Flash Freeze

February 2, 2018April 5, 2018 ~ Piece, of the Sky

sea

Alli hadn’t been back there in half a decade. The sun was setting, making its slow, crepuscular descent. Alli sat on the park bench facing the water’s edge

The sea approached and receded. Alli sat, buttoned up in her winter coat, battling the January wind.

New Year’s Day.

They had spent New Year’s Day together. They had held mittened hands. Walked by Chinese groceries, with crustaceans hung up by their tails, fish markets that left the sidewalks slippery.

Now, Alli had no idea where she was. Dallas had disappeared into the lengthy line of Facebook friends.

Alli pulled up her collar against the chill. Summer days. December snow. “But here I am again,” Alli thought. The wind pushed the water. And endless cycle of oncoming waves.

The sun touched the horizon, bathing the bench and asphalt in a rough, red-orange glow. Dallas had never returned from Australia. Got lost somewhere along the way in Louisiana. Chasing new espers. Jan had been right.

The wind began to cut and Alli pulled further into her coat. Her cellphone rang; it was Dani, “Are you coming to the game?”

“I went to the store,” Alli said.

“Come by my house. Aspen just got here with beer.” Dani said.

“OK,” Alli replied. She ended the call, swiping the virtual red icon on the screen. She stared out over the vista, as the sky went from yellow to gray. Night was coming. The frigid wind picked up, pulling Big Gulp cups across the sidewalk.

Alli walked up and leaned on the railing. On the other side of the world, the sun was rising.

back home

Songs:

Cosmastly – ALAZAY CA$TAWAY

コンシャスTHOUGHTS – 空バウンド (based on “The Glow of Love,” by Luther Vandross)

BACKWHEN – Ｍｉａｍｉ

Related: The Vampire and Ghost Flavor

A Falsifiable Life

January 31, 2018February 25, 2018 ~ Piece, of the Sky ~ 1 Comment

hey

The sky was the hardest azure overhead. Alli watched the faintest trails of clouds go by in the grass. The blades swayed around her head. From every which way, came the smell of new growth. A grasshopper bounded into view, and just as quickly, vanished.

A biplane puttered across the vista, made its way from one side of the sky to the other, leaving a ghostly line of exhaust. Alli lay there, with her arms stretched out on the ground. She closed her eyes. The world was alive, bustling, quaking with life in the summer – but at the same time, the land was tranquil, still, breathing.

A tiny flower touched Alli’s nose. Alli opened her eyes and saw Lara reaching over her. Lara in a white, lacy dress. Lara wearing a big, joking smile.

“Sleepyhead,” she said, reclining next to her.

“It was a very nice dream,” Alli answered.

Lara motioned for her to get up. She grabbed Alli’s hand and play-dragged her across the field. Green hills loomed in the distance, but Lara pulled her toward the forest-edge.

The forest was dark as the meadow was bright, damp and cool as the grass was dry and warm. Some yards away, they could hear the gurgle of a brook. The soil was darker, covered in wood chips. The heavy wood also breathed, enriching the air with a deep, musky scent.

Alli ran after her, the trail of Lara’s dress flying as they ran. Lara had woven more tiny white flowers into her own hair. She had long, nearly, sunburnt arms, covered with freckles. She let go of Alli’s hand and turned around, twirling her dress as she walked. “I found something,” she said.

Lara pointed at a spot near the edge of the woods, hidden in the shade. Creeping weeds and vines curled around it, but the area itself was empty and bare. No vegetation grew there, not even lichens. The ground was perfectly circumscribed by a line of mushroom caps. “A fairy ring,” Alli said.

“There’s a couple that grow around here,” Lara said, “The earth is so moist all the time. The fungi just take root.”

Alli made a wish and began to walk through the ring. She stopped in the center, staring at a skull in the ground.

“It’s a deer,” Lara explained. Near the skull, Alli could still make out some scattered ribs. “It seems to have died right here,” Alli said, peering at the bones in the gloom.

Lara walked beside the edge of the ring. One might imagine tiny fairies skipping from mushroom to mushroom. Or sitting cross-legged on them, holding a council. “The body fed this ring,” Lara said.

Alli felt a chill, and skin prickling, she looked once again to the yellow-green grass basking in the overexposed light. The wind blew the heat of the afternoon sun into the hole in the woods.

The white of the skull glinted in the dimness. Alli stepped out of the fairy circle, and followed Lara back to the vegetable farm, where her fellow graduate students were working, tilling their gardens.

belief

Songs:
– String Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 11: 02 Andante cantabile, Arranged for orchestra by Marriner — Tchaikovsky
– U2, “Mysterious Ways”
– Messiah, oratorio, HWV 56: “I know that my Redeemer liveth” — Handel