The laughs never ended. A constant ping pong game of sorts. You served hilarity, I laughed until tears were moving down my face, until my stomach cramped from the continual jolting of laughter coming out of my body. I was ready for the set up as soon as I could get the words out. I served my own kind of funny. Your eyes would crinkle as your laugh started low in your belly and then barely squeezed out in a pitch higher than you looked like you could hit. Looking at each other’s eyes. Locking the moment in. Both of us gasping for air. Constantly playing ping pong. It came so easy. We won all the titles. No one could do what we did.

The laughing stopped for a moment. Several moments. The air was sucked out of the room.

We sat in silence.

We sat and we sat.

We remembered we had to keep laughing. The giggles began to come back. All of the tiny inside jokes only we could laugh at were peeking at us from behind the curtains. It was a saving grace. We began our usual game of back and forth smiles and snorts. It felt so good. Gave life new meaning.

And then it stopped.