Friends And Family

My dad was in the optimistic mode today. I could tell by the sound of vacuum cleaner as I entered my apartment. It was on third floor of some complex whose name I always seem to forget. It's just a simple double room apartment, just fit for us to live in. Who could have imagined that the previous multi billionaire was living his life here with his son.

There was an upbeat music playing in the background, and when I entered I watched helplessly at how everything was a mess inside. My dad was humming a cheery tune to himself, he was holding the vacuum cleaner in one hand and trying push away the sofa with another. I guess he was trying to clean the space below the sofa which gathers a lot of dust.

He looked absolutely normal, with rolled up sleeves, his black hair tied up. He looked energetic and quite like a homely single father who just happened to decide to clean the house up for a change. The sun was shining upon him like a halo, which seemed to be mocking me for what could have been mine but isn't.

But observe closely and you will find that everything was an illusion. There were dark circles under his eyes, the clothes he was wearing was dirty and was unwashed for weeks, and most absurd and glaring sign would be the inside out sweater he was wearing. He looked like a lunatic.

Maybe he is.

"Oh! You are back? Come quickly, help me push this away. What are you still doing out there? Come in, come in... We have so much cleaning to do! God! Look how dirty this place has gotten... " I listened on as he started rambling about how long its been since we last had properly cleaned this place up.

The floor was wet and had muddy footprints on them, presumably from the water he used to clean up those windows. He had opened up shelves to clean them up apparently but just ended up discarding the stuff inside. My dad dropped what he was doing, noticing my inattentiveness and explained himself.

"Look at all these random junk I found. You are not a kid anymore, so you don't need these toys. And look at those shoes, clearly they are too old for you. And do we even need those broken clocks?...", I agree that he made an excellent point but that doesn't excuse him from spreading these junks all across the room. "... We should stop treating these shelves as place to store unwanted things, we can better use this space for.." he continued his tirade.

I made my way through the 'random junk' he has thrown around in the name of hygiene. I looked at the toys I used to play when I was a small kid but now discarded as if it had no worth. It probably didn't . I brought these stuff here because I felt too reluctant to part with those memories. What are memories worth? Didn't even spare them a glance until now.

Life is like that. You treat something as very dear to you but in reality, its just that - junk.

I helped him as he cleaned things up, who knew how long it would take him. We looked quite harmonious as we discarded the things too old for use, cleaned all the shelves and wiped the floor. We looked quite like a harmonious family in the process, where he asked my progress in school and if there's someone causing me trouble.

I accompanied him, answering his questions when asked, but most of the time, I just silently watched him as I knew this wouldn't last long, and I might as well just humour him. By the time we finished cleaning up, it was already 8 and nearly time for dinner.

"... Look son, everything is so sparkly clean now, a healthy environment begets healthy life. Always remember that an-" he freezed suddenly ,as he looked at the family photo on the shelf. It was old photo, but it was significant as it was on my thirteenth birthday and my parents specifically made time from their busy schedule to celebrate with me.

The picture captured the scene where my mom was smiling at me and I looked annoyed for some reason. Its the best picture we have of her.

"Son, I am tired, I am gonna sleep for a while." Without looking at me, he mumbled as he shuffled onto his bed carrying the picture with him. He dazedly looked the picture as he mumbled to himself. Now this is how he usually behaves.

Silent, dazed and in his own world.

I heard children with tragic childhood mature faster. And it's true in a way, as I had to mature faster because I had to deal with him. I learnt that there is no use complaining about anything because it doesn't solve jackshit. You have to do everything yourself if you want something to happen.

I ordered some takeout food to eat in my room. I usually stay in here. With internet access, I go through scientific articles or magazines. When I get bored with that, I hang out with my friends. I may not be friendly with my school mates, but I do keep in touch with my friends from my previous school.

Most of my old friends have lost contact with me as three years is a lot of time and I guess those rich kids don't have anything in common with me. But when I was around 10, me and my best bud Alex discovered online gaming. Our young selves were totally crazy about it and decided to create a club for gaming. We came up with this silly name called Turbo club and many of classmates joined it at the time.

And now we have a whole complex dedicated to it (Rich kids can be overbearing sometimes and Alex's parent dote on him a lot). Most of the members decided to leave as we got older as it didn't seem as cool anymore. But now it's not just about gaming, Turbo club is where I hang out with my old friends occasionally.

Now, the whole complex is every preteens wet dream. It has everything - Billiards tables, swimming pool, gaming consoles, separate canteen... We even have a gym in there but I haven't seen anyone using it before.

So once in a while, I join them to blow off some steam and to just escape from home when it gets depressing.

I felt my phone vibrate. Oooh... A text from Alex. He wanted me to meet up with him. As today was not a weekend I was honestly surprised when he invited me but I figured why not? Better than staying in this depressing place.

I took a shower and changed into fresh clothes as I was sweaty from the cleanup earlier. As I hailed a cab I wondered what could have made him look for me. These days although we try to catch up, I could feel the distance between us growing. I guess we don't have anything in common now except for the club and we are starting to feel that too old for that anyway.

I guess we are just reluctant to part away from an old friend who used to be so close to us. But as we have grown older, we are planning for different futures. He has to learn to deal with family business and assume responsibilities. I want to become a scientist in the future and discover the mysteries of the universe. So we are drifting apart.

...

...

I got out of the cab after reaching the destination, and looked at the complex that contained my childhood. I sprinted towards the complex after finding Alex waving at me at the entrance.

He looked absolutely like a golden child blessed by the heavens. With his blond hair and blue eyes, he looked like an aristocrat, giving off ethereal vibe. He looked far off from the smiling friendly youth I met as a child.

People are more innocent and simple as children. The first day of school we happen to sit together. Understandably, we were nervous at being in a different environment. Especially since we were restricted of our freedom, forced to be seated and listen to someone speak.

In this kind of situation, I vaguely remember some kid screaming for his mommy and falling off his seat for some reason. This made both of us laugh and released the tense atmosphere between us. Since then, for first few days of the school, we chatted with each other and... been together ever since.

Alex has had a impact in my life since young, as he was always the leader. He established the Turbo club, he was the one who always deals with troubles and he was popular. To put it bluntly, I was the sidekick. And I didn't mind. I don't have grand aspiration, so I felt it was alright to follow him.

But what I didn't know was how much of a change he will bring later to my life.

After all, he was the one who introduced me to magic.