A little story for you...

It actually was a nice, warm and sunny day... but as Matsi sat down in the grass beneath her, she didn´t felt like enjoying it. Sure… a lot of people around her, like a mother with her daughter, wich played with an ball in the park, or a few other children that listened to a story that an old lady wich sat on the edge of an fountain nearby told them, gave her the feeling that she should be happy to feel the warmth of the autnumn sunny day, but the young women just didn’t felt quite like it.
Instead, all the people around her made her feel… lost. As if she´d be something wrong in this happy picture, something that didn’t belong here. She knew that feeling, it related to the feeling of depression and sadness she had suffered for a few days every now and then, the feeling that something misses in her life, or that she misses someone…
So although the colourful leaves around her that almost completely covered the grass seemed to shine aswell in the warm sunlight… the world seemed to be gray and distant to Matsi.
She sighted, as she slung her arms around her knees and pulled them closer. Yes… there was this feeling again… Although she thought that escaping her room that even started reminding her of the times in wich she layed on her bed feeling that way by taking a walk in the nice weather down to the park, it didn’t help at all.
Matsi almost was about to get up to go home again, trying to distract herself with reading a book, drawing or something else that would keep her busy enough not to think or feel that much like she allways did in this situation, when suddenly something bumped softly against her back. She turned around to see a red ball rolling away from her through the colourful and dry leaves, with a noise that reminded her of someone eating chips. As the ball came to stop, soon the young girl walked slowly up to her, a somewhat nervous look on her face, while her mother, before looking up to Matsi with an apologizing gaze, cheered her daughter to ask the nice young women to return the ball, like mothers in such situations allways do.
Matsi forced herself to smile a little, before reaching out for the red ball with her right, to pick it up and finally showing it to the young girl. “Do you want it back?”
Instead of asking politely, as her mother once again cheered her to, the young girl just nodded. The mother then sighted. That was when Matsi didn´t had to force herself to smile a little anymore. She rolled the ball back to the girl.
The young girl then bent down to the ball to catch it with her both hands, as if to make sure that it doesn’t get away this time, before looking up to the young woman with an smile. “Thank you, Miss.” she said quickly before turning back to her mother…
… leaving Matsi once again with this awkward feeling she allways got when she felt down and a normal, happier world got to reach out for her in ways alike to that. Friends that called and asked for how she was. Her mother beeing worried about her when she stayed in her room for a while. She would´ve loved to not lie to people that care about her when tellig them that she was better then… but all she felt after that was exactly the feeling she had right now, as if the distance between her and the normal, happier world grew bigger somehow…
And once again Matsi sighted.
She let her head fall down onto the cover that was made of those dry leaves, now lying down on what seemed to be a beautiful blanket. The young woman admitted to herself in thought that it was almost as comfortable as her bed at home, as she closed her eyes to breath the fresh air the wind brought along as it seemed to play with some of the leaves surrounding her. Matsi liked how she started to feel everytime she did that… Just focusing on hearing her own breath, her heartbeat and the different noises around her coming from… well, everything around her, whether at her home or in this park… she felt like she wasn´t bound to this body, as if she would be free to go whenever she wanted to, just staying for the noises that she heard nearby.
Like the story, that the old lady told her young listeners, that now seeemed to end. Unfortunately, Masti didn’t get any other part of the story, but she could tell from the reactions of the young boys and girls surrounding the laughing old lady, some of them got noisy and asked, begged or even demanded her to tell another awesome story, that they seemed to have enjoyed listening to her.
That somehow reminded her of her friend Hockey Bat… since she was sure that once Wuffel got to be older, he would also sit down on the edges of fountains in parks to read or tell his awesome stories to children…
The young women the wished, although she would be a lot older then propably, to be able to sit down infront of him to listen to him too.
Matsi wondered what Wuffel was doing at the moment… or what he would´ve done beeing with her now, here in this park, sitting next to her…

“Well… First, I propably would say “Hello.”, I guess.” said a voice nearby. The young woman opened her eyes in surprise, feeling that she almost was about to slip off into sleep, curious for who was talking to her that way. For an, so it seemed to her, neverending moment of confusion and doubt she just sat there looking at the young, average looking man with the glasses, that sat down next to her in the grass, following him with her eyes.
“W- Wuffel?” was all she was able to say after a while and after he stretched his torso and arms as high as possible against the wind yawning.
“Sorry.” the young man answered smiling to her. “I am a bit tired, appearantly. And yeah… who else did you expect? I have to admit you were faster then Ryn was, it took her a while to realize who is talking to her the moment I spoke to her the first time we met. Not to mention the time she needed to lay off the shyness.”
Matsi fought the urge to rub her eyes while still staring at her friend that appeared out of all sudden. After a while she raised a hand and reached out for him slowly. Wuffel laughed and took it.
“Hello Matsi. You seem to be surprised to see me.” he smiled.
“But… wha-“ the young woman stuttered. His hand felt as real as anyones hand would feel. “Why did… How are you coming here?!”
“Is this really THAT important now?” Wuffel answered after a short while he spent with looking at her, before looking around to stop at the young girl that played ball with her mother again. “I actually rather would like to know how you are now, or better what made you come here, Slap.”
Wuffels aggressive yet friendly honest way of speaking silented the questions that were on Matsis mind. But she couldn’t say that she was happy about what he asked, it reminded her of what she felt like.
The young woman turned her face to look at the leaves at her feet. She didn’t wanted to say “I´m allright.” and lie to him that way, just to shorten the part of a conversation she just didn’t like lately, like she usually did around friends recently. But she didn’t want to give him a sad look while telling him while answering atleast.
“Well… I don’t know. It seems like… I just don’t know. I get depressed out of all sudden every once in a while latley. And then… I usually just distract me untill the feeling fades on its own. So I went for a walk to the park. But I have to admit it didn´t help at all.” She sighted. “Now, what do you do h-“
“Matsi… take a look around.” Wuffel said, stopping her from what she was about to ask, looking at the old lady that now told another story to the children that listened to her. Slap couldn’t help herself but to follow his look and watching the storyteller at the fountain too.
“Uhm…” the young girl started, wondering what this would lead the conversation they had to. “I can see… Well. The fountain, where this old nice lady sits and tells stories to the children.”
“And?” Wuffel contineued “What else can you see, here in this park?”
“The girl playing ball with her mother? Er… The trees and the leaves? The grass we both sit on? Uhm… You?”
Hockey Bat nodded. “Yes… that’s right. But there is one important thing you can´t see, as it seems.”
“What is it?” Matsi asked.
Wuffel then lifted his right hand, stretching his pointer, poking her nose softly. “It´s you, silly. You are here too.”
“And… that means… ?”
Her friend just smiled once again at her, before he turned his face to look up to the sky, where the sun was about to go down.
“ People long time ago mentioned that one of the many prooves that a god is responsible for creating this world, is, that it is so beauty- and wonderful. I sometimes wonder if because of that, people started to draw and write down what they saw in pictures and poems… maybe that, or to express themselves, what they felt and thought about the world…”
Matsi just sat there, listening to him, before she realized that, as it seemed, she not only understood what he was telling her, but also saw what he meant:
The sun was about to go down, almost reaching the horizon that seemed to be far away, while colouring the sky in beatuiful warm colours. Matsi also seemed to realize just now that the dry leaves that fell off the trees and covered the grass added to this scenery, with them, Wuffel and herself, a young woman and her mother, the old lady and the children that listened to her, beeing a part of it.
Somehow, Matsi wanted to take a picture of this park, this moment now.
“Although we are a part of this awesome world that surrounds us, and everyone of us is, sometimes we forget that we are a part of it. Many reasons can lead you to forget that… And it also is hard for you to remind you of that again on your own… I know that. I also know what it feels like to not feel like beeing a part of everything…” Wuffel went on, before turning his head to looking at her again. “But it is not like everyone of us is alone. We all are in this world, sharing it… So it is likely that some of us run into eachother somehow to become friends.” he smiled. “Just like we did, Matsi.”
The young woman smiled back at him. She wasn´t forcing herself to it this time, no actually she would´ve needed to force herself not to, since that kind of smile came from when the feeling wich kept her depressed and down faded, replaced by her feeling… happy.
Yes, she wasn’t alone. She shared this awesome world with so many people that cared for her… Friends like Hockey Bat.
“You might know that there are scientists arguing about whether we all see this world in a different way, or not… I think that we all see it the same way, the trees, the leaves, the sundown… but we just tend to feel different about it, wich makes the difference in the end.” Matsis friend said before stopping shaking his head slightly. “Tch. My thoughts are drifting away again, sorry.”
“It´s okay.” Slap sat down a bit closer to him, before adding “Do you mind if- “
“Nah. Not at all, Matsi.” Wuffel just replied smiling. She might have wondered about if he was able to read her mind, but maybe he was just good at guessing her intentions.

Soon Slap sat in his lap, his arms around her, with her leaning against him and enjoying him to be here with her. It was a nice warm and protecting feeling she got from Wuffel holding her that way.
“Wuffel?” she said, holding onto his arms that were around here with her own hands. “Can I ask you something?”
“Yes, of course. Go ahead.”
“Is this a dream?” she asked, fearing that this might set an end to what she thought was just a figmet of her sleeping selfs imagination.
Her friend didn’t reply instantly, instead he moved his right arm from out of the hug and put it on her head to palm her softly. “I wish it wasn´t… but for now it isn´t a easy thing for me to just come over to you to enjoy a warm day in autnum in a park with you, is it?” Hockey Bat answered before takig a deep breath to sigh.
“I know… the distance…” Matsi couldn’t help herself but sounding a little sad about that, although she actually didn’t want to.
“Yeah… but atleast the distance can´t keep us from beeing friends, Matsi, and it never will. Plus, one day I´ll be a wealthy medical technican, famous fantasy writer or lucky lottery player. Then one of the first things I plan to do is visting you.” They both had to laugh.
After a while of them sitting and beeing together that way, the sun was about to disappear behind the horizon compeltely, Wuffel said: “I have to go soon…”
Matsi turned her had a little, she saw that he didn’t want to go as much as she didn’t want him to. “But…”
Hockey Bat smiled at her. “Don’t be so sad about that, Matsi. It is not like our friendship ends with just that dream. Don’t forget that I am out there and caring for you too…”

Slap woke up as the wind that still seemed to play with the dry leaves around her blew cold enough to make her shiver for a moment, as if to drive away the warmth of this day. As the feeling of sleepyness faded, she found herself still lying on the grass, while the sun, like in her dream, already had went down.
She looked around and found herself to be alone, the mother with her daughter aswell as the old lady and the other children already must´ve went home.
But…
Maybe Matsi was alone here now, but she didn’t felt lonley, nor lost anymore.
She got up smiling to walk home to, hoping her mother wouldn’t be too worried about her still beeing out, while feeling a comforting and caressing warmth coming from the air.

As if it tried to remember the people that still were out this early night, that it has been a nice, warm and sunny day. But to Matsi, it reminded her of someone.


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Story text by Wuffel, art by me. Please don't steal: I don't want to have to put a watermark on the image and make Wuffel get copyrights for his work...