He stands, the skin tone matching the wavering candlelight, not quite dying, yet having lost its long luster and roughness and its predominant innate unpredictability and uncountability. Crippled, burnt, scarred and charred. Spent in reckoning of a life half-wasted. He is the ticking of a clock, while his innate aura the time between seconds; always so close, but never together as time flies. As if immortalizing something incredulous, yet his ambition would be his downfall as needing to lay claim to all in its -and his- path, wanting to spread its ideas as the ink devours the paper in its entirety. Perhaps he had been lost in a sea of itself as he becomes chiseled sharpness personified. Incarnate blade, of its hard tendons and muscles moving in concurrence as a visible swallow and a cant of his head engages the woman enshrouded beneath such an enigma.
The slow rhythm of his heartbeat continues to play, but he couldn’t fathom to figure out why. Still, he finds himself expanding his chest as inhalations swell his chest cavity and shut his eyes; an image, not quite manifested in tangible reality, yet a concept of him so aptly painted by her unfolds. Adamantine armor soldered and beaten beneath the thick shroud of black in a kiln-like atmosphere, while the molten metal pours into the rifts of the crack, reminiscing his skull cracking as he had plummeted to the earth as the world tipped over. Through the rising wafts of curling smoke, the color of rust and ash as the metal continues to be malleable, taking shape as sharp edges define, softened edges pronounce in reverberation as his body joins the echo-surrounding field.
“Everyone has that loss of impulse control where you have to have certain things done no matter what, this had been one of them, done before my eighteenth birthday, but there would be no regrets.” Fused with non-commonality, it would turn into the profound evidence of his transient days of delinquent, as he lived on transposed debaucheries and ethereal consumption, further stirred by perpetual ache.
And as he drinks in the silence punctuated by the pouring of amber liquor as his gaze melts upon into oblivion; not of its reckless abandon, but a lulling jolt of color hewed by ochre, preceded by temporary parting of vivid red dune, onto the atmosphere and the glittering cascade of broken glass beneath his feet. With a determination of Icarus as he would adjust to the pouring eruption of the sunset, as his locks, the halo in early mornings blending in with the lusciousness of multicolored locks splash across the soil as they pulse with life; until they burn up in the sunlight, wither into ash that gets carried away by a gust of wind to travel through the airwaves, right into his eye.
“You are an unfolding iridescence of the galaxy, a stretch of nebula that dances the tempo of the poetry, who smile like the planet is spinning faster and see the world like the stars are falling. Diaphanous night making small purchase of plaintive specter; not quite vacant and never loathing, yet there’s some emptiness under the waking moon.” A click of his tongue as his inquisitorial gaze remains fixated upon her alabaster façade - all the encompassing held knowledge floating against the firmament of her aura. “Not pandering to people’s basic instincts but of depth.”
He supposes, each desire provokes in him a counter-desire. So whatever he does, all that matters is something that hadn’t been done - and this assessment would suffice as she had brought the universe of himself closer to his being.
Ahh, yes, to be young and brash and full of star-dust, wasting it on everything and no one. Even if it was a moment of drunken young-manhood then, it had meaning now. She understood it, at least.
Time, in his presence, slipped by so fast. She thought she had more time before the sun dipped low and kissed this part of the world goodnight. She had to check on her things–a tattered tent, a sleeping bag, her backpack of everything she owned–make sure that other, diligent and greedy hands had not found them and her hiding / sleeping spot in the park. These worries nibbled away at her without creasing her eyes or showing upon her face that tilted its way back to him over again, like little paper whites following a light too bright for them but too pretty not to.
“I should like to think, if I must pine upon regrets, it is better to regret that which never happened because I did not will it so, or try, than what happens after trying..”
Because of being colorless at best, her skin, her hair, picked up the riot of sunset’s exploding colors. Oranges and marigold’s shades in white strands and skin. When he went silent she did not panic or fret. Nor did she rush to fill it with nattering ons of her mind, that, like all people, had ceaseless inner dialogues that left them little rest. She kept them to herself because of the way he stood, the way he quieted.
When he spoke, however, of how he would paint her…the bow of her mouth parted in amazement, a flash of little white teeth betwixt. Eyes rounded slightly, flickers of such galaxies lit themselves in thanks or awe behind purple iris. For the briefest moment, let him know that he did not bring strife or heart break or ruin upon a person, but a little joy.
When she could finally speak again, her head had bowed prettily as if in some church, or some wild altar in prayer. “Thank you. I do not think I have heard myself in such a way, nor so close to …the truth.”
He wonders if they were meant to collide in this unfurled universe, with their creativity, passion and craft as he became the most lucidly clear shooting star upon the iridescent backdrop of her essence, swiftly coming and leaving, in order to take a piece of her along with him in the most calm and violent way. Even when she remains out of view as his being hurtles by, the remaining dust would rattle with his departure as he still settles high and above. How the sky seem to come down like raindrops, as she permeates through him, resonating through every fiber and inch of him, even through his deepest thoughts.
How their seemingly disparate souls sing in concurrence - he sees her soul, as the song resonates through her body, takes over every inch as he sees her build with the chorus and links, as if they had built the bridge itself. And it is remarkably beautiful - as colors melt from them. Swirling into multicolored spectrum as they become the song themselves. The ray swings deep and gets stuck beneath their feet trying to go lower. How his thoughts seem to shut off from the rest of the world, as the unbroken vault of his tumultuous spirit becomes pleasant hum, rattling through his chest.
The world blurs, as his form accompanies the folds of cold wind; wickedly engulfing the manifestation of his form, matching the solitary, deepening night. Yet unperturbed, as his long- treading over the storm’s edge had subdued and all the tension in the atmosphere hovering around his neck like a noose severs; albeit ephemeral. As the warming hearth where the thickness of the heat intensifies, both to suffocate him and chase away the cold shadows from his bones, the crestfallen heart of his melts with her astonishment. How it halts the heavy and strenuous hold upon his heart, without making half hearted attempt at friendliness difficult.
“It would be downright fucking painful and dismal if someone saw you as a blasé being, of colorlessness. No one is ever devoid of hues, not even the most unremarkable individuals I feel indifferent towards.” Dissimilar with forgettable scents and nuances of individuals, he would almost always see through the chroma of persons as his own being becomes an incarnate of turmoil, hypostatized to become such a formidable, endowed concept.
They had held each other in such tangled parabolic curves that he never wished to free himself from, for such exercise of his mind have evoked something profound - he wouldn’t ever want to forget such chemistry between them. How he had gravitated towards her out of nowhere, from that moment as he continues to be held inside their little orbit. “I suppose you saw through all the knotted clumps of darkness and detangled me in a moment in darkness, an instant to compose. I wonder if you could help all those fucking constipated memories to flush out of my fucking brain for good.”
“This, I would say, the very same to you. How unfair of people to paint you sun-bleached waste-land, or arizona plains with brittle tumbleweeds. Though perhaps, some are simply destined to see the cover of a book and never read the print.” The latter part, when she spoke, deepened with a mix of empathy and sadness. As if she took pity on those who didn’t really need it–the souls of the world too much in a hurry for visual gratification as well as finger-snap decisions; too quick to care for anything else.
The more the sun slipped lower, the more the color faded from the world around them. Greens of spring turning blue, streets and paths showered with quaint electric lamps attempting to mimic once-fire illuminated slicked the paving stones with yellow and silver, and a breeze began to wind slowly through the night. It was brisk, winter desperately clinging on despite the fact trees were starting to bud all around in the park, green shoots overcoming brown. It made her shiver first, then have to reach up and grab the arising strands of moonwhite, long hair that floated in it as easy as feathers. When she had tucked the majority of it behind ear and neck, a third of it stubbornly flew free once more, sticking to long pale lashes, mouth and tickling nose.
“I sometimes wish I could be amidst the unremarkable,” this she said with the softest of whispers, because it seemed she had not meant to let such a deep sliver of herself slide across her tongue to be heard in the cool air. After her words, she looked momentarily confused (at herself for saying them outloud after thinking she had only…well..thought them..) and then her awkwardness made her duck her head once more. She crossed her arms over her chest, wriggling her long, frail seeming fingers into the sleeves to keep them warm.
What he said however crept over her in increments. He could watch as the earlier chagrin from speaking out loud eased away from her face to be reinstated with that same, deep, thoughtful mien from before when he asked her to paint him–brows drawing together over nose, mouth puckering together in a small line.
‘I saw a little. But to say that I see everything or know everything would be false. I cannot know all, at once. And besides–what joy would one get from doing so? One would lose the midnight chatter that winds into the sunrise. One would no longer stumble and fall, then have to search to fix what was broken–mend it–and make it stronger. Friendships would no longer be, and love…Well…What is love without adventure, or–” the pause was barely noticeable. But there. “–tragedy, too.”
She raised her chin upward, for he was a tall man with taller shadow. The way the street lights began flickering on made his hair alight with ruddy fire, but kept his face in deep enough shadow that only the ridge of sharp cheekbone and brow was highlighted in light.
“Memories are memories, for a reason. But they fade. They can be crowded to a smaller part of your heart if you can gather newer, brighter ones.”
Words would never cling onto him like a lingering dust and smoke, permeating through his skin in brazen colors, both imaginary and real. How words can ebb and flow into each other as gracefully as a dancer, how they can evoke emotion with the smallest nuance and most often, they would hold so much venom and fueled fire that he would burn and blister with almost tangible maliciousness of invisible threads - unprecedented as they often would dig into his deepest reverie. Yet, they become more of invisible threads that tie everything together so seamlessly that it makes him wonder he would ever detach himself away from all the premolded perceptions of his life - for humanity’s stupidity may be infinite, but his curiosity, stubbornness, the potential of kindness as well as cruelty, the ability to learn where he didn’t know or was wrong and most definitely the ability to achieve something simply because he was told that he couldn’t.
“I’m the universe’s most mind-fucking-boggling creature there is to prove every goddamned thing wrong.” He refuses and defies to be subtle, embodying such lifelike and vibrant persona as he remains a stark contrast of dark and light. How difficult it had been, to see the symmetry and the beauty in simplicity, even beneath the mundane and blasé - perhaps that’s why he had preferred the midnight to the break of dawn, to watch the sky change colors as the moon slips lower and lower as time slips through his hands, as the infinite deep sea would cascade the brightest stars up, even more luminescent than the glow of the sunrise as his aura would agglomerate with the fire of his creation. How his life itself would feel like the flow of time as it runs to its veins, like a natural phenomenon.
“No one ever bothers to bare one’s fucking soul naked like I would,” though he isn’t particularly vocal about his instincts and lingering emotions, he would be the night without the moon and the day without the sun if weren’t for all the fingerprints of his darkness and flame and shadows as his constant companion. “Yet, the firmly-held armor you spoke of earlier seems to be the prevailing criterion among all the fucking strangers and I prefer it to remain that way, despite my sacrificed affection and comfort.” There is not a day that goes by where he fails to realize it, yet that doesn’t entitle him to be inadequate nor this travesty to become something extraordinary that would sadden him with his agglomerated loneliness.
“No fucking man should remain unremarkable, albeit fucking washed out and predictable. I face those who masquerade with such chicaneries and duplicities, yet I find that remarkably agonizing - not in the conventional sense that I would have to attempt to prod and breach through the other like I would a lock without its key, but knowing the depth of my despair, knowing I would have to reveal a truth of myself to dent a crack through my naked soul.” How he yearns peace of mind when his heart remains a chaos, thoughts riot.
A forlorn look as he knows Gabi will be in a better place without him; yet how fragments of his life had made the whole worth living because of her. How galaxies collided, for she had been a remedy to a troubled soul and an ore with a valuable heart that was meant to be cared for, to be loved unreservedly. “I am unable to do nothing but fucking watch as she slips off that last piece of ledge and plummet out of my life. How can I ever fucking rebuild my heart when she had been an emblem of my heart that helped me to blossom?” For he’s not here without a broken bone and a switched wound; she had been a part of him that’s as tortured as his emotions for not coming out in sync with the wonderful occurrences he vows to recreate.
