Kadeleidoskope

What is vision if not colours and shapes? What are memories of not remembering those colours and shapes, along with all the feelings they bring with them? Every person connects a colour with an emotion, event, person or thing – every person has different colour preferences and everyone will think of different events when given a colour and asked to think of a memory. Some might associate orange with peacefulness, others only feel distress when seeing this colour.

She tiled her head to the side, trying to look at him through the colours all around. “It’s not stopping, it’s just changing all the time.” “It’s not supposed to.” His voice was mocking, as if she had just said the stupidest thing a human being could be capable of. “I know. But it’s weird.” She looked at where she thought he would be. The spots of light all around made it impossible to see anything for sure, but that black splat of colour reminded her of his jacket. She kept her face turned in his direction and imagined him sitting there; one arm on the table, body leaning to the side to face her, the other arm sloped over the chair he was sitting on. She could tell he was looking at her. Amused? Affectionate? Mocking? She didn’t know. The colours changed abruptly, her vision now embedded in golds and whites. It reminded her of the clouds in the sky above the sea, illuminated by a searing sun. She had stood atop the cliffs, facing the sea, the clouds, the rampaging wind. She had leaned in to the wind, it holding her bodyweight up with ease. The birds around cowered close to the ground, their feathers ruffled by the salty air. She had spread out her arms, staring into the clouds. A few birds took off by letting themselves fall off the cliff, falling out of view until they soared up again. She had stood, and she had felt. In her chest, in her arms, her legs, her bones was the overbearing urge to jump – not to fall, not to crash, not to die but to fly. To fly up through those clouds, soaring higher and higher, feeling the wind even stronger than now, feeling the tears streaming out of her eyes, feeling the adrenaline in her heart, feeling the scream in her throat. She wanted to fly like those birds but so much more. They had been flying their whole life, they did not know what it was like to long for this feeling so much that even if just a single stranger told her that she might actually fly, she would have jumped. They did not know what it was like to want something so impossible so badly that one would step out into their death for it. They did not know. And so didn’t she, she thought. For she would not jump, would she? She would not give up her life, all those carefully crafted and preserved moments for nothing, would she? For it was nothing that would await her if the jumped, for she could not fly and never would. She wouldn’t, would she? Would she not? The colours changed again. Grey tones, purple. To her it looked like her home. The walls in her living room were of those colours. She lowered her head, away from the golden clouds and soaring birds. There was a crash. There were voices. Lastly, there were people. Three people. One, a woman, was crying. Crying and screaming. The second one, a girl, was screaming as well, and she would cry later. The third one, a man, was calm. Calm, but distressed. He always tried to keep the peace – without success. He was sat on the couch while the other two stood, screaming and crying, crying and screaming. She was stood in the doorway. Her eyes were set on the scene before her, but her emotions were quiet. They always had been. There was no space for crying if two others were already. There had never been. The screaming continued, the crying continued. The woman was throwing things at the ground, the child cried harder. The man stood up. She knew he wouldn’t do anything; he would leave. And he did. He took the child with him and she knew he would have taken her with him too. They left. The woman cried. The woman screamed. The woman threw a vase. They would come back once she had calmed down. They would come back once the dangerous creature was hidden away again. They would come back and it would be quiet in the house, quiet for the next day. They would be back and everything would go back to normal, without anyone mentioning that they had to leave. That they had to leave the woman because they didn’t know what to do with her. That she screamed and cried because she didn’t know what to do with them. They wanted to work, they really did – but no one really ever tried. It was the easiest to act normal when everything was normal and then leave when it was not. It was best to not anger the woman, best to keep your voice down, best to not tell you deeds. Best to leave when she started screaming, best to not care who else it would hit. Best to stay in your room all day, best to not talk, best to pretend to not exist. Best to pretend that they worked even when they didn’t. Pretend to care. Once again, the colours rotated, spinning. Blue, red, green – a panel on a wall in a white- cream room. A man in a chair behind a desk, grey hair, half-hidden by a PC. She was sitting in a chair across the room, smiling. The man leaning back in his chair, folding his hands. Telling her she could come back whenever she needed to. Her nodding. Him opening the door. Him wishing her good luck for her life. Her leaving. Her thinking about what she learned from him. Her going home. Her going to school. Her going on. Her doubting ever having needed him. Her doubting ever having not needed someone like him. Her questioning herself – why not saying more, why not saying the truth? Why lying to him? Why lying so much? Why not feeling bad? Why not feeling? Why feeling so much? Normal? Not normal? Help? No. Colours were twisting again, rapidly spinning, and she felt like she was getting drunk on all those changing forms and shapes. Being drunk – they had been sitting on the stairs next to the church, hidden behind one of it’s stone wings. The day had been warm, and so she was only wearing a light hoodie, the other two dressed equally summerly. They had been on a class day trip, visiting an old women’s prison that held prisoners during the time of the DDR. The three had planned this day long ago, always wanting to go out drinking together. They had bought decently few bottles and only wine and beer – the older sister of one, who had bought it for them, had insisted on them trying a certain kind of beer that they now were passing around. While they all agreed that this was really not a beer you’d drink for it’s taste, the bottle continued wandering, at some point joint by a bottle of wine. She remembered the stone wall next to her, made out of black bricks. Her head had been resting on it for long, long minutes as they were laughing and chatting away. The dark of the early evening had started to settle in, the twilight making it hard for her tipsy self to clearly distinguish the trees in the distance. It was peaceful, a peacefulness filled with laughter and jokes, with comforting hugs and warm words. In this moment, she felt like she belonged – like this was how her whole life could go. Like nothing could pull her out of her warm, drunken, dizzy state. And, indeed, she was not pulled out of it, but instead hit in the face. The group of kids was just passing by, shouting something at the three drunk teenagers. In fact, they weren’t all kids – if she had to guess, she would say they were all kinds of ages, some even older than she was. There were about seven or eight of them. They were saying something about joining them, commenting on her and her friend’s appearance. Her friend flipped them off leisurely. In the next few minutes, she felt as if the true effect of the alcohol only now sprang into existence – everything happened within the blink of an eye, too fast, too loud, too chaotic. They came over, four of them, standing face to face with the boy in their little trio. She would not remember who threw the first punch, but her friend was shoved head-first into the black-bricked wall of the church before standing back up, and then the brawl started. It was her two friends against one of the other group’s – she was trying her best to hold the other’s back, pleading them to keep calm and stop their bullshit. Her friend was trying her best to protect her boyfriend, shielding his body against the blows. Time was racing and slowing down, nearly coming to a stop, some moments frozen inside her brain forever, as finally footsteps fell nearby. They left as fast as they came, rushing along the path that was winding through the small park, vanishing in the dim light. The man who had come went after them, making sure that they were gone. He then left to get water. She was confused – why would they need water? Her mind was slow, stooped in honey, the dizziness never leaving her thoughts. But once she walked unsurely over to her friends, checking on them, she realized. They were crouching on the ground, holding each other’s hands as if their life depended on it. They were coughing. She knelt down next to them, only now realising the urgency of the situation. Her friend was crying, his eyes swollen shut, his voice barely audible. His words were panicked. “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, it hurts, make it stop, it hurts, I can’t breathe.” Pepper spray. It was all over his face, his hands, it was in his eyes, his mouth, his nose, his throat. Her other friend was doing better, but she could not see – her eyes were red and teary. Now she also started coughing, her eyes burning. She dragged the other two out of the small space in which the fight had happened and called an ambulance. They asked her questions and she tried to keep calm, to slow her voice. She had to leave the other two to look for a street sign, and when she came back, her friend was gasping for air. They told her they’d come, that they should wait, that help would be there soon. She hung up. She talked to her friend, comforted him, rinsed his eyes and mouth with what little water they had with them. The man appeared, bringing a large bottle of water with him. He left again, looking for another one. Her friend was crying. Her other friend was crying. She could only watch, could only try to talk, could only reassure them that everything would be fine. She got up and hid the alcohol bottles. She came back and collected their things. She waited for the paramedics. They arrived and brought huge first aid bags with them, doing their best to rinse her friend’s faces, to get the pepper spray off. Then, the ambulance arrived. She had answered questions, had called her mom, her friend’s parents and was now waiting in front of the ambulance. She wasn’t standing steady, she could feel the earth tilting from side to side beneath her feet. The alcohol had not yet worn off. She went home as her friends were driven to the hospital. One would be able to go home that very night, but the other one stayed in the doctor’s care until the next evening. The next time they were in school, their faces would be covered in bruises while hers was uninjured. They never went drinking together again, and her friends both distanced themselves from doing it again. Four days later, she sat in a park alone and drank until she didn’t have to think anymore, hoping for that comfortable feeling of being drunk, cozy and warm to come back. It didn’t. Spinning colours, turning and turning and turning. A new setting, a new picture, a face, a feeling. She was safe. She knew it the moment she looked into those eyes, the moment she saw that hair, those familiar features. She had never known what it was about this person that made her feel like she belonged so much, without doubt, without hesitation. When she had first met her, she could never have guessed how close they would be. How much they would laugh, how often they would talk, how big their love could grow. It had not been long since the day that they met, but, somehow, slowly, everything had fallen into place perfectly. The face in the colours was grinning, trying to hold in a laughter. Walls with wood panels on it flashed by, a bathrobe, a book written in pencil. She found herself looking at that laughing face and stopping for a moment. Once again she realized how much beauty this face, this person, was carrying. Once again she realized how much love was swirling in her gut, mixed with laughter, memories and future plans. Rarely had she felt as comfortable and secure with any other person, as if she didn’t have to try to be someone else, as if that person would accept and hug her nevertheless. Looking at this so new but so familiar face brought a smile to her own, along with the knowledge that this safety would stay for long, long years. The colours shifted again, moving in circles, triangles, up and down, left and right..

She lowered the kaleidoscope and blinked a few times. He was not looking at her. Instead, he was reading a book, his shoulders slightly slumping forward. She could see he was wearing headphones, engulfed in whatever story he was reading. A fondness cradled her heart, an unexplainable feeling that was creeping up through her chest and throat until she strangely felt like she couldn’t breathe anymore. He looked so peaceful, so utterly loveable. She wasn’t in love with him, not really – there were no butterflies, no want to kiss him, no tension. She was not in love with him, but she did love him. When she looked at him in moments like this, when he wasn’t noticing, she longed to freeze the moment, to capture this feeling of being at home. She loved hugging him, spending time with him, talking, bickering. When they were together, no matter what else happened, she felt so magnificently warm and cozy. To her, he was orange and black and beige – the colours of autumn, falling leaves, his hair. To her, his darker tones, the little that she knew, were just as beautiful as his warm colours. He had never talked about how he felt, rarely spoke about his life, his worries. Yet, somehow, she felt like she knew him, like everything he said was just another long forgotten memory, like he himself had always been known to her and she just needed to recall the memories of a person she had never met before. And still she was surprised about every little thing, watching layer of layer of him unfolding before her eyes. So familiar yet so unknown, so safe yet so new, so reliable yet so ever- changing. She looked down at the kaleidoscope in her hands and wished, for a moment, to be able to know what the colours inside meant to him.