#agatewords

I felt alive before I knew what it meant. I felt alive before I knew anything, while I was an infant lying in my mother's arms and waiting until I could start remembering how it felt. But who remembers their very first step, their very first word, their very first smile? No, who even remembers their first memory? Why would one ever need to run back so far within their own mind?

I was standing at the door, as if spawned in for the first time. I walked ahead of me, within the living room, a space that felt all too familiar. I saw no one, heard no one, thought of no one. But I could remember it. I was alive, and it felt like it. A warm hand touched me on the back. Yours.

Next to me my mother stood. You were there, smiling at her and me. Your jet black hair covered your forehead, your glasses frame matching it, reflecting the light of space that peeked through the blinds on a probably cloudy day. I felt at home with you. You felt just as familiar as her. Your laugh felt sweet, like a fireplace I'd never sat next to, a candle scented of amber or teak. I didn't want either one of you to leave, and yet you grabbed your leather purse at one point. You left the apartment then, and I awaited the return of the familiar brown-eyed woman as I stood there with my mom, legs aching more and more until I was picked up and put to sleep.

I don't ever remember seeing you again. I have no idea who you were, and yet you're the first thing I remember. I've asked about you before to no response, replayed your words until I forgot what they were, pictured your face to see a hyperphantasic silhouette with painted attributes that have gotten hazier every time I've looked at them. I'm afraid to become you, to be you, to be seen once and then left forever, fallen down to become nothing more than a stupid child's nameless memory. Is it not scary? If I'd begun remembering a moment later, I'd have never known you. I still don't. What was your life like? Your family, your feelings, anything about you I might be able to find out? It's as if your life was cut out of my mind, and my own mind forgot to go as far back in time as you do.