´´Reggie, are you coming with us to the park?``
´´Nah, you guys can go. I found this new writing trend and want to try it.``
´´Okay, I am curious, can I read it afterwards, of course only if you don’t mind.``
´´Maybe, it looks like it is super deep and private.``
´´Oh no problem, i think I know which trend you mean, is it this: I met my younger self today for coffee?``
´´Yes, saw it on TikTok, sounded interesting.``
´´ Alright, have fun.``
´´Thanks Panda, you too.``
After Pandora left him to himself, Regulus stares at his screen. He always need some time to think before actually beginning to write. He stares at the blank screen for a while, repeating what the trend is actually about. And. When inspiration Strucks him like a lightning bolt he begins the journey to himself:
I met my younger self for coffee today.
We were both 10 minutes earlier.
He came in a black, puffy dress.
I came in black jeans, a red hoodie I borrowed from James. Just something casual.
He ordered a black coffee without sugar. No piece of cake. He needed to look at his weight.
I ordered a black coffee with extra sugar and a big piece of the chocolate cake, covered in strawberry.
He looked nervous and I think that he wanted to go home as fast as possible.
I was nervous too, but I didn’t go.
At the beginning no one knew what to say.
He didn’t know how to start conversations.
I didn’t know it either.
Slowly we began to talk.
He told me about his struggles in school.
I told him that we left these behind and are happy studying at a great university.
I asked him how he felt.
He explained that there is nothing much to say about, he feels lifeless, bodiless.
I could not bear to hear it, I told him that this ended.
He didn’t want to talk about it anymore.
I asked him about his wish what to study.
He had to choose between law and medicine, because his parents didn’t allowed anything else.
I told him that I study literature.
He asked about our parents.
I told him that they were no longer a part of my live.
He didn’t dare to ask about our brother.
Therefore I asked about his friends.
He looked away and stayed quiet. He had none.
I told him that this would change too.
His eyes lit up, he didn’t believe me full, but I had ignited a little fire of hope.
We fell in silence.
He was drinking the coffee he didn’t liked.
I ate my cake and enjoyed my coffee.
Right before we both were finished my phone rang.
I told him I needed to take this call.
I came back visible annoyed.
He asked about it.
I told him that Sirius had a little mental breakdown about his date with Remus.
He was very confused.
I enlightened him about their relationship.
He asked me if I was taken.
I smiled and said yes, and even if he wanted to, he could not bring me to tell him anything.
He was confused and demanded that I should tell him everything.
But I couldn’t.
He was too young.
It would leave him in smashed pieces of glass, because he wouldn’t understand.
I wanted to, but I could not tell him that I did came out to our parents and Sirius.
I could not enlighten him about our transition.
I could not tell him that they had kicked me out and that Sirius had took me in.
He asked again, about everything.
I was staring at his half filled cup of coffee. The coffee we both knew he didn’t like.
There was so much that I wanted to say.
But how could I, how could I be this self centered.
I told him that I couldn’t ruin his life with this.
He told me that his life already had lost all its worth.
I knew that, but if he knew what would happen, I was afraid he would not survive it.
Because I barely survived, I was afraid he could not life with the knowledge of all the coming pain.
Instead of answering his questions I asked about his wishes in live.
He didn’t even let me finish the question.
He was angry, he didn’t even know why, he just was.
He said that he hated me, the school and every human being on this earth.
I told him that beside the bad, there will also come good.
He looked at me like I was an alien.
He didn’t understand why this mattered.
If bad comes in life, it doesn’t matter that it will bring good afterwards.
I was speechless.
Until now I thought: how much I have changed, but I did not really.
I still wished enough people very bad lives.
I still hated people.
I still hated school.
I still thought that the good is not worth living through the bad.
In this moment I realized,
I could change my style,
I could change the books I read,
I could change friends
I could change my relationship with my brother,
I could change my body
And I could change things like how I liked my coffee.
But I could not change crucial, very important things.
I could not change my trauma.
I could not change my past.
My plan,
to make a new life far, far away from the dark, looming presence of my parents,
didn’t really work out.
They had left more scars one could overcome and heal from in one single lifetime.
They actually had left enough scars for my next ten lives.
I hadn’t changed at all, not even in bits.
I was still always angry.
I was still depressed.
I was still struggling with social anxiety and socializing problems.
I was still a scared little kid, that couldn’t stand up for itself.
When I looked again, he was gone.
On the way home I waited for the tears, but just like how he couldn’t cry, I couldn’t either.
As I stood before my mirror, I had another realization.
I wasn’t still always angry.
I am still always angry.
I am still depressed.
I am still struggling with social anxiety and socializing problems.
I am still a scared little kid, that couldn’t stand up for itself.
I didn’t know that I was still feeling this way, because I was an expert in suppressing my feelings. I sat there, in my chair, in the room my friends helped me to create and couldn’t believe my own thoughts. I really believed until right now that I got better, that Sirius and James were not only names of persons I once knew but rather people that had helped me.
I had left them in the believe that what they did had helped.
They were too optimistic, too naive, they really believed that I got happier. I was too optimistic and too naive too. I had believed what they said about changing the own life. In reality I always knew.
I had always understood that my destiny laid in the cold shadows nobody wanted, all alone but never alone enough to be considered lonely.
To actually change something magnificent in your life you need to change yourself, because your life always adapts to yourself. So if you don’t change, your life will also stay the same old way.