Leftover Resonance

May 12, 2018May 12, 2018 ~ Piece, of the Sky

The rain splattered on the leaves, rolling off them. The ground was saturated, the tree trunks soaked.

Alli lay on the bedspread and stared up at the ceiling. A familiar room. A solution to so many wants.

“I’ve wanted you to come over and watch a movie, for the longest time,” Jan was saying. Her voice seemed to come from far away, from deep underwater – from an ancient, sandy ocean floor.

“Do you ever think you could leave her?” Jan lit a cigarette. Menthol smoke filled the air. Alli breathed it in and glanced at Jan.

“Do you think you could ever love me again?” A voice in the darkness, “You don’t seem to love Ran.”

Alli did not trust herself to speak. Instead, she looked out the window, at the endless lines of water running down the oaks, in the summer night.

She didn’t say anything. She turned around and slowly re-crossed her arms. At this moment in time. At this juncture, at this crossroads, Alli wanted to reserve judgement.

Jan ground out the cigarette in the ashtray on the dresser and turned her full attention back to the TV. A nightingale sang, unperturbed by the downpour.

Songs

“No More Tears Left to Cry” – Ariana Grande

“Love on the Brain” – Rihanna

“November Rain” – Guns N’ Roses

“Purple Rain” – Prince

Modernist Dream

April 28, 2018May 20, 2018 ~ Piece, of the Sky

Nealy stood in the wood-paneled study, in her beige suit and red ascot. She poured a glass of wine from the glass decanter. Lightning illuminated the room, splitting the sky in two. The faint lamplight flickered across her face.

Alli sat in front of her, in a simple cashmere sweater and jeans. The rain raged outside, racing down the windows and pouring onto the balcony nearby.

The darkness pressed in on them, suffocating and urgent. All along the walls were tomes, ancient, leather-bound manuscripts, shrouded in dust, some of them written hundreds of years ago.

“There can be no future, without the past,” Nealy growled. Thunder snapped and cracked, in the distance. She poured a second glass for Alli. The scarlet liquid seemed to hover in the air, forever suspended in time, even as it flowed inevitably to its endpoint.

Alli stopped glancing around, and looked back at Nealy, her eyes flashing with a look that could have also cut the sky into pieces, “If that was the case, Nealy, then why did you leave me?”

The thunder grumbled in reply, rolling mindlessly, over the hills dotting the landscape.