Tuesday, February 15, 2005
Shattered Realities
Short stories from the brink, born of an idle mind.
*****
In another reality...
...He leaned back against the railings and looked up towards the sky.
Maybe, he thought, I just have a thing for damsels in distress; maybe there's something infinitely beautiful about the way a girl's eyes soften and the mask she wears melts away, as she confides some secret inner pain to you. Maybe it's like, what was that they said, an orgasm, "a little death", a tiny moment of pure and unfettered honesty. Man, that's so fucked up.
And it didn't explain why it was so rare, and it didn't explain why he found the first beautiful, at all. Not in the least. She was beautiful from the moment he first met her, and she was almost always happy.
Now the sky, that was beautiful and he didn't even need to ponder why. He just knew. It was breathtakingly blue, and high above him, somewhat incongruously hung the ghostly white sickle-blade of a crescent moon.
Once in a blue moon. It's a kinda magic.
*****
In another reality...
...He didn't bother to take off his damply dripping overcoat as he stepped out of the eternal twilight, into the translucent yellow haze of a random pub.
Liquid amber swirled around the rim of his glass, framed by his hand as he stared morosely into its vertex, thinking nothing in particular.
Some random stranger blew smoke in his direction; he didn't even flinch as he breathed in the musty, slightly sour scent. She laughed, but not at him. It was just part of everyday, humdrum conversation, bastard words trickling by his skin, lost in the meaninglessness of now, dying into the past, remembered and cherished by nobody in particular.
He looked up, and for a moment the world seemed to come to a standstill as he thought he saw, across the room, someone who looked very much like her. But no, it couldn't be. Nah.
He looked back down into his drink. He was getting too old for silly dwellings on unimportant things.
In life, you have to get your priorities straight.
He glanced back up, and her eyes met his.
*****
...In another reality...
"Hello," She said, smiling in that amiable, familiar way she had about her.
"This is Ethan. Say hello, Ethan."
The bob of hair at her wrist glanced up at him, and grinned.
"Huwwo, mister".
He had his mother's eyes - warm, liquid brown, yet taunting. Not quite insolent... but engaging, with a faint air of daring you to an almost-confrontation about them; an unspoken challenge to a duel. Lively. Alive. Intelligent.
He knelt down and looked the child in the eye.
"Hello, Ethan" he said, sombrely, shaking the mini man by the hand.
And for some reason, he felt happy again, after the longest time of pretense.
*****
He watched impassively from his deckchair as the sky burnt itself out into an unearthly sheen of purple. It was a beautiful sight from way up here, and part of his brain duly took note of it, dully.
It was quiet here. The evening breeze caressed his skin lightly as he picked up his 'phone and idly thumbed in "Do you ever wonder what it is we are actually living for? Or are we just supposed to go looking for a reason."
His thumb lingered for a long while on the "send" button, before he finally mustered up enough will to depress it.
The sky darkened imperceptibly as he stared off vacantly into space, not-quite taking in the broad horizon of skyscrapers and condominiums sillhouetted in bronze against the dying sunset.
His phone buzzed twice in his palm, but he didn't glance down.
It wasn't that the sendee's opinion was unimportant. It just didn't matter right now; the question could only have been meaningfully answered by someone else who no longer existed in his world.
In another reality... he took a drag from the cigarette cupped in his left hand, the one that he never did learn to smoke, put his 'phone back in his pocket, then stepped off the balcony into the nine-storey freefall towards yesterday.
Apathy is a little death, too. The death of the soul.
*****
In another reality...
...He leaned back against the railings and looked up towards the sky.
Maybe, he thought, I just have a thing for damsels in distress; maybe there's something infinitely beautiful about the way a girl's eyes soften and the mask she wears melts away, as she confides some secret inner pain to you. Maybe it's like, what was that they said, an orgasm, "a little death", a tiny moment of pure and unfettered honesty. Man, that's so fucked up.
And it didn't explain why it was so rare, and it didn't explain why he found the first beautiful, at all. Not in the least. She was beautiful from the moment he first met her, and she was almost always happy.
Now the sky, that was beautiful and he didn't even need to ponder why. He just knew. It was breathtakingly blue, and high above him, somewhat incongruously hung the ghostly white sickle-blade of a crescent moon.
Once in a blue moon. It's a kinda magic.
*****
In another reality...
...He didn't bother to take off his damply dripping overcoat as he stepped out of the eternal twilight, into the translucent yellow haze of a random pub.
Liquid amber swirled around the rim of his glass, framed by his hand as he stared morosely into its vertex, thinking nothing in particular.
Some random stranger blew smoke in his direction; he didn't even flinch as he breathed in the musty, slightly sour scent. She laughed, but not at him. It was just part of everyday, humdrum conversation, bastard words trickling by his skin, lost in the meaninglessness of now, dying into the past, remembered and cherished by nobody in particular.
He looked up, and for a moment the world seemed to come to a standstill as he thought he saw, across the room, someone who looked very much like her. But no, it couldn't be. Nah.
He looked back down into his drink. He was getting too old for silly dwellings on unimportant things.
In life, you have to get your priorities straight.
He glanced back up, and her eyes met his.
*****
...In another reality...
"Hello," She said, smiling in that amiable, familiar way she had about her.
"This is Ethan. Say hello, Ethan."
The bob of hair at her wrist glanced up at him, and grinned.
"Huwwo, mister".
He had his mother's eyes - warm, liquid brown, yet taunting. Not quite insolent... but engaging, with a faint air of daring you to an almost-confrontation about them; an unspoken challenge to a duel. Lively. Alive. Intelligent.
He knelt down and looked the child in the eye.
"Hello, Ethan" he said, sombrely, shaking the mini man by the hand.
And for some reason, he felt happy again, after the longest time of pretense.
*****
He watched impassively from his deckchair as the sky burnt itself out into an unearthly sheen of purple. It was a beautiful sight from way up here, and part of his brain duly took note of it, dully.
It was quiet here. The evening breeze caressed his skin lightly as he picked up his 'phone and idly thumbed in "Do you ever wonder what it is we are actually living for? Or are we just supposed to go looking for a reason."
His thumb lingered for a long while on the "send" button, before he finally mustered up enough will to depress it.
The sky darkened imperceptibly as he stared off vacantly into space, not-quite taking in the broad horizon of skyscrapers and condominiums sillhouetted in bronze against the dying sunset.
His phone buzzed twice in his palm, but he didn't glance down.
It wasn't that the sendee's opinion was unimportant. It just didn't matter right now; the question could only have been meaningfully answered by someone else who no longer existed in his world.
In another reality... he took a drag from the cigarette cupped in his left hand, the one that he never did learn to smoke, put his 'phone back in his pocket, then stepped off the balcony into the nine-storey freefall towards yesterday.
Apathy is a little death, too. The death of the soul.
