Feathers in the wind

So we went our separate ways and lived our lives the way we lived our lives, and here I am, twenty plus years on, still thinking of him, still dreaming. And it all comes back to haunt me even more when I find that a friend we both knew is now living close to me. A link. A link in that chain which goes back to a time I sometimes wish I could forget. A link, a coincidence, a chance?

If it was the house on the hill by the park, I'd have been about seven, or maybe eight. The memory is from Christmastime and dark. Dark in my room, and dark on the outer edges of my vision, but in front of me, spotlit by streetlamp, a triangle of snow floating down forcefully towards the tarmac on the other side of the window. The snow lying thickly on top of the hedge is black to the sides, but glowing amber under tungsten in front of me. Very early morning? Or the dead of night? Not sure. I sense that it was night and that perhaps I should not have been awake; stealing a moment in time for myself. Perhaps that's why something so uneventful has remained with me for so long. It wasn't Christmas Eve, though there is a tangible sense of excitement in the air. Perhaps it was the first day of the school holiday, perhaps we were due to visit my aunt in the morning, perhaps the snow was excitement enough.

Snow again. Edinburgh this time. At first there is only the bitter snark of wind stinging my ears and that painful numbness in the toes as unsuitably suede ankle boots do battle with leftover sludge that is refreezing with every step. The snow, when it comes, is not soft and pretty but grey, and hits at my cheeks with mean little stabs. And then we were inside a flat with a five bar electric heater impotently glowing in the icy air. I'm struggling to remember who was there; four or five of us anyway. Coffee was made - hot and too strong if truth be known but I remember we all clamoured to say how much we liked it that way because it seemed the coolest thing to do. For three years I drank coffee I hated just because it seemed the coolest thing to do until eventually I forgot that I preferred a weaker blend and could no longer stomach it unless it was thick, black and tarry and preferably accompanied by too many Marlboroughs; another taste acquired against the odds.

More lights, only this time from a car. Motorway lamps seem to hover in the air above us, the skein of roads unravelling as we forge our way through the darkness and count the spots of light on our way. Lights on the other side of the water dazzle with reflections so spectacular that you forget they hide an industrial scar on the landscape. Shop windows glowing in wet pavement puddles, advertising warmth and wonder within, cities making pretty in the dark, almost begging you to go and have fun. Reno rising. Christmas trees, large, small, real, fake, all twinkling in the half light, offering promises, promising offerings, tantalising glimpses of the fairy life.