I call my ankles by your name. When my mother dipped me in the river, she was introducing us.
That is it, isn’t it?
I hear the words, but feel, instead, the press of him against the alcove of my neck and shoulder. If I wanted, I might have chosen to view this moment as one of absolute safety; as a private sphere where only he and I exist. I glimpse only his outline in the dark of Damascus’s grasp; soft, and gold; the length of his lashes that brush so, so gently against my cheek.
My stomach is in my throat. I blame the flying, the steep decline, the way the air rushes past in an audible scream.
(It is not the descent).
No. It is Adonai’s warm breath, and the flash of his eyes, full of wonder. I do not answer, aside from that brightness of my own expression—but what I want to say, as Damascus takes us down to the seaside, is in this moment, we are gods forever.
But forevers never last; and before I know it he is stepping away from me onto the wet sand, and the aspect of myself that will always be conqueror, will always be warrior, thinks:
For the rest of his life, when he sees the sea he will think of me.
It will be my name upon the horizon. My name is written into the wet, strange sand. My name is on the breeze. My name is in his eyes when he turns back toward me, wearing an expression I have never quite seen before in my life. I recognize pain. I do not recognize this pain, not fully—and I briefly wonder if this had been a mistake, until he answers. I don’t feel like myself out here. For that alone—I both love and fear it.
There is so much within me.
There is so much within me, clamoring to escape; words unsaid; promises unkept; wants and needs and hatreds contending within the too-small space of my heart. To save. To condemn. My expression flashes, briefly, with this turmoil—before I settle on a smile, small and perhaps too sad for the occasion.
“The sea is the thing that taught me love and hate and fear are not all so different,” I confess, with a lover’s quiet tongue. A voice for bedrooms, and poetry, and promises of more I cannot make.
He is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen, silhouetted before the too-blue waves. Ethereal. He is halfway to celestial; gold, and gold again, with the soft omnipotence of otherness. Does he not know, he is what is other? And yet—I know I cannot be gentle enough with him. I know the way my affections corrode, even the most extraordinary.
I know the way I cannot help but ruin those I touch.
I had stood away, only a few feet back as he dropped to his knees in the gentle surf—but I can no longer restrain myself. It was his wing, outstretched—his wing, which reached to touch me and then decided otherwise. I do not refrain.
Because I am already doing the unforgivable. I touch the soft hair at the nape of his neck with my nose; I let the wind whip it, stinging, across my cheek before I lay it flat against his side. Brief. So, brief—and then I am pulling away. Not at all. You will think me ignorant, but I hadn’t expected for it to be quite so—other. He touches me, and it is my undoing.
I smile a knowing smile. Because, after all, I understand. After all this time, I belong to the sea in a way that I belong to nothing else. It is the only thing that remains familiar in this turbulent life. “I do not think you ignorant. Quite the opposite, in fact. Most are awestruck, and captivated by the beauty. I do not think it is beautiful—I think… it is as you say. Other. But it’s taken me almost a lifetime to understand that.”
I listen quietly as he tells me of Vitae Oasis, and his companion—when he draws away, I want to pursue the line of conversation, and file away my questions for later. I do not fear Adonai’s past; I do not fear it because I know it cannot be as terrible as my own, and—well, I understand the importance of companions. "Perhaps you could take me sometime. You could show me." I do not know why it already seems too late to ask.
My mouth is dry when he looks at me; he smiles back, and I imagine it is as unconvincing as my own. He remarks on my different disposition. You are quiet, today. It makes me feel strange.
I always find myself wanting to lie to him. I always find myself wanting to be someone else, beneath his gaze. I think, briefly, of my interaction with Ruth—how she had seemed so unimpressed when I remarked on Adonai. But then again, she seemed unimpressed about everything.
But this is why, I think. This is why he has somehow become special to me; he makes me want to tell the truth, even when a lie would be easier; even when a lie comes more readily to my lips. I take too long to respond, I think; looking not quite at him, but beyond him, toward the horizon.
“My entire life, I fought a war by the sea.” I admit, aloud. It feels fable-like; as if the confession belongs to someone else, or is a line from a story I once read, but did not live. “It—it is strange, to be by it, and feel no fear.”
I cannot explain the gravity that draws me to him; a meteor in orbit; a meteor that will collide, doubtlessly, in a way that causes damage. This, however, is gentle—it is the quiet flick of my leonine tail against the top of the waves, spraying him gently with an elegant fan of water.
(And, I suppose, I do not give him the full truth—I do not tell him that Damascus holds several vials of silver pegasus blood that looks like starlight liquified. I do not tell him that I have done an atrocious thing—perhaps, because, I do not even recognize it as atrocious—in order to… see if I can save him).
I meet his eyes, and smile—it is the first one since the chestnut tree that seems genuine. Then, however, I cannot help but somber, when I ask:
“Adonai? Why do you not want to be saved?” I cannot meet his eyes when I ask it; because in the asking, there is an underlying question. If I could save you, would you let me?
I wish I did not feel so mortal, here. I wish I could not feel my pulse in my throat; or that I did not feel the reminiscent sting in my leg, from my fall by the sea. I wish the gentle lull of the waves did not remind me so unforgivably of Khashran singing beneath the waves; an eerie call, unrepeatable, unexplainable. I have seen too many die by the sea, to not feel as if upon it's precipice one is closer to the dawning, and ending, of life.
A man is always mortal. Even when they fool themselves into believing a moment has the capability of being eternal. The sunset has become the color of a two-day bruise. There is a color of blue on the horizon that exists only in this twilight moment; that exists only as the sun first disappears, and the sky and sea kiss.
There, and gone.
I hear the words, but feel, instead, the press of him against the alcove of my neck and shoulder. If I wanted, I might have chosen to view this moment as one of absolute safety; as a private sphere where only he and I exist. I glimpse only his outline in the dark of Damascus’s grasp; soft, and gold; the length of his lashes that brush so, so gently against my cheek.
My stomach is in my throat. I blame the flying, the steep decline, the way the air rushes past in an audible scream.
(It is not the descent).
No. It is Adonai’s warm breath, and the flash of his eyes, full of wonder. I do not answer, aside from that brightness of my own expression—but what I want to say, as Damascus takes us down to the seaside, is in this moment, we are gods forever.
But forevers never last; and before I know it he is stepping away from me onto the wet sand, and the aspect of myself that will always be conqueror, will always be warrior, thinks:
For the rest of his life, when he sees the sea he will think of me.
It will be my name upon the horizon. My name is written into the wet, strange sand. My name is on the breeze. My name is in his eyes when he turns back toward me, wearing an expression I have never quite seen before in my life. I recognize pain. I do not recognize this pain, not fully—and I briefly wonder if this had been a mistake, until he answers. I don’t feel like myself out here. For that alone—I both love and fear it.
There is so much within me.
There is so much within me, clamoring to escape; words unsaid; promises unkept; wants and needs and hatreds contending within the too-small space of my heart. To save. To condemn. My expression flashes, briefly, with this turmoil—before I settle on a smile, small and perhaps too sad for the occasion.
“The sea is the thing that taught me love and hate and fear are not all so different,” I confess, with a lover’s quiet tongue. A voice for bedrooms, and poetry, and promises of more I cannot make.
He is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen, silhouetted before the too-blue waves. Ethereal. He is halfway to celestial; gold, and gold again, with the soft omnipotence of otherness. Does he not know, he is what is other? And yet—I know I cannot be gentle enough with him. I know the way my affections corrode, even the most extraordinary.
I know the way I cannot help but ruin those I touch.
I had stood away, only a few feet back as he dropped to his knees in the gentle surf—but I can no longer restrain myself. It was his wing, outstretched—his wing, which reached to touch me and then decided otherwise. I do not refrain.
Because I am already doing the unforgivable. I touch the soft hair at the nape of his neck with my nose; I let the wind whip it, stinging, across my cheek before I lay it flat against his side. Brief. So, brief—and then I am pulling away. Not at all. You will think me ignorant, but I hadn’t expected for it to be quite so—other. He touches me, and it is my undoing.
I smile a knowing smile. Because, after all, I understand. After all this time, I belong to the sea in a way that I belong to nothing else. It is the only thing that remains familiar in this turbulent life. “I do not think you ignorant. Quite the opposite, in fact. Most are awestruck, and captivated by the beauty. I do not think it is beautiful—I think… it is as you say. Other. But it’s taken me almost a lifetime to understand that.”
I listen quietly as he tells me of Vitae Oasis, and his companion—when he draws away, I want to pursue the line of conversation, and file away my questions for later. I do not fear Adonai’s past; I do not fear it because I know it cannot be as terrible as my own, and—well, I understand the importance of companions. "Perhaps you could take me sometime. You could show me." I do not know why it already seems too late to ask.
My mouth is dry when he looks at me; he smiles back, and I imagine it is as unconvincing as my own. He remarks on my different disposition. You are quiet, today. It makes me feel strange.
I always find myself wanting to lie to him. I always find myself wanting to be someone else, beneath his gaze. I think, briefly, of my interaction with Ruth—how she had seemed so unimpressed when I remarked on Adonai. But then again, she seemed unimpressed about everything.
But this is why, I think. This is why he has somehow become special to me; he makes me want to tell the truth, even when a lie would be easier; even when a lie comes more readily to my lips. I take too long to respond, I think; looking not quite at him, but beyond him, toward the horizon.
“My entire life, I fought a war by the sea.” I admit, aloud. It feels fable-like; as if the confession belongs to someone else, or is a line from a story I once read, but did not live. “It—it is strange, to be by it, and feel no fear.”
I cannot explain the gravity that draws me to him; a meteor in orbit; a meteor that will collide, doubtlessly, in a way that causes damage. This, however, is gentle—it is the quiet flick of my leonine tail against the top of the waves, spraying him gently with an elegant fan of water.
(And, I suppose, I do not give him the full truth—I do not tell him that Damascus holds several vials of silver pegasus blood that looks like starlight liquified. I do not tell him that I have done an atrocious thing—perhaps, because, I do not even recognize it as atrocious—in order to… see if I can save him).
I meet his eyes, and smile—it is the first one since the chestnut tree that seems genuine. Then, however, I cannot help but somber, when I ask:
“Adonai? Why do you not want to be saved?” I cannot meet his eyes when I ask it; because in the asking, there is an underlying question. If I could save you, would you let me?
I wish I did not feel so mortal, here. I wish I could not feel my pulse in my throat; or that I did not feel the reminiscent sting in my leg, from my fall by the sea. I wish the gentle lull of the waves did not remind me so unforgivably of Khashran singing beneath the waves; an eerie call, unrepeatable, unexplainable. I have seen too many die by the sea, to not feel as if upon it's precipice one is closer to the dawning, and ending, of life.
A man is always mortal. Even when they fool themselves into believing a moment has the capability of being eternal. The sunset has become the color of a two-day bruise. There is a color of blue on the horizon that exists only in this twilight moment; that exists only as the sun first disappears, and the sky and sea kiss.
There, and gone.
