28. Relevant

Being part of the Etc. Lost group and working again, gave him some peace to his tormented and regretful mind who was tired of not being normal anymore. Although his frozen feelings remained the same, he felt a bit less pressured with them because they never asked questions, just let him be whoever he wanted to be, be with him and let him listen to them, even if he was a terrible adviser.

The people who he was closer was the Awkward Boy, Pious, Shonda and Nightjar. In the beginning Nightjar and him coincided in many debatable point of views regarding the protector, in how he could easily be turned into a bad persona and a danger or how they shouldn’t idolize so much; however with time, Nightjar learnt to appreciate the protector, he became a fan more in a day when he saw him fighting.

He knew the current jobs and lost dreams from almost all of the members of the group after one year of being around, and they knew he was some kind of office worker with a lost dream that no one was sure of what it really was. Nevertheless, no one pressured him to say more like in which city he lived, when was his birthday, because every time they asked, they received an “it has already passed.” At first, they weren’t satisfied with it, until Shonda talked with them about let it go if he didn’t want to be celebrated.

With the years going by, people in the group came and went. Because it was a group of people with a thing in common but that served just as a excuse to let them be together and overcome their troubles, people could get tired of it or feel that they didn’t need it anymore, so it was normal for them to change from time to time.

All those times they had a goodbye party, it was as sad as happy. They were happy to know that the people who decided to go, had already gotten over their lost dream, probably because they found a new one or they accepted the lost or maybe they weren’t as sad as before. Every time they bit farewell, their nickname and picture were hanged up in the wall of the Lost Members, and their profiles erased. None of them said their true name, if they had said it in the group to a person or some, they had the obligation of never tell it.

There were a lot of moments in which Teshal considered if it were his time to say goodbye or not, he neither knew if he would disappear from their lives without telling them who he really was. But at the time he was having a great time with the Awkward Boy going back to college, Pious going to the same as his but in different major, Shonda following the protector’s steps in the same major and Nightjar marrying Flying Fish.

In fact, after six years since he came to the group, and two since those two married, they announced their soon to be born baby and how his birth would mark their last time coming to the group’s reunions. It was sad but so joyous.

Some of them, principally the Awkward Boy and Shonda, tried to have a romantical relationship with him, they even declared to him the same day but at different moments. At first, he only told them “I’m sorry, I can’t accept your feelings as how am I right now”.

It was until the start of the communal chat, that he took both out of the apartment to explain to them how he couldn’t get attached to no one because of his demanding job and that he wasn’t really looking for any romantic or sexual relationships. Without telling them, of course, of how buried his real feelings were. After three weeks without seeing them, they came back being the same chatty ones, accepting being with him just as friends, as before.

Ten years later, he was still going to the group, it was a relevant activity as his days staying inside his basement without coming out with his family or to anything else.