[redzaru]

So many moons ago, I met a gentleman.

The down-on-his-luck kind,

slogging through the everyday monotony of simple and non-magical life.

He asked to buy some soothing reed. Maybe he heard that my family were, once upon a time, renowned alchemists.
Against my best judgement - or perhaps, terrible Samaritan that I've always been - I obliged; I told him it was free.
He offered a hundred crowns though I said it was fine.
"Us smokers are a dying breed," I assured him, looking out for another of my kind.


Normally, I do not carry coin. In my waning years, many have been all too happy to fetch things for me.
I had nothing to buy for myself, and my weightless pockets felt much better.
But the man insisted, perhaps doing something of the same in looking out for me, and I went on with a small pouch of gold in my pocket.
I hurried along to the garden of my father's old home.


The old, vine-trammeled work of wood and stone configured into a museum of memories.
Though doubt hung heavy over my head, and the silent fear that its current owner did not even remember his face pricked its fangs into my skin; I did not stop to ponder.
I brushed aside the choking noises I'd remember - my first dad suffering one of his weekly struggles, and all the chaos that seemed so willing to be wrought - and began to work.
I had an entire day - a whole life to live, even a century old - and night owl that I was, I began to whittle away the sunny hours.


When the afternoon was pronounced dead and three cups of finished tea stood against my mountain hundreds of undone poems, I carried on.
I'd pitch my head over my shoulder every quarter-ish of a minute, hoping to see her silhouette against the evening bloom and her sweeping curtain of dry-blonde hair.
She'd walk up the stone steps. I'd say, "eventide," like I always did, and we'd press our heads against one another for warmth.
In that waning daylight, however, she took me towards the street.


Our shoes clattered against stonework, providing a clinical affront to anything rhythmic, and we danced our way towards another of a dying breed.
Down the way, just past the apartments, a man was stretching his soul across the strings of a violin.
There was majesty and magnificence in his notes that took me back to a field swallowed by summer flowers.
I took her hand in mine, pressed my lips to hers, and we took to the cobbled stones with glee.


And when he finished, and our old joints ached like Hel, my wife and I turned to thank him.
The artist simply returned a nod, his ears likely deafened from the commotion and his mind rattled by exhaustion.
One foot tapped the stone. A propped-open case lay and a sign that read, "tips appreciated."
Now, normally, I do not carry coin; and in my waning years, so many have striven to help me.

On this night, however, I had nothing else to buy for myself,

and an unfamiliar weight in my pocket.

more like bye-zara amirite