Half-Remembered, Half-Forgotten

the night is young and warm... awkward initial niceties of hazy acquaintances, guarded cordiality with half-hearted joviality, calculated chuckles for half-remembered jokes of half-forgotten friends the night is ripe and good... boisterous laughter , banter, recalling this and that, but once in a while, an uneasy silence blasts in their midst, they fidget, look up the ceiling, clear their throats, smile blankly, trying to think of what to say next. and the night is old and cold... they stare at drowsy coffee mugs, past whiffs of steam they gaze with a quiet, knowing grin, at what they have become, across a chasm of decades back to a youthful exuberance very vaguely remembered.