That Jazz

  

    You remember the first time you heard that jazz. That obnoxious boy with the big pimple on his nose was playing it repeatedly at the night class you always go to, usually for solace and quiet. Nobody could tell him to stop, everybody minded their own business and that jazz started to creep up on you like a thief in the night.

     You leave the class in annoyance in the middle of the night because that jazz snatched your peace and quiet, your golden opportunity to study for that test you have tomorrow but you find yourself humming that jazz. You find yourself craving to hear it once more because if you do not, you would never find peace. You brain convinces your legs to walk back to the class and ask that obnoxious boy with the big pimple on his nose to send you that jazz. You notice the way he lights up when you expressed interest in that jazz, like you understood something only he could understand. That jazz was speaking, and only both of you could understand. For the minute he transferred you the jazz, you were like brothers. Sharing a strong covalent bond which was that jazz.

     When you got home, you played that jazz for all your family members but they all dismissed you, except your favorite cousin, who rocked to that jazz the same way you did. His smile, the first time he heard it said it all, it had you wondering if he was really into the jazz or if he was just pretending as one of the compromises you make in a relationship. You start wondering why you liked him so much, it was not as if he was perfect, he kissed your crush when you were thirteen years old but then, a lot has happened in those seven years. He had gone from been the best student in your secondary school to a full fledged junkie. He practically lived in the alternate "utopia" the pills and the herbs gave. Those drugs, they gave him the ability to smile without reason, as society had taken away his reason to smile.

     Your family members call him a bad influence, they say he is a thug just because he smokes weed, but they do not understand. They do not understand the reason he smokes like you do but you do. And that was all that matters for you to be friends. Today was one of his sober days and you are happy, really happy he is spending it with that jazz.

 

****

   You did the test yesterday and it was woeful, the questions did not only look like a foreign language, they looked like a foreign language from a predated historic era whose translations were lost. You could only write back the questions you were given, you are distraught and devastated. But you find solace in the warm embrace of that jazz, the jazz does not mourn with you, rather it dances in the face of your sorrow, but rather than dampening you, it uplifts you, to also dance in the face of your own sorrow. A mental success over a physical wound.

    Then you heard your favorite cousin overdosed on pills and potions, a mixture you had warned him countless times not to try. Every time you told him to drop his habit, he would agree without equanimity and you would think he would never smoke or pop pills again. Almost like he would agree to anything for you to shut up. But, then again, he is your cousin and you are the only one that understands him. You father says he is still out cold but he will be o.k. You sit and wonder where his consciousness lie. You fall back on that jazz, because not only does the jazz understand you, it understands your cousin too. As you listen to that jazz, you see your cousin's face smiling, the face he made when you played it for him. You attach his memory to that jazz and you sit back and put that jazz on loop. Everything becomes temporarily better. That jazz made it better. That jazz.