Life was like riding a train. Some people got off along the way. Those left behind either felt wistful or lost, or smiled as they watched the train depart. Those aboard gazed numbly at the figures on the platform as they faded from view, perhaps because of the distance, perhaps because of tears.
But we knew we had to keep moving forward.
We couldn't stay where we were. Even if our hearts got off the train with those figures, we would find that, without realizing it, we had already set off again.
We met different people who boarded along the way. We laughed together, cursed each other, played around, and resented one another. In the end, they all became scenery along the journey.
Then we would realize a truth both cruel and beautiful: if we opened our hearts, beautiful scenery was everywhere, not only in the past.
The beauty of the past was worth cherishing, and the beauty of the future was worth anticipating.
That was what Snape had come to understand.
Between people, between people and society, between people and their surroundings, and between people and everything else, there was always emotion. It had been that way throughout history, all over the world.
Each of us was incomplete. Only by piecing together the fragments, whether beautiful or cruel, could life take on its full flavor.
And each of us was also whole. No matter how beautiful or cruel the fragments might be, they were still our own fragments, our own experience, and had nothing to do with anyone else.
And so, some people stayed by each other's sides until old age, while others gradually drifted apart.
Anton was no different.
In his previous life, he had been an orphan, walking through the world alone. Along the way, friends, classmates,