The sky was cloaked in heavy clouds, and the air smelled of damp earth, as though the universe itself was on the verge of crying with me. Sofía and I had decided to take a walk in the park, but the atmosphere seemed to mirror the weight I still carried inside. It was one of those days when the past felt more present, as though the shadows of who I had been surrounded me, whispering doubts with every step.
"Sometimes I think I'll never stop feeling this," I said, breaking the silence.
She didn't respond immediately, her gaze fixed on the trees swaying gently in the wind. Her eyes followed the branches' movement, as though searching for an answer in their rhythm.
"You know," she finally said in a reflective tone, "there are things that don't disappear, but they change shape. It's not about forgetting, but about learning to live with them."
Her words reminded me of something Astrid used to say: "Time doesn't erase anything; it just puts it in perspective." The similarity made me smile, though with a touch of melancholy. Perhaps, in a way, Sofía and Astrid shared a way of seeing the world.
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The diary and a resurfaced memory
That afternoon, back home, the diary called to me from its place on the desk. I had been writing in it intermittently, but it had been days since I last opened it. This time, I didn't pick it up to write. I opened it, searching for something—anything—that might help me figure out the next step.
As I flipped through its pages, my eyes stopped on a phrase I had written months ago, almost like a whisper lost among the words:
"Return to the place where we promised forever."
I couldn't quite remember why I had written it at the time, but something about those words resonated deeply now. It was as though that place, that "forever," had been waiting for me, holding onto something I needed to find.
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The return to the lookout
The place those words referred to was a small lookout in the mountains. Astrid and I had gone there once, on a spontaneous getaway. We had christened it "our secret refuge," a corner of the world that seemed to exist just for us. Under a clear sky, we had promised "forever," not realizing how fragile those words could be.
The path to the lookout was long and winding, with cold air filling my lungs and the breeze brushing against my face. When I arrived, the landscape was exactly as I remembered: an endless horizon, where the sky seemed to embrace the earth. The mountains stretched into the distance, and the wind carried a soft echo, as though Astrid's laughter was still trapped among the rocks.
I sat on the ground, letting the crisp air clear my mind. I took out the diary and, with trembling hands, wrote:
"Today I returned to the place where we promised forever. Not to look for you, but to find myself."
Writing there, in that place so full of memories, was bittersweet. On the one hand, I felt Astrid's absence like a sharp pang in my chest. But on the other, I realized that her absence was no longer an open wound; it was a scar, a testament to what I had survived.
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Reuniting with Clara
Back in the city, Clara appeared in my life again, this time unexpectedly. She found me in a café while I was reviewing comments on my writing forum.
"You're still writing, huh?" she said with a smile that seemed to hold a hint of pride.
I nodded, a little surprised to see her, but glad. Clara had always had a quiet way of reappearing exactly when I needed her, as though her intuition could sense when I was ready to open up a little more.
We spent hours talking—not just about ourselves, but about everything we had experienced since the last time we met. We talked about books, about trips we both wanted to take, about our small victories and the challenges we still faced. It was strange, but also comforting. Clara wasn't a specter of the past; she was a reflection of the present, of my ability to move forward.
When we said goodbye, her final words lingered in my mind.
"The past never truly leaves, but that doesn't mean we can't walk toward the future."
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The dream with Astrid
That night, I dreamed of Astrid for the first time in a long while. It wasn't a sad dream, nor was it full of regret. We were walking together down a path lit by soft sunlight, but this time, our hands didn't touch. She was a step ahead, turning every so often to look at me with a smile that radiated calm.
The wind blew gently, carrying her voice with it—a whisper that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.
"Keep going. It's okay to leave me behind."
I woke up with tears in my eyes, but also with a peace I hadn't felt in years. It was as if I had finally received the permission I had been waiting for all along, though I knew that permission could only have come from within me.