December nights have always had a special place in my heart. As soon as November kisses us goodbye, treading on the cotton soft snow, December whispers the softest hello in the ears of this world. I wonder that is why I can never forget the glimmer on her face, when I first saw her drunk on the subway train, on a cold December night.

As the train stopped with loud screeching and its doors opened with shrill whistles, I paved my way, pushing a mob of people who were rushing to their homes after a long, tiring day. I could see some young lads, hardly in their thirties, dialing numbers on their phones, not caring about the rain until it blurred out the screens of their devices. Grabbing a mug of hot chocolate from the nearby cafe, I sat on the small bench that could hardly bear my 65 kgs. Glugging a mouthful of cocoa, I quietly observed how trains came and went by, dropping people and taking them away at the same time.

This sight had always made me wonder that just like this subway station, we come across many people in our life. We meet new people, who make the bells in our heart chime, but at the same time, a lot of people leave the room without us even knowing. This is how life is and how it would be until Venus collides with our planet, causing a huge distortion in the cosmos, leading to its doom. Carried away by these twisted thoughts, I forgot why I was actually sitting there until a soft female voice announced: “The last train on the platform would arrive in 15 minutes.”

I shuddered my head and glanced at the emptied mug that showed traces of grease in the bottom. This took me back in the days when I used to go for Tarot cards reading in a local book shop. This old wench used to sit in one corner of the book shop, surrounded by lilac curtains to attract the maximum visitors. That woman used to serve honey ginseng tea to her visitors in shallow tea-cups. After the tea was finished by the guests, she used to peep inside the cups with her bulging eyes and tell them their future. She did so by giving several strokes to the traces of tea left inside. The crystal ball on her table used to shine the brightest reflecting pink, violet, and aqua hues. I stopped visiting her when she read a card to me that said, “You are destined to chase a shadow until you don’t find whose shadow it is.”

“The last train has arrived on the platform,” announced another lady with a rather stiff tone than the previous one. I stood up and wore my antique hat, which is considered as my heirloom, by my friends of course. Oh, wait! did I just say, friends? Nevermind! As I started walking towards the last train, my legs started to feel heavy. It was as if they aren’t able to bear the weight of my self-inflicted misery and helplessness anymore. I pulled my hat a little bit downwards, on my face, as she crossed me. Like a wind, in a split second, she walked away like a cyclone. A cyclone that just leaves behind a sight of destruction and pity. The whole world stopped where it was and at that moment, it was just me and all the memories that have been burning inside my chest for five years now. Inhaling sharply a familiar moringa scent, I turned back anxiously and started following her footsteps. Her footsteps on the snowy platform were well-formed and beautiful. Gently and carefully, I stepped right above her tiny, delicate shoeprints. The snow was crushing beneath my feet but I could feel the pain in my heart. Putting one hand on my chest, I managed to glance at her. All I could see was her beautiful hazel hair, fluttering in the air like the needles of a crisp fir tree. She walked on the road with such a grace that nobody could ever doubt that she was drunk even a single drop. 

Taking out a metal lighter from her pocket, she lit up a cigarette and started humming a very familiar tune. In the destitute pathways, her voice see seemed to be echoing till the seventh sky. It was a perfect twilight but the stars were sparkling in my eyes, instead of the sky above my head. The first tear rolled down my cheek much faster than I thought it would. She took a left turn in Wellington Street and my steps froze upon what I saw next. The lights from the streetcars lit up her face and I could see that same December glimmer on her face which made me nervous for the first time I saw her. Those messed up hair that tied my heart into numerous knots were still the same as they used to be. Though she was running her long fingers through her hair, I could feel the warmth of her scalp in mine.

She stopped by the same cafe where I was sitting just before she came and after looking here and there silently, she sat on the same bench that happily carried her 47 kgs unlike mine. Pulling her hand-knitted muffler down the chin, she started sipping on the hot-chocolate that she loved the most. As always, she called the barista for some smores and roasted chestnuts. She cracked them open but the curve around her lips didn’t rise even a bit as it used to be when I cracked those chestnuts open for her. Oh, how she clasped her hands and ate them while standing on her toes. She never did that again after the day I abandoned her; here, in the same cafe where it all started.

Rising up from the bench, she looked into the emptied mug, held it upside down and shook it violently. She returned the mug to the barista and started walking again, but this time, she walked slowly, with both her hands clenched on her chest. She was lost, lost into the same world where we both are wandering but are destined never to see each other. According to that Tarot card, I will have to chase a shadow until I recognize whose it is, but to my anxiety, I already know the answer. It is of the girl that I cherished the most in this world and still do, and will love her the most till death do us part.

She turned into a dark street that almost rendered me blind. Upon gaining some vision, I shouted my lungs out upon seeing a blurry figure: “Excuse me, Do I know you?” A soft, familiar voice chuckled back, “You never knew me, darling! And now you never will be.”

My foot slept over a big rock, making me fall over my face. I raised my head and could see her departing shadow. A shadow that I am going to chase for the rest of my life because maybe the old Tarot card reading wench was right, maybe I never tried to know who she was…