Fresh Memories

Fresh Memories

We were wandering around in the night, half drunk and being towed by an attractive group of new found friends. Circumstances of being kicked out together had bonded the group together, even with most still being nameless. The two at the front were typing away on their phones finding the next party that hadn’t been noise complainted yet.

Cameron revealed they still had two beers in their pocket. We cracked them open. A girl in front gave a dirty look warning us that we’d get in trouble. Cameron and I shrugged her comments aside.

We went up and down enough streets that I stopped mentally following, letting the group lead me anywhere. When I finished my can I delicately placed it on a bench. Cameron revealed another pair of beers from their pocket and we cracked those open.

Eventually, we stopped at a door and our entourage began buzzing the intercom.

“Huh, I thought I would just be wandering for the rest of my life. But here I am,” I said to whoever was listening.

The door buzzed open and our blob of a group stumbled into the blindingly bright lobby. No one could figure out how to open the old elevator door so we entered the stairway.

“Just three flights,” someone said. Someone else moaned in despair.

Knock Knock. Instead of waiting for a reply we entered with our own initiative. I realized in horror that I was led into a university party full of youth! I should have back peddled out of their immediately but the staircase climb felt like too much of an accomplishment to fallback now.

“There better be alcohol,” I muttered.

I migrated my way to a corner of the kitchen, avoiding the overenthusiasm of the eager young students talking loudly in their little voices. It was when I opened the fridge door that I realized I’ve opened this door before.

The way the fridge door required a hard pull and then immediately swung open. And the low stained shelves and dull orange light inside. I knew this fridge!

I looked around. I knew this kitchen! I had to see the other rooms. Yes! They were all the same.

“Where are we?” I asked one of the youths.

“What?”

“What street is this?”

“Oh. Uh, I don’t know.”

“Cameron!” I yelled in desperation.

“Yes, I’m right next to you. What?”

“What street is this?”

“It’s ___ street”

“I know this street,” I said. “I know this place. This is Alice’s place!”

“Who?”

Alice from… half a decade ago.

Before this ugly fridge was filled with cheap beer to steal at parties, it was filled with an assortment of Alice’s hand-picked vegetables. She was a vegetarian constantly creating elaborate salads. The apartment used to always have a fresh smell. Curious how that fresh smell is what lingers in my mind.

Along with the veg, Alice also kept a stock of rose wine in the fridge. Always at the ready no matter what night or day it was. It was one of those nights when we played a game of writing little secrets on pieces of paper. We would hide these notes for reach other to find. As the night dragged the secrets got deeper and so did the hiding spots. I remembered slipping a little note in the impossible crack between the stove and cabinet, forever unreachable.

That was years ago. Now everything else was different. The furniture was boring and held up dumb looking students instead of pretty Alice. But if the fridge was still the same, then some of the past must have remained too. Maybe, just maybe a forgotten note.

I opened the fridge. Where would drunk me hide it. I pushed past the junk and opened the clear plastic case that covered the fridge’s lightbulb. Sure enough, a little folded up scrap of worn paper. I unfolded it, and without a doubt, recognized Alice’s handwriting.

I read the note.

I folded the note.

And I placed it back in the fridge’s lightbulb case.

I thought of Alice. I thought of texting her, rekindling that chat from years ago.

But I didn’t. This moment was for me and me alone.

“Cameron,” I exclaimed. “We should get the hell of out here, shouldn’t we?”

Cameron nodded.

From the fridge, we grabbed a beer for each of our pockets. We began our descent down the stairway and back into the night.