Your Strength
I know that I'm older than you. Regardless, I look up to you in some ways. You have this power to do the things you want to do. You never let the strain show on your face. You always go forward with a certain confidence that not many people can muster. Even at your lowest, even when you don't feel powerful and you just want to give up, you don't. You trudge along and hide your pain, your discomfort, your sadness, and your insecurities behind a hard face or a joke. Maybe some sensible words. You've been a solid rock since the beginning, always there for everyone.
Even now as I'm preparing to talk to you, I know you're feeling something weak in your heart. Something that makes you want to cry out of happiness and gratitude. The good kind of tears. Something that makes you want to cry because you're afraid. The not so good kind of tears.
But you give me a pleasant smile, maybe a mental squeeze of the shoulder, and you let me approach you without showing that you want to break down and show that soft part in you.
Remember: you're not going to cry. You said so.
I don't cry. It's simply something I don't do for public or for show. But part of me wants to as I stand in front of you and prepare to do something that I know has been inevitable since day one. That part of me is afraid. Afraid of what I have to become. Afraid of what shoes I have to fill.
But I'm not going to admit that to anyone. Not even to you. You already know, but it goes unspoken between us because that's the kind of friends we are.
I'm a bit sad because we are losing one of the ways we can connect. However, I'm not losing your friendship, so there's no point in crying over that.
Instead of all that mushy, gushy stuff that I don't buy into, I'm going to look up to you, match that happy, confident face that is hiding the same kind of fear I feel, and I'm going to speak to you like I would on any day of the week as you hold that giant bouquet of flowers that I gave you minutes before.
You give me the strength to do that. I hope that I've learned enough from you to continue this legacy.
I'll miss you here, but I'll be seeing you around.
"Congratulations on your graduation, Yocchan."
I can never replace you as leader, but I'll do the best job I can while keeping you and your strength in mind.
Topic: Your Strength (a very short story) (Read 3554 times)