Stop trying to forget.

Dear God

Can one heal by forgetting? Can one heal without losing? I don't want the pain to disappear but i want to forget.

Yami found me in my bedroom, sitting on the bed with a cup of freshly brewed Elachai tea, the fragrance of the tea filled the room and blended with the vanilla candle scent I had lit. By my side I had the photo album we had created when we were in high-school, we had promised each other that every memorable moment of our life would be photographed and then put in the album so that when we grow old we would look back and be grateful for everything.

"You took out the album," Yami said as she smiled lightly and sat by my side, she brushed her hands over the cover of the album that spelt 'In case we forget to be grateful' . "It's crazy how this idea came into our mind after reading the Notebook novel," she said sighing deeply as she opened the album showing the first pictures which were of us as babies. "You cried so hard at the end of the book and said that you want something that will never fade away, memories you get to keep even if one day you are forced to forget," I said looking at her, she looked up at me and gave me a smile but her smile wavered and then fell as she looked at the album back.

"It was a pretty awesome idea, now we get to look back at these pictures and relive the moments," she said moving to the next picture which was of us as toddlers, we hadn't met but with the pictures side by side it felt like we were always together. We always joked around that maybe, just maybe we had met before when we were kids or crossed paths and God just knew we had to be in each other's lives so then he brought us back together and that's why we were inseparable.

That seemed true at that time, highly true.

I looked at the pictures Yami was looking at and it was the first picture we took together at the school valentines event, we were covered in red and gold glitter on our faces and had heart shaped candy that we absolutely hated because it tasted nothing like how it looked. "Remember when we bought these thinking they would be strawberry sweet but they tasted like that brown cough syrup," she said taking the picture out like she would see something she couldn't see with the picture in the sleeve, "You manipulated me into buying it but after we tasted it we manipulated each other to believe we could endure the taste and finish it, to be honest I threw mine the minute I got home," she added chuckling, " I knew you did because I did the same thing, actually I took mine crushed it with a stone and then flushed it," I said with a light smile on my face which Yami noticed but didn't say anything instead she browsed further until we reached our Prom/Matric dance pictures. We were each other's dates because somehow we both disliked all the boys in our school because somehow we knew of all their dirty scandals and ongoing scandals. We really did enjoy ourselves and we ended our night by having our own mini party just the two of us and we obviously got so drunk we blacked out, when we woke up the next day we were so grumpy and had a bad headache. "I never regretted having you as my prom date," I said putting my cup aside and taking the picture out of the sleeve, having the picture in my hand made the memory feel so alive. Somehow the smiles plastered on our faces seemed to come alive and I could see us giggling and struggling to find a suitable pose for the picture but the more I looked at the picture the more my heart beat fast, my hands were sweaty and the voices of our giggles became loud. "Are you okay?" Yami asked as she held my hands tightly and her warmth somehow stopped the loud giggles, "I am fine," I said putting the picture down.

The next picture we were looking at was the picture we took at Yami's business launch, that was the happiest day for both of us. " I remember before the launch you kept on calling me and sending me messages asking me if I was okay, you were more nervous than me and you kept on second guessing the whole thing because you didn't want to see me hurt," Yami said. I couldn't sleep the night before the launch, it was as if I was the one launching the business. I tried doing some work but that just worsened my nerves, I kept calling Yami to make sure she was still okay and if she wanted to postpone I would be there to help her postpone everything but she was excited after the launch I was able to relax, I was able to enjoy the event well and show Yami how proud and excited I was for her.

"Ohh we put this picture in here?" Yami asked as she held in her hand the picture I took of my first date with my first boyfriend. "You convinced me to do it, you said it was a big step and even if it didn't lead to somehow a good ending it was a memorable day."

"Too bad the date was for a douche," Yami said, her eyes rolling at the thought of my ex boyfriend, she never liked him but because she loved me she let me go on the date and when we first dated she only pretended to be happy for me because she didn't want to put me in a tight spot and make me sad but she also didn't try and hide her disdain for the whole thing. She was right he was such a douche we didn't last a week.

"You know you don't have to force yourself to forget these memories, we made this album so that we never forget, even if the memories had bitter parts there were sweet memories. That's what life is," she said as she held my hand, "Looking at these memories and remembering them isn't bad, you smiled today tomorrow you could be laughing," she added. She was right remembering all these memories wasn't bad, the memories reminded me of what I once had how grateful I was to have had all those experiences. But I wasn't sure anymore, I knew remembering these memories would force me to remember the other memories and accept that it had happened accept that I had lost.

"Remembering is like reliving, and reliving will only hurt me," I said, taking my cold tea and sipping on it to avoid her eyes on me, she knew I wasn't afraid of being hurt, it's not like I am immune to the hurt now, everyday I am constantly in pain.

She knew I was running away.

"They say time heals all wounds, that running away won't stop time from moving.Eventually someday you will have to face the memories,the harder you try to forget the harder the memories will hurt you. Do you think he would want you to be like this? To run away and hide?" He was the reason I was running away and hiding , he was the reason I was finding it hard to move on ,he was the reason I had to move on in the first place. How could he expect me not to do all these things when he forced me to do it anyways, this is the result of him leaving me.

"If you push away these memories you are pushing me away, if you forget them you are also forgetting me, do you want to act like you never knew me?Like we were not best friends?" She said, her eyes had tears in them and I knew at that moment what Forgetting meant. And at that moment I didn't want to forget yet.

"How do I heal?" I asked looking at her in the eyes showing her that I was being serious. That I really wanted to heal and that was the beginning of my worst nightmare.