Next Step

    If voices were colors, I guess hers was violet.  There was a fullness to it, so I suppose it was a bright, full shade of violet.  She was short for someone her age, but something about her indicated she was just a little older than us…it could have been her hair, which was cut short and hung neatly.  It could have been her manner—she was a little formal and very quiet, but above everything else she was kind.  So I think her voice matched her perfectly, and I hope I can somehow remember the sound of her voice.
      I’m describing her in the greatest detail because, of all the people I met and hung out with these last four years, she’s the one I knew the least.  I only talked to her in passing and don’t know much about her, other than the details I described.  This means that there’s a high chance she’ll slip away in memory.  I hope I see her again.  I know I’ll see her again.  But that could be years from now, and we’ll be different people years from now.

      “Well,” he said, “are you ready to leave?”
      My bags were packed.  Everything fit neatly into two bags.  Pictures…books…notebooks…a few random objects…that’s all I really needed.  The rest was in electronics, I guess.
      “Just give me a moment,” I said.  I had laid out the pictures of 21 friends…not necessarily my best friends, but friends I had managed to take pictures of.  I wrote random details on the back of each picture, like quotes and memorable memories.  I gathered each picture up and carefully placed them into my bag.
      Now I could finally leave.

      She was tall for someone her age.  Her skin was smooth and fair.  Her voice was purple, now that I think about it.  Sometimes I thought her voice was red and sometimes I thought her voice was blue, but her voice was purple.
      I’m describing her in the second greatest detail because, of all the people I met these last four years, she’s the one I’m least likely to ever see again.  We had great memories and awful memories, but memories have a tendency to blur together as a single color.  We cut each other off.  She said she never wanted to see or talk to me again, and I said I was happy.  But I wasn’t happy, and I wonder if she is.

      It wasn’t a long drive to college, but I knew the distance would seem a little wider every day.  I would miss this city.  I would miss this city so much.
      We passed houses and fields and various towns, but my mind was in other places.

      As for everyone else, I hope they don’t require descriptions at all.  I’ll see them again soon because I know we’ll make the effort.  And they’re already etched out in memory, so words won’t be necessary.  Words aren’t necessary.
      I met lots of people at college events, and their words and faces ringed with promise.  But it never hit me that this was the new world I was approaching.  That this was the next world.  That this was the next step of my life.  It never hit me until the college gates came into full view.

      Here it was.  This was the city where I would reside for the next four years.
      There were possibilities everywhere.  There would be good memories and bad memories and so, so many new people.
      But I would miss everything and everyone.  I would miss them so much.