Darkness. It enveloped the boy. It permeated within him as he fell deeper in the abyss. As he peered to the sides, he saw himself. There were multiple panoramas slowly passing him by and in each one was himself. Hundreds of them depicting his memories. His successes and his failures. His happiness and his sorrows. His aspirations and his fears. The boy did not feel any emotion as he saw them sway by him. To him, these were just mere inconveniences that weren't worth caring about anymore. The air then turned cold and the boy found himself calmly shutting his eyes. "This is it, this is how I'll fade away", the boy thought to himself. Darkness...
Ahahaha! The boy then quickly opened his eyes, startled by the sound of laughter. He was suddenly sitting on the edge of a stone fountain in the middle of a crowd. It was night-time and yet there were so many people around him. He then decided to examine the area a little further and saw the radiance of many lights. The air smelled of a mix between smoke and ambrosial cooking that made his stomach quiver in anticipation. The boy also felt oddly calm instead of his usual anxious behavior despite being in the midst of so many people. He savored the feeling.
It had been a long time since he had felt this way. Since the time of when he was child. As he stared more into the crowd, he could see the faces of cheerful lovers walking arm in arm, the content faces of the elderly boisterously chatting and laughing like they did in their youth, and the fathers, mothers, and children all holding hands together as they mirthfully paraded towards the festivities. It all lit the boy's heart. Inside, the boy quietly yearned for the same, but tossed the feeling aside since he knew it was only a pipe dream.
He then thought to himself that he should explore more of the area to find out where he was. Before he could get up though, something, no, someone grabbed his hand and pulled him into the crowd. The boy became confused as to who it could be that was leading him through the jubilant crowd, but did not let go of the hand that was placed in his. The hand within his was small, warm...and familiar.
By the time the boy was done being led, he found himself out of breath. He looked behind him and stared at the people at the bottom of the stone steps. He then proceeded to look at where he had ended up. The boy was now in front of a grassy field. Before he could ask his captor where he was, he was interrupted by one ominous boom after another. He looked up into the sky. There he found countless numbers of colors, all merging into each other as if to portray the many hues of the heart. It was beautiful, he thought to himself. One by one, he watched as the fireworks were lit and sent out to the sky to show the people of it's glory.
The boy felt a sense of nostalgia. He remembered seeing the same colorful damped sky when he was little. Tears had welled up in his eyes. As he turned to look upon the person who had led him to the spectacle, he fro-zed. He could not see her face clearly due to the bright luminescence of the fireworks, but there next to him stood a girl of the same height gazing upon the night sky. Tears rolled gently rolled down her cheeks as if to caress her. She then turned to look at the boy and at that exact moment time stopped. The boy could not stop his own tears as they bursted from within him. There on the girl's tear ridden face was a smile.
The wind became a warm breeze that seemed to hug all that it came across that night. The sounds of the fireworks and the crowd became null as the girl's lips moved. "Thank you". That was all she said as she smiled at the boy. As if the bliss of the universe developed within him, the boy broke down. He could not understand why he was crying, but the feeling was so overwhelming. Then the boy was enveloped in darkness again, only that it was not the same one that he was in before. This darkness was warm...and familiar. The boy then opened his eyes and found that his friends had woken him up since he was crying. He got up from the bed and proceeded outside. The boy then looked upon the night sky and quietly whispered, "I promised, didn't I?" as tears stained his sweater.
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