Bucket List

The wine bottle was jingling with the sound of laughter, smelled of nostalgia and tasted liquid gold. It danced in the bright eyes of friends, brought together in the worst of nights, uniting over spilled truth and the magic of years that had made them who they are. In the recesses of the mind, there was the sound of clinking plates being washed in a kitchen that held the traces of spices and the whisper of steady hands that had fed them. They looked at each other, all of them, consumed by veritaserum and the taste of love, of bonhomie, of brotherhood. And they grinned. 

The leaves in your lap were once bright green, they're now rust and gold. You keep looking at them, in a mix of disbelief, wonder and the knowledge of the inevitability of age. You trace the spine of the now crinkled paper and impulsively crush it in your palm, just to hear the satisfying chrrr. The deafening sound of a death knell, the final cry of what has been waiting to mingle with the soil, it, rose from.  You dust your palms off and shoot right up, the intense emotion telling you to flee, rising like a cry against sacrilege, in your bones. So you turn around and run. Blind, thoughtless, breathless. You run like your life depends on it. You run like there is no tomorrow. And you don't stop. Not until you collapse, on your knees, the beat of your heart reminding you to feel grateful, to be alive.  You run so far away from the remains of what was once pure life because you know you must wait. For the autumn breeze to turn to cold, to sweep away the shattered bits ...