Winning Demons

  But he had changed, and of this she was sure, for she had noticed it at once as they were walking along the shoreline during their regular date, and knew without a doubt that he had never done that before. She said so:

“What is that, by the way? You’ve never done that before.”

“What’s what?” and she gestured towards him in response.

“Oh, that. Sure, I have- I’ve been doing it for ages now.”

“Really? But- how have I never noticed it before?”

He shrugged. “You’ve had a lot going on.”

They came to their usual spot, hidden behind the tiny peninsula that extended a few metres into the water and shielded them from view. But how was it possible, after all? She had never seen anyone do that before. He shrugged.

Could he control it? He couldn’t. Did it ever stop and start up again? It didn’t, it was like that all the time. But he hadn’t always been like this, right? That was right, it was just the way things were now. But what did it mean?

“What do you mean?”

She meant, what did it say now that he had changed like this? But he didn’t understand her question; did not see why it was important. It was just the way things were now and she needed only to accept it.

The golden light hit the back of the cape and shone through the cluster of trees, reflecting on the water. The snow gathered in soft mounds on the ground and on some particularly dense branches, and shone white and brilliant. She turned her head to look out where the lake widened and spanned to the hibernating mountain on the opposite shore, brown and frozen through to the centre. The lake rested usually on the earth during the other seasons in a manner she usually thought to seem dull and hideously flat, but as the weather had changed for the final time that year, she had begun to see the water as playfully alive, as the cold had ossified the nature in place and yet failed to freeze the lake and so, ever so often, the surprisingly warm breeze would prickle the surface of the water and push it along: the only movement in the otherwise motionless scene. A final look, and the sky was a pale yellow, and the clouds were clear.

As they continued to meet at their same time and spot over the next few weeks, she would ask him the same questions relentlessly- begging for sincere answers, and yet he continued to remain evasive. But when had this happened, exactly? He sighed and looked out at the lake. She couldn’t ask him these things every time they met, he insisted. She knew, she knew, it was just- a middle-aged couple walking a small dog emerged from behind the trees and nodded at them briefly, in greeting-

“What?”

“Well.”

“Yes?”

The couple and their dog rounded the bank and disappeared from view.

“It’s just that, I’ve been thinking about it and I just get the feeling that- or rather, it had occurred to me the other day that you might have died.”

“What? Why would you say that?”

“It might be the case. In fact, I really do think it is- I think that you’re dead right now and that’s why you’ve been doing that thing off late.”

“Wow.”

A red breasted bird landed close to their feet, carrying tiny branches in its beak, and hopped along thrice before taking off again.

“Oh my God,” he said, his energy rising. She braced herself for his outburst.

“How could you say that?”

He was really hurt, she could tell, but it was the only thing that made sense.

“I’m sorry, I-”

“You’re my friend.”

“I know, I just th-”

“My BEST friend.”

“I know, I kn-”

“I would never tell you that you were dead.”

She exhaled a thick cloud of mist. “I’m sorry, I-”

“I mean, it just says so much about the kind of person you are.”

She paused. “What does that mean? Just because I said you might be de-”

“No, it’s not that. It’s not just that, it’s that it matters so much to you, doesn’t it? Whether or not I really am dead?”

She blinked. “No, it doesn’t-”

“Oh, come on,”

“WHAT?”

“I mean, you are just obsessed about it.”

“No, I’m not! I’m not obsessed about it.”

“You’re just being so, honestly, so, so… I don’t know, I’m just- I’m surprised at you.”

“Oh, stop it.”

“Really, I hate to say it, but,” he sighed.

She looked away from him, over the water. The silence between them swelled and they faced away from each other while the temperature began to fall. He glanced at the sky and saw the sun had been obscured by a thick cloud.  

“Alright, I’m really, very sorry, okay? Just forget the whole thing,” she said.

He was shaking his head, not looking at her, but deep in a thought. He was going to go, he said at last. She would call him tomorrow, she offered, but he raised his hands in objection.

“Don’t worry, I’ll call you when I’m ready.”

He stood up and walked away from her, still doing that thing he had not used to do before. From this view, it was actually quite charming, she thought. She wondered how he would call her, or if he would still be able to maneuvre his phone now that he was dead.