Goodbye my friend.

With dismay I knew that one of my colleague with whom I worked side by side for a whole year passed away in one morning.

I've never been good at dealing with grief, death is something that scares me and darkens too much.

Mourning I do not even know how to define it is as if the real extent of what happened was not yet clear to me.

When my ex-colleague called me yesterday, I thought of a joke or some work emergency, a last minute replacement or similar.

"Celeste is gone" and the first reaction on the part was a resounding blasphemy, of those worst, but it was there.

Celeste was 56 years old, she was young, she was the one who best supported the shifts and the place and she  always laughed. A smiling happy good  woman

To us other counters the days "no" often happened, stress days was our daily bread..

She did not feel stress, that job for her was a second home, you saw it from how she move or sat, as if it were in the family, at ease not like us with the bushes. She was calm and easygoing. She was the strongest between us, never say no to a long shidt, never discourage new dinners or costumers, she always do her job happily. She loved her job.

I thought with regret at the last time I said hello, a hug, a kiss, a go back soon.

I told her I was going to have an aperitif only when there was her, because the other bar girl my jobmate Julia  was always very small in the doses.

I did not know it was a goodbye, this mourning always leaves me stunned, I did not know it would be the last time I saw her. And I had things to say.

And I bitten my hands to think about when I thought "I'm going to have a coffee so I show Celeste, her name,  how good my new dress is" and then I changed my mind because I did not want to see old customers and their silly questions about my new job.

I knew she would rejoice with me, heartily for my new dress.

Yesterday after the news I sat alone at a table and I ordered a prosecco, a moment we are there and the next we're gone.

This trivial thought came to me like a boulder.

Followed by awareness "And I'm going to make me no mental problems  for anything, tomorrow I put that short skirt too short and I try to approach the guy I've liked since i saw him, but what the hell why i waited so much?"

And then a bit of sorrow. She is gone. I can not think that there is more, it is strange, irrational but it is as if in the minds the presence was still alive.

I have a hint of terror returning to the bar, afraid of memories, of what it could evoke.

Because for me she was the main friend at my job, the only one that always support me, she never argue with me or scold me, we had fun together. 

She was there to laugh, she was there to make fun of me when I was more tired "What have you been all night doing have wild sex?" she told me, laughing like a madman at my modest and full of shame  answers.

"Trombetta!" She used to call me when I went in or changed the shifts, I never asked  why, after all, it was a nickname that appealed to me. Like something noisy and loud like my attitude during my shift.

That's it, just a moment. We are here and than we are no more here...

And tonight thoughts were galloping at the smile that so often gave me comfort.
Angrily I think "Just the best you take, but had not already suffered enough her?"
She had a name that suited her, Celeste. I did not know what she dreamed or wanted, we rarely talked about serious things, but we loved each other, I still fondly remember she brought me the cold beer when she saw the stacks of dishes to be cleaned and my tired, stressed face.
I would not have wanted to write it and still partly do not believe it.
It seems to me that if I go to the bar I find it still there to mock me good-naturedly. And we had to have a drink together ...

I miss you Celeste, whatever you are...

All pics are taken from : www.pixabay.com