Underneath the Oak tree, leaning against the lamppost is where you could find Dawn. The shade of the tree was just enough for her to watch those pass by in perfect comfort. She had just realized the sunburn touching the collar of her shirt. The pain had crept as slowly as a spider's footsteps.
She looked up, her hands meant to be shielding her eyes from the sun, but it wasn't there. When she looked back to where the oak tree stood tall, it’s shadow had sprawled itself out in another direction, not offering her any shade at all. She looked around, she was sure she was sitting where she always had. Dawn’s first thought was of course: The insanity of her mind. That perhaps she did not sit here like she always thought. She got up and leaned herself against its bark, abandoning the light post. The grooves resting in her blouse. Still, there was something nudging at her brain.
She did not think of the most logical explanation, because she hadn’t heard of it since she was a child: Time. Time which pulled the sun across the skies a millennium ago. Time that aged the skin into wrinkles. That time had been frozen in place long ago.
“You’re burnt.” Dawn was taking off her shoes when her blouse shifted off her shoulder. She flicked her head around seeing her husband cooking dinner. “I can see it all the way from here,” His voice flat as he moved his eyes back to the steaming vegetables.
“I know, I thought I was sitting in the shade,” She slumped herself into her favorite chair, it creaked in response. It released all the pent-up stress from work. Her muscles relaxed begging her for a quick nap but her mind was still chasing afternoon thoughts. “Do you remember where I was sitting when you brought me to lunch last Thursday?” Her husband stopped cooking, tilted his head up, and shifted his eyes back and forth much like how a finger sorts through images.
“By the lamppost, I remember because the black was the same color as your shirt.”
“No, it wasn’t,” His eyebrow raised, it wasn’t often that his wife had the courage to challenge his visual memory. A smile made its way up his cheeks.
“You were,” He was sure this time was going to be an argument he would win.
“No, I wasn’t I got burnt because I always sit in the shade. I sat by the lampost today and there was no shade.”
“It was a different lamppost then.”
“I'll bring you your lunch tomorrow and we can settle this.”
Dawn never received a hand delivered lunch unless it was a special occasion. A devilish grin danced its way through her face starting with her lips and then cutting into the eyes. Perhaps, she thought, winning an argument against me is a special occasion to him.
She shifted ever so slightly, to the left, a streak of light blinded her eyes. She closed them, giving in to her body’s exhaustion before sitting up rather quickly, eyes sizing up the light.
"How odd," she stood up shoved her heels back on, so quickly that the back folded under her foot. Her husband watched her trip down the front steps with a furrow in his brow.
He turned off the stove leaving the dinner still on the burner and wiped his hands on the tablecloth. He walked over to the front door intending to follow her outside.
"The shadows really are moving." Dawn giggled at the thought. Shadows stretched across their driveway, like a carnival mirror. She stood in the center of the street, the sun had just made its way to the horizon painting the edge a deep orange.
"Time," her husband whispered under his breath. He stood in the doorway looking into the center of the sky, where the sun had permanently pinned itself centuries ago. His wife looked at him, saw his gaped mouth, and knew her mind was crazy that day.
Dawn walked back to the house and sat down in her chair once more, clicked on the tv. Her husband always left it on the news. Her husband flicked his head at the sound of a familiar newscaster, who looked to have worry bleeding into her features.
“Unfrozen, the earth rotates around the sun once. The country has issued a national emergency but reminds citizens,” She glanced down at a note card in her hand like she was trying to decipher some code “to stay calm for we have experienced time before. The TCC says that the world will return to its frozen state, soon. He also reminds you to stay inside especially as it begins to be dark in your area and weather occurs, again don’t leave your home.” Her husband stepped inside and closed the door behind him.
Dawn couldn't remember the last time she heard thunder. It echoed into the bedroom and sunk its way into her ears. The rain added an extra element to the soothing drum and created music. Dawn admired the sound, it came so quickly after the sunset. Her husband eyes were bloodshot glued on the tv.
"Thunder was always made me want to read perhaps that why I don’t anymore."
Her husband didn't reply, He was stiff his whole body frozen.
Dawn made her way to the back door and slid the glass open. The rain began to soak the carpet. She took another peak to make sure that her husband wasn't looking. She shut the glass behind her as the rain-drenched her in seconds. The cold had already worked its way through her toes and they curled in rebellion. Her makeup seeped into her eyes making them feel dry and itchy. Still, she smiled, rain had become a new experience all over again.
The back door swung open and her husband pulled her inside trying to use the kitchen towel to dry her hair.
"What the hell are you doing," He held her in by the shoulders. She wanted to say that she couldn't remember the last time let the rainfall, but she just shrugged. He scoffed and took a step back to look at his wife, mascara painted its way down her face.
Dawn didn't look up from her feet, a sense of guilt sat in her stomach.
"I had forgotten, what the rain is like"
He rubbed his eyes. Another round of thunder sounded throughout the house.
“Do you think this will last,” She looked up at him a drops of water still making their way down her face. The news tv behind them spoke of mass panic and the news lady was speaking faster than anyone could comprehend. Dawn, only Dawn he thought would wish for just a little bit longer, so she could experience the rain.
“Let's go to bed,” he put a hand on her back, the warmth a stark contrast between the wet blouse. She walked up the stairs, her husband stopping right before the first step, remembering the dinner sitting on the stove. “I'll meet you upstairs.” He pulled a container out from the cupboard and placed the stir fry in the fridge. A wave of rain pulled by wind streaked the window above the stove.
There was a crack left in between the door and the wall, a few drops had snuck there way in. He placed his hand on the handle expecting himself to close it but he paused. He recalled his younger years on the way to the bus stop running to escape the rain, only to watch the yellow streak by and come home drenched. He opened the door and reached just his arm out to greet the rain. He didn't think, when the idea of freezing time became a serious political topic, that it would freeze the clouds. There was no more wind at his back, no more shadows stretching on the ground and no more rain. It was twice as cold as he remembered and found himself wanting to step forward and experience the goosebumps gathering on his arm. He pulled back and locked the back door. A drip of water trailed off his fingernail.
He made his way up the stairs, rolling up his wet sleeve. Dawn had her hair in a towel and was sitting up in the bed, the news displaying crimson red headlines. She took a glance when he walked into the room, not expecting to see that a light blue sleeve had turned dark from the rain. She tried her best to hide her smile.
“How long do you think we have been together.” Her husband asked while slipping on a t-shirt and bouncing into bed.
“I don't know tens of years.”
“They say we’ve been frozen for hundreds at least.”
She raised her eyebrows. Dawn leaned into the pillows. She couldn't even remember the last time she heard the word years.
“Wanna go outside tomorrow,” She was completely serious.
“Didn't they say specifically not to,” her smile grew at his response.
The rain soothed Dawn to sleep and her husband’s eyes fell while watching the news. Out of all their neighbors, they were the only ones who slept. Most of everyone feared the unknown, and time had become one of them. Dawn wasn’t afraid of time, and her husband knew Dawn was almost always right about things. They slept. each one of them on the other edge of the bed.
Her husband woke up one eyelid at a time, Dawn had been awake for a while staring at the ceiling. Makeup still trailed down her eyes and smudged a perfectly white pillow.
“Where did you want to go.” Dawn flung herself from the bed doing her hair in a neat bun.
So, of course, her husband chose the one place they both knew well: underneath the oak tree.
Dawn was thoroughly disappointed by even the walk there. Her husband seemed to cling close to her and get rather annoyed by her sneaking. She hid around bushes and benches as if a teen running from the cops.
“If they told me you stop aging at 12, I would believe them.”
A siren went off in the distance. Dawn slipped around a lamppost not realizing that had made her way to her workplace. Her whole being was disappointed all her muscles loosened at once and she hunched over.
“Really you choose here.”
Her husband sat down on the grass, only to sit back up realizing a giant wet mark covered half his pants.
He sighed like an old man getting up from a comfy chair. She removed her heels walking barefoot towards the oak tree. In college, Dawn had gotten caught in the rain only once. At a concert held in the courtyard. The rain seemed to come down all at once and a couple hundred people tried to make their way under an oak.
“It will be dry under its leaves,” she walked with determination swinging her arms beside her, each hand holding a heel.
He got up and met her under the oak tree. She sat crisscrossed, he leaned.
“You look happy Dawn.” She didn't hear him she was smiling off in the distance facing away from her work building, a cube of windows.
Dawn, both the person and the sky, was still settling in. The clouds painted purple but still coasted mostly in orange. A single tear ran down her cheek. Dawn, the person, was still smiling, she was sad she was happy. She laughed at herself and rubbed the tear into her cheek.
“I want to go home,” she didn't hear him. He let out the second sigh of the day and sat next to her. He still don't know why they were here, then again he had chosen this place. He liked it, the towering oak tree. The sunset was a nice compliment as well. He thought they were pretty when they were younger, told his mom he wanted to be a painter. In college he had met Dawn in an art class, they both just took it for fun talking the whole time.
He wasn’t sure if he could call himself young. Then again the earth was frozen when he was about 20 something years old, so in a way you could say he was still 20, most people did. He always thought of himself as an old soul, though. It seemed easier for him to picture himself as an old man than to remember his reflection in the mirror. He looks at his hand still young and free of any blemish, his nails, however, had been bitten down quite far, leaving the skin torn and scabbed. Nails don't grow back without time, still in times of nervousness you usually find him with his fingers on his lips. I don't want to go home, he thought, I just don't want to feel the want to stay.
“James,” Her husband turned his head away from his hand to answer the call of his wife. “What something that you want, that's only possible when time exists.”
James looked back at his hands.
“To age, you?” his voice was monotone but Dawn was married to someone for lifetimes, she heard the want, the need to pull that dream closer.
“Kids,” James face still studied his hands.
“I want to stay,” the words came out in between sobs.
“I know Dawn, let's go home.”
She put her heels back on and walked carelessly towards their house. He smoothed out a stray piece of her hair.
Dawn made dinner this time, finally cleaning the makeup off her face. James watched tv. He said he wanted another thunderstorm, she agreed, it never came. In fact, the sky was almost completely clear again, just like the day the earth was frozen when time was stopped.
When night came he told her of constellations, surprised he remembered them. Dawn listened, seeing animals and names written instead of the constellations.
They went to sleep that night closer than the night before. James’s arm wrapped around her.
He woke up one eyelid at a time Dawn wasn't there. He had a good idea of where dawn was. He ran downstairs heading for the old oak when he noticed an even happier smile being worn by the newscaster.
“Time has been frozen once more, the earth has stopped its rotation and we urge you to return to your daily lives as soon as you ready.”
He closed his eyes let out his third sigh and continued out the door.
He walked to Dawn’s old workplace, glancing at the sky. Everything was the same as before the sun in the same place, the shadows on the ground unstretched. He found her sitting next to the oak. Dawn was waiting for the dawn to come once more.
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