It had been nine years since they last spoke.

And the way that they left their tie was abrupt - severed and left raw. There was no heart-wrenching goodbye, or a regrettable exchange of words. There was nothing - complete silence. And that, somehow, was worse.

She had barely thought of him in those many years passed. Now and then, she’d play a song they used to sing together in the car. Or a memory from their years in school would surface, but he would merely be in the background; slightly blurred yet still recognisable.

However, this time it felt different. She had dreamt of him, and the yearning for a life she barely recognised appeared like an unwanted visitor to disrupt her current one. She began to dwell in her dreams - within scenes from a film she once loved, and he was the protagonist.

Without realising what she was doing, she reached out. Almost as if the ghost of her past life had possessed her. A past life that had resided inside of her since the last time they spoke.

He reciprocated her attempt at conversation with external thoughts and empty sentences. Until he confessed that he was reading a book that reminded him of her - ‘normal people’.

*****

Once, they were like normal people. He was admired and sure of himself – at least on the outside. While she stood on the outside, hidden and barely acknowledged. Somehow, they discovered the parallels that tied them together, and the world outside dissolved into insignificance. They became lost inside their shared reverie.

She found comfort in him, a comfort seldom found. She could reveal to him the suffering sitting beneath the surface of her skin, and he responded with empathy. It was a suffering that was familiar to him. And when he eventually exposed those scars, she knew that it connected them just as deeply and permanently.

For a while, it was all that mattered. Until they could no longer bury themselves in their shared daydream. Without explanation, he decided things could not continue the way they were, and she could not understand. Reality seeped in and left them bruised and bloody in the grave they dug together.

All that was left were lightning glances from across rooms, and fragments of moments piercing tender hearts.

Now, nine years later, here they were. As if nothing happened between them. Normal people having a normal conversation - lacking substance, fizzling out and evaporating into thin air.

He unexpectedly asked her to see his band play one Saturday night – a few days before she was leaving to move interstate. She agreed. If this reunion became too much, she would be gone soon, and her life there would be finally laid to rest.

*****

The pub was dimly lit and unfamiliar. She had never ventured inside before; she had never found herself in this situation. As the room began to fill with people, she glanced at every stranger that walked through the door to ensure she hadn’t missed him.

Eventually, their eyes found each other, and they embraced. The embrace was familiar, a place that once was safe. But now, it felt like a distant memory that she was merely remembering, not a moment that was currently happening. 

When the band began to play, she became lost in a sea of faces she had never seen before. She didn’t belong; she wasn’t like these people. Again, she stood on the outside, amongst the crowd of unknown faces calling a name she didn’t recognise.

She was in a place where she was the only one who knew his name - the only one who knew of his pain. And it was painfully clear that their worlds were no longer intertwined.

When the show was over, she congratulated him, and they embraced one last time. An overwhelming sense of their past lives and their new reality clashed inside of her until she could no longer endure it. Their parallels skewed.

This time it was her who left with no explanation.

She wondered if his comment about normal people had meant he sometimes thought of her too. Like an old friend that would always be in reach; a place that still felt like home. Did it mean that he feels the same aching in his chest? Did it mean that he feels the vague vulnerability of absent closure?

Nine years too late to plead for an answer. She would have to continue living as if their past life didn’t play like a film inside her – those fragmented moments leaving puncture wounds that fester.

All she could do was continue acting like a normal person.