Sunset

SUNSET


                                                                       by Kariwani

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The boy was called Misae. Wispy white-blond hair blew across his face as he stood facing the wide and restless sea in front of him. He was beautiful. He stretched out his hands and cast his shadow on the waves. He had an amazing talent where he could tread on the water without ever getting himself wet. He could swim deep until he was floating in the depths on the aqua marine world and still he would not be wet. His heart, his soul, would continue to burn forever. There would never be an end to this beauty.

The girl was called Neona. She could see the warmth radiating from his sturdy frame. But all she could do was watch from afar. Few were the moments where she could even bring herself to step out from behind the white cliffs in daylight and take a step closer, an inch closer to the one she loved. The thought that this pale faced girl, this petit creature would ever step out beyond the safety of those white cliffs and out onto the sandy shore to speak a word to anyone was unimaginable. It was absurd. What would she say? Could she even talk? Those who lived in the town by the sea did not even know whether she had a name. No one had ever heard her whisper a word. And yet they knew of her silent existence. She was always there watching the waves from behind those rocks it seemed. Some believed her to be a ghost. Others believed she was the extension of their overactive imagination.

The boy took a step along the shore, at the edge of the water. Testing the waters—it was getting cooler. Of course, this is the nature of things; it was late afternoon. The water was not meant to be warm at this time of day. This time of day…. This time of day was crucial, quintessential. It was this fleeting moment everyday when everything would be alright. For a single moment everything would be still. People would look up and be amazed. He would stare across the water waiting for a familiar reflection. He saw his own face contorted as the waved flowed in and flowed out across the sand. He noticed his face becoming redder and redder. But this was the nature of things. This was to be expected.

Perhaps the time was 6 in the evening. He did not really know, nor did he care. He never cared for time in the sense that the others on the beach around him did. Day after day he would come here to these sandy shores and hear children laugh about, exclaiming that it was lunchtime! It was snack time! And mothers running after them a period later – It’s time to go home! It’s time for your naps. Time! Time! Time!

Time was all around him, but why should he care? He felt so young, so alive; time could not constrict him as it did the rest of the people. He could be free of time! And at this moment the boy realized he was invariably trapped, aged. He had lived for decades, centuries, millenniums! He saw the changing waters and he saw the way small children grew up into men and women. He saw it all, he lived through it, but he never experienced any of these things. He never really grew up. He was forever young.

The evenings were meant for reflection, for he would descend soon. Would that pale faced girl peek out from behind her home and greet him today? He doubted it. That would be absurd. That pale faced girl would never come to him, and he had no way to go to her. He looked back.

He knew she watched him. And he knew she knew.

The water grew menacingly darker.

Oh heavens! How she wished to be able to pull up the courage and step out onto the sandy beach. She tried, oh she tried, but it was not possible, it was not possible to walk onto the scorching sands, she would burn and die within the boy’s radiance. How much she wanted to throw her small arms around him and embrace him forever. Why is time so cruel? She couldn’t move! Her legs were fastened in place by silver stands to where she stood. Men and women, brothers and sisters, friends and lovers slowly moved away from the waters as the skies darkened. They could walk, one leg after the other to wherever they wanted to go, and she was here, so far above them, grasping onto the cliff for support, clutching onto the rock until her knuckles were painfully white, even against her pale skin, and aching to move. The boy was right there. She could run to him- she could run and run and run and run and run, if only she could work past those silver binds and break free.

But there were rules to follow of course. There were always rules to follow. With a heavy sigh she remembered hearing that there was a natural order of things in the world and no one could go against it. Time would pass. It would never stand still. Throw a rock up, it would fall down too. It always worked like that—there were always rules to follow. And it was nearly impossible to break those sacred rules.

Night would soon approach. Night would free her from her binds and then she would have but a moment to run free down the beach. She would have a single moment to run down to the boy, a single moment. The winds were getting colder and she could feel the silver binds loosening. Her whole body shook with the excitement to be able to move. No one would be on the beach and she could run as much as she wanted to.

Night would soon be coming on its way and the boy felt cold. He took a step into the water, without getting wet of course. The water could never make him wet. He did not wish it, but his left leg took another step, further into the water. The familiar sinking feeling returned to his stomach.
Another small step and then another. He couldn’t stop moving. He tried. He did not want to go. But the waves were so inviting. They were not cold. He would not fade. But the cold Night air was approaching and he had to go. The rules stated he had to go. He had to go because she was coming. Day was leaving and he was inevitably bound to the Day.

The shadows of Night slowly started to descend from the rocky cliffs. The girl tried to wiggle free; she wanted to run. It would all be up to her and time was working too fast. She would have to run quickly. Night was so oblivious to their love. And Day was so pitiless.

It must have lasted a mere second for the shadow to reach where she stood and that second could have lasted all eternity. Shadow engulfed the girl and her pale skin shone in the dark. As the darkness touched her feet the silver strands melted away, and freed her from those confines. She could move! She could rise! As long as Night’s shadows protected her from the heat of the Day she could move. She glanced ahead—

He glanced up. A difficult task for he was already waist deep within the waters. He saw her move and he saw the shadows of night approaching. This was it. This was the moment he waited for. He would use all his strength not to sink now into the waves. His legs, leaden with his body mass quickened their pace. Day was pulling him into the waters and Night was chasing right behind him. He could hear his own heart, so young and so old, beating furiously in his ear…

…And the sound of water. He was sinking and sinking. Would she make it? Would she come to him?

The girl ran down the sandy beach with all her strength, spending all her energy from being tied down the entire day into this one fleeting moment. She had to make it! She had to! She had to reach the boy, the boy she loved. She had to tell him she loved him so!

The sands were covered in purples and pinks and everything became engulfed with Night’s shadows. She was close. She was so close, she could see the boy’s wispy hair and could scarcely imagine how soft it must feel. She was almost there. She was almost at the end of the water—

The boy was up to his neck in the water and was trying desperately to hold on. The shadows would push him down and the waves were coaxing him with slumber. It was getting dark…so dark…..and the water rocked like a cradle ….so inviting…..  His eyelids grew heavy and he was sure that he was already dreaming. And still, he could not resist but to try and hold on for this one last second. Reaching up his glowing hand surfaced above the water.

No…. no, no, no! Not yet not yet! It’s too fast. Time is too fast! The girl had barely made it to the water’s edge and the boy was almost completely submerged. No, no no! She couldn’t step into the water. She had to stay there on the beach. She had to; it was written in the rules. No, not after all this! Not after he held out for her so long and she had run so fast. No! She reached her hand out, never actually touching the water. It was too dark to see. No, his light was already fading and she herself began to glow dimly.

And for a second, perhaps less than a second, their hands brushed, above the waves. The boy sinking deeper and deeper and the girl reaching out after him. Not enough strength left to grasp each other’s hands, the contact was over as soon as it started. And in the next second they were not touching anymore.

The boy sank deep down, and fell into slumber. The girl sighed exhaustedly and looked out at the dark waves before she stepped away from the water. Day was gone, and Night loomed in the air. Her love, her bright light was gone again, taken away.

Would she ever be able to embrace him she wondered. She failed this moment but the lovers would have another chance when the boy awoke. She would wait here, she would not walk away, she would wait until dawn.






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