The Lasting

A hush descends over the stone lined pathways as the few who remain observe a penance-like silence out of respect for those who have left. Either that or they have had their energy sapped by the many adieus bid to lonesome strangers who were converted by the alchemy of friendship into loyal comrades and brothers in arms.

He left the same way he came in, with his parents and a sense of wonder, fear, excitement, and sadness all stirred nicely in his glass heart to from a concoction that he had tasted for the third time in his life now, and found all too bittersweet, for the third time in his life.

Rooms and places that were just numbers and names take on the avatar of homes for selves and friends and places to congregate late into the night and share tea and memories. The alchemist’s work stretches beyond human bonds and seeps into concrete, wood, stone, and glass.

That last day, he hadn’t slept. He had to see off a friend early in the morning (and had the luck to see off one more as well) and, when he went back to his room and lay in his bed, his heart wrenched in a funny way as he realised that he was leaving behind everything that he couldn’t.

Alchemy is not a science, it is not a myth, it does really work. Only it does not rely on any physical ingredients (though catalysts are known to exist), it does not have any ten-step process to convert the worthless into the priceless, it does not work for each and every thing and for each and every one. The miracle in alchemy is not the lead into gold bit, but the ability to convert a drab thought and a silly passing moment into a cherished memory. Call it retrospective falsification, but somehow, whenever we look in hindsight at the different eras of our lives, they never seem to be as bad as we thought. The living of life has a way of making the important a memory. The living of life itself is that alchemy. And we are but its apprentices.

Just before the car took the last turn at the gate – out into the crazy and crowded street that was so antithetical to the oasis of calm behind the ten foot tall stone walls – he looked back and smiled at the path he had tread with trepidation not long ago. He would return. Some day. After age had lessened his zeal and his works were replaced by those younger, better, stronger, faster, harder than he was. He would press on into the red setting sun, his brown leaves quivering in its warm embrace.

author's note: ending has been "inspired" :)