Sun rise today was more beautiful than one would expect on Buckeye. The shabby stuck-o houses were a more vibrant orange in the morning light then their paint managed on its own. The trees clinging to life around the street were beginning to wake up from their brief winter’s sleep. One particularly large tree looked as though it would not wake up this year. Its tall frame was a cold ash-brown like one of the foothills that rose opposite the house the tree stood beside.
Underneath its bare branches stood the owner of the house. He gazed out past the immediate raven just beyond his yard to inspect the sun peaking over the hills. The twigs above him painted dark lines across his face which constantly changed with the movement of the wind somehow fitting the musing hidden within his buried brow.
The sun finally overcame the far off hill, beaming the warm morning light in a new found strength. Its yellow light stung his eyes yet it had already blinded him, reducing everything else to dark silhouettes. The man’s liquid blue eyes began to tear though he refused to look away. Brushing them away quickly his hands remembered the stubble creeping across his face.
Suddenly everything was back in motion. The trees were hissing with the new breeze and the grass whipped and scratched about his bare feet and legs. Below the house in the valley someone could be heard yelling in reply to a barking dog. Even the flowers seemed in a hurry to live. The sounds of cars on the nearby highway were in roaring chorus. The house itself was full of sounds hustling and bustling as the day began.
The man looked from the house to the sun rise again. The inevitable union with the chaos he could already hear inside. He stole only a few moments more as the wind settled a moment longer. Something evaded his lips, a word that to think it was too loud an utterance. It was a question he couldn’t bring himself to reason, a hope he loved only a little more then he hated.
He drew another deep breath looking out over the horizon. In a moment another gust of wind swirled around him. The grass hissed and the leaves which scratched over his feet tumbled on the ground. The sun was still rising peaking from the clouds that had made the morning so beautiful.
His eye could no longer dare to look up into the sun, her beauty leaving him wet eyed and blind, he focused back down onto the valley before him. It grew more detailed as daylight began to fill the crevasse.
The trees bellow were more dead than alive, their brittle branches were adding to the roaring torrent around him, birds and children’s screams could be heard off a ways. Everything came pouring in at once. Sound, feel, sight, flooding in, all saying so much but the meaning eluded him.
“Kirk?” someone called from the house.
“WHERE?—” he yelped with a jump. Embarrassed he turned back to see if someone had heard the word which had leapt from some dark recess of a thought. Much to his relief the call had come from some room deep within and from a voice far too preoccupied to notice him.
He stood alone under the tree and looked back once more to the view below. One more moment of peace, even though it and everything around him seemed to be casting him out of this serenity. Something desperate welled again inside; a cry too broken for a living soul to hear and almost too much for one to carry. He held it within him a moment longer along with all the air in his lungs. The wind began to pick up again. The chaos resumed this time it did not cease. Something sounding like broken glass came from the house only this time the different kinds of turmoil were as one and the man could no longer distinguish the hiding place from what he hid from. Everything rushed back into his senses; he could feel the ache in his chest beginning to wane.
Over come, now with the fear of losing it he dropped to his knees unconsciously plugging his ears with his hands. Once in the new found silences everything else fell away. He could feel his heart beat and hear his breath in his ears. The ache within him throbbed to the beat, he had no idea he was so attached to it.
“No,” he breathed, the words a gain escaping from his lips from some deep dark recess.
“Where are you?” He gasped, the thought of these words being released seemed so momentous, but when spoken they were dull and awkward. It was all in a language so clumsy for such a deep cry.
I am right here
Everything stopped.
The man opened his eyes, realizing only then that he had shut them. The wind, not even a breath and the light around him, was again soft and yellow. His hands relaxed to his sides as he stood silence blanketed the air which seemed thin around him. He looked around at the grass which was also still until his eyes fell upon a pair of feet. Following them up to the face of their owner he discovered that he was not alone. The embarrassment of what might have been witnessed flushed embarrassment across the man’s face with a small spike of anger.
What?
“What?” said the man. Somehow the only thing sillier then what he said was how he had felt only moments before.
They stood, simply stood there. The man was unable to come up with something to say, and the other man seemed unwilling to help him out. They stood and nothing passed before them, everything had already been played out upon the man’s face, though something deep within burst at the seams to get out. Something so much like the ache in his chest, though it was no longer a hollow feeling but one that overflowed.
“What are you doing here?” the man asked when he could no longer take the yearning within him. The foolishness of his words were only fully realized once they were ringing through their ears.
“What am I doing here? What are you---”
“I—I mean you’re here,” he burst; his breath seemed to be in some far off place while his words were everywhere at once.
“I am,”
The other man smiled in a way that lit up his whole face and the face of the man. His eyes shone like part of the sunrise itself as though he was a part of the scenery, or perhaps, he even dulled it in comparison.
“I see,” said the man still out of breath. The deep goodness which swelled within him was now contented to stand forever more in this silence while his mouth was not. “Well that’s, good.”
The other man could hold back in his smile no longer a loud ringing laugh with shook the trees and mountains alike. A great, warm, rich tone which made the man’s knees knock beneath him though he felt stronger now than ever.
“I am”
P.S. happy birthday siss...
Love it! *:)
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