He's always known the girl next door, maybe their moms were classmates in high school, or maybe he's written poems under the covers about her best friend for a year and a half. But he's never quite taken a second look at this girl because even though she was always there, she's always just, well, there. Now everybody likes a pretty girl, but this boy had his head way up in the clouds. He was drawn to the intelligence, strength, and resilience of the working lady, and in his mighty quest in courtship of such a specimen, he found himself galloping his horses some fine years ahead into the horizon. He cast his mind to a will of iron, and with it, he trudged forth into a land forbidden by worried mothers and fathers afraid of the lost. He took his tongue like the strings of a dusty violin, and tuned it so that each note rang out a like silken thread between an angel's lips. Tedious work never broke him, and a copious amount of sweat, blood, and tears poured into hours each day chiselled his body into a brazen statue carved by the worker of god himself. But this iron plated man and his powerful golden stallion never got the hand, nor did the heavy timber doors to the castle ever allow them to proceed, and eventually, they left, empty handed, a boy and his mere country horse exiled from the land of unrequited love and unforgiving chances.
How apt it was that it drizzled sheets of grey on the streets below his house that day when he felt his world crumble beneath his tired feet. The cool pane of glass he rested his forehead on gave a little breath of exasperation, not unlike his as he counted scores with the raindrops racing their way down his window. How strange is, his thoughts whispered, as he watched his neighbour peel her window open and, a little clumsily, made her way up on the window sill. She was small girl, about a head shorter than he was, and he wasn't very tall to begin with. She's climbing up to the roof, he thought. She had beaten feet, a dancer, maybe, but her precarious stature scampering up to her roof made him think twice about his judgements. Silly girl, his breath fogged up a circle on the window, who would climb up to the roof on a rainy day? I would, his mind confessed. A while later, another figure appeared next to her on the rooftop, a male from the appearance of it, and she shifted her posture slightly. Boyfriend, maybe. He didn't know why, but the gnarl of annoyance lulled at the pit of his stomach. Great, now another one enjoys sitting in the rain too.
Some people find comfort in solitude to get over a heartbreak, while others drowned themselves in alcohol to escape the sadness and for the boy, the window became his shot of morphine that made each day a little more bearable than the last. He watched as his neighbour spilled her mind with watercolour lines onto mounted canvasses that seemed almost larger than herself and scowled a little at all the forgotten art lessons he left behind in elementary school. He listened and cringed a little as she struck the chords on her guitar a little too loudly, and allowed himself to smile for the first time as he belted out words on his own guitar to songs he made sure he could play better than she did. And he felt, that night as the girl next door scrambled up to the roof once more, a dire urge he's never felt before. For the first time in his life, he pushed open the windows and took a deep breath. It was like a soft flutter of icy butterfly wings inside his lungs as his eyes adjusted to the deep blue hues of the night and shadows. Clumsily but hastily, he made his way up to his roof, feet a scramble of cluttered steps as he finally reached the top. How apt it was in that moment, that he looked up at the glowing heavenly body above him, when he heard her gasp "the moon!".
And how lovely it was, joining the punctures in the sky's canvas, not a boy and a girl from next door, but children of a universe too complicated for them to understand, two souls in pursuit of simple happiness.
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