I need something to slow me down
It's the kind of night that brings up lots of memories. A cold night, finally. A night where the cold seeps into me from the concrete where I sit. I sit Indian style on the concrete against the wall outside my apartment. A gentle breeze blows the smoke out from my lips and around my head. My ear is pressed against my phone listening to my missed messages. I move closer to the edge of the back porch and dangle my legs over the edge. The chill in the air is a welcome to my cold-nature. The memory that hits me from the messages in my ear is a night two years ago. Trying to talk out the problems with my girlfriend at the time. The problems that we began to have more and more of each day we spent together. By the end of the phone call she felt that we needed a break. The break which I thought would be a month or two turned out to be the end of the relationship. Two years later, I have a new set of problems with my best friend. She just so happens to be a girl. And because of that dynamic, we have a set of problems that resembles my memories of the last relationship I had two years ago. I just hope that this cold, October night won't be the same outcome of that cold night two years ago. I'm sure that it's unfounded. That it's just the first cold night. The cold does things like that to me. It drums up the memories from past times. And it's not that the cold brings bad memories, but given the situation I'm currently in, it makes sense for this to be the memory right now. I try to call her back, but she doesn't answer. I don't know if it's because it's late. If she's too busy. If she's just ignoring. I don't know. I just let my mind run as I leave the message. When I hang up I light up another cigarette and wait. I don't know if she'll call me or not. All I can do is smoke and think about it. And in my truest fashion, over-think it. I stand up and pace the small concrete above the stairs and chain-smoke for 15 minutes until the cold actually starts to push through my coat and make me shiver. It's time for me to drop it and hope I won't look back on this moment in a few years as the downfall of our friendship.