The leaves rustle underneath my feet as I meander in the park. They are November’s leaves— brown, crunchy, and dead. The darkness seems to win in November, taking the daylight from the morning and evening hours bit by bit until there is so little light left. The fleetingness of time is tangible. My heart aches with longing for simpler, older days.

At this thought I feel a pang of anxiety, remembering my plans for this afternoon. My mother wrote to me last week, telling me that my cousin was in town and she was hoping that we would meet up. She even set up the time and place for our meeting.

I haven’t seen him in a long time. 

When we were kids, we spent so much time together. Laughter was easy and the fun never ended. Yet my family had to move when I was young, and after the move I saw less of him. At first, we wrote letters, but soon I made new friends and my responses grew fewer and further between. He came over to our house to visit for a few days once, but that was not fun. I felt like I barely knew him—it had been four years since I last saw him—so I just stuck with my neighborhood friends and tried my best to ignore him. I remember my mother being very disappointed in me: “Your cousin was so happy to come visit you, yet you seemed to barely notice him!”

That was the last time I saw him, over twenty years ago. 

I don’t know why my mother tried to arrange this meeting. “I think you’ll find that you two are still best friends,” she wrote. How is that even possible? We haven’t kept in touch. I’ve changed so much since we were friends, when we were kids. I’m not sure I’ll even recognize him. He probably won’t recognize me. 

But if he were to be my friend again…

I couldn’t shake this thought as I ate my tasteless lunch, which I finished quickly in order to make it in time for this meeting. I continued walking in the park, kicking around the dead leaves. Have I actually had a true friend since those childhood days of simple and blissful friendship? My other friends have come and gone—they lasted for different lengths, but always ended when I moved away. I eased the pain by saying, “We’ll keep in touch,” which worked the first few times I said it, but gradually lost its meaning until it became a simple platitude. As I reflect, I’m now not sure if I actually have a single real friend.

I wonder if my cousin is as nervous as I am for this meeting. Does he really want to see me? Perhaps he is just placating his tenacious aunt. Either way, I tell myself that it’ll surely be awkward for him—yet I can’t convince myself. For some reason, I think he actually wants to see me. 

Why else would my mother write, “You two are still best friends”? We haven’t seen each other for twenty years! Does she know something that I don’t? Did my cousin arrange for her to reach out to me?

My mind is fuzzy and my heart is now racing as I approach the coffee shop. I check my watch a few yards from the door; I’m a few minutes late—I have to go in. I take a deep breath and begin my first step toward the door, but someone clasps my shoulder with a gentle hand, strong from years of work. I turn around. Those eyes—my mother’s eyes, the very same since we were kids. His face—two decades have passed, yet it’s as if I just saw him yesterday. My heart melts likes wax as I hear his familiar voice call my name and say:

Do not be afraid, it is I!

✠

Image: John Frederick Kensett, Salt Meadow in October (public domain)