"What." I spoke, not a question, but a plain, confused, "What."
"Yeah. We thought you had stopped your medication."
"Patton, he's real!" I yelled out,
"You may have had a visitor called Patton, but not these two days."

The plain room turned into a brilliant crimson, like flames had overcame the hospital.

Then everything came back to me.

Patton, my closest friend.

I froze as all the memories rushed at me.

A Month And A Week Ago

"PATTON!" I screamed, seeing him in the hospital.

"Crash."

"I'm sorry sir."

"Patton Sanders was pronounced dead on arrival."

Current

"... He died." I said.

That's why I was seeing what he was seeing. That's why I thought he was crying. That's why I could still smell the perfume when I crashed it against the ground. That's why I was still there. He was gone and there was nothing I could do.

I closed my eyes, allowing the burning tears down.

I was left alone in a room.

Death wasn't kind, I knew that. It snatched where it could, taking people who were far too young, far too good. It didn't pretend to care, it didn't pretend to take care of the ones who suffered the most. Now I could sit staring for hours. My face sunken and haunted, my mind cold and empty, leaving only my memories of him.

They say you die twice, the first when they bury you in the grave and the last time that somebody mentions your name.

Everyone knew this quote, and yet it felt a lot more real, now that somebody close to me had died, and I now found out.

I guess I had given him the chance to be with me.

I did the thing I had sworn to do a few months ago.

I don't remember how, I only remember where I opened my eyes.

An apple tree.

Sweet, summer air.

I see him.

I run.

And the pain passes, but the beauty remains.

"Couldn't you miss me at all?"

kairosclerosis

n. the moment you realize that you're currently happy—consciously trying to savor the feeling—which prompts your intellect to identify it, pick it apart and put it in context, where it will slowly dissolve until it's little more than an aftertaste.