There was too much vivid history swimming through his brain, too much closeness since he had reached the ages he remembered his father of having, for it to sink away into barely noticeable grieve. His father asked him to live on in his thoughts, to bring him along on his future adventures, if only to see what life could be like for the really old. He did not resist the plea and it made him realise poor Jimmy might have wanted that too, live on in stead of being vaguely remembered and sink away into rituals. It was much too late for that now of course, there was no recognition left in his mind, nothing to recall and to build upon other than the faintest of pains.
He cried for the wisdom he had lacked when it mattered, cried for the stupidity of his youth, but he quickly accepted there could have been no other way, him having been so young when the truck struck. He expected Jims parents, whom he had never seen again after the funeral, would have found a better path. Jimmy must have been safe in their hearts, for years going through the horribly boring routines he had always ran away from, come to think of it.
He started drawing pictures of Jim and when he felt he had done quite well he hung the last portrait in the hallway where he would glance at it a few times a day. Who is that man, his children asked, and he told them the story and that Jimmy might have looked like this had things gone differently. Would I have been here today if it had, his youngest asked, and he looked down on the head from where this thought had sprung and he gave the little bugger his honest answer. I don’t think so, he said, and the boy remarked: I am sorry for you but I am happy for myself, and after those words he really cried and he kissed him.
