All is still.
A distant voice calls; birds chirp, and trees whisper in an ancient tongue. I sit beside a boulder watching the river thaw itself back to life and wonder, “Is this really what is left of me?”
Change overtook me. A torrent of an unfamiliar consciousness swept me into a new reality. I became bound to it as it flowed on. Accustomed to the new everyday life, where all else is irrelevant, all besides It. It seems so distant now.
The birds are still chirping and the trees are babbling in their ancient tongues. I must get going. A path emerges before me; branches protrude from its sides and veil everything surrounding the path. Only a speck of outside light reaches my eyes. A barely discernible detail catches my glimpse: a beam of light converging in the distance; a hand stretches out towards me. Glimmer arises at the path’s end and leads me forward.
I set foot into the partially defrosted water. My steps are careful. The goal lies within arm’s reach, the closest I’ve ever come. So I carry now a single burden: reaching the other side. But another emerges. The call of the memories within becomes louder, overtaking me with each step I take towards the path. It bangs in my mind. I shut my eyes to silence them, but my step wanders and I slip on a mossy stone, toppling over and submerging myself in the freezing water. Getting back on my feet was a chore.
Mother appears behind a tree to my left side and calls out in an unfamiliar voice. I can see through her. My gaze slips to the other side. A lamp post materializes. I see myself and Him standing below its flickering bulb, our eyes sparkle with hope as we lean in for our first kiss. We disappear for a brief moment, and reappear two years older. Not a trace of glimmer in our eyes or purity in our souls. His face deprived of life, grey hairs emerging on his head, we gaze at each other, the tenderness that once warmed us now a distant memory. We end it all.
I turn around. The boulder is still there. Like a monolith.
On the top sits father in his usual dusty suit. I cannot remember him differently. Crossing his legs and hunching his back as he always did, and holding in between his hands a wood planer, he raises his head and looks at me. His mouth flutters.
“Is this really what is left of you?” he says, and the stretch marks on his forehead deepen as his eyes widen and sparkle. But he never shed a tear, even now.
I turn around immediately. In front of me, I see the path shrinking; my step towards the coast hastens. I manage to silence them, if only for a moment.
A distant bell sounds. And the structure forms. A mother’s call, a father’s love, the first love and heartbreak bind.
Memories begin flowing.
And I defeat myself once more.
There never existed an obstacle too large to overcome or a goal unachievable. I always latched onto the side of pride and conformities until one day It entered my life unannounced and took all that is me with itself. No returning from this point.
Yet I fought; moving forward despite always being pulled back to the same place each time.
It consumed my essence – my clothes, my thoughts, even my soul mirrored my perceived perfection of It. All my actions were devoted to imitating Its. I could not see further than that. Truly, beauty in its purest form. The possibility of It noticing me, however fleetingly, gave my life meaning: just a single moment, a glimpse of my clothes, my hair, everything mirroring Its perfection, would bring me lifelong happiness.
All it took was a smile and a brief gaze – nothing but a mere setback in Its perfect life. Yet even something as trifling as a gaze became an insurmountable barrier. The only goal unachievable.
So the wilderness comforted me. The birds chirped their song each morning, leading me to their shelters hidden deep in the forest. Never have I ever declined their call.
It took about an hour of walking to reach their shelter: the eagle’s hut. I would join their gatherings there, sitting in complete silence, while they salvaged today’s prey. Sometimes, the bigger birds set out with the aim of comforting my meandering. And it always seemed as if we faced the same obstacles, albeit from different perspectives.
A couple of years passed. A few more. I could not recall a day passing without me visiting the eagle’s hut, even after they had stopped gathering there.
They abandoned the hut in search for a better shelter. Still, I came back to it every day, spending my time sitting on the boulder to the hut’s left side, and only entering once in a while to check up on the wooden flooring.
A river flowed under the boulder. It helped me watch the seasons change.
Green water indicated summer. Leaves flowing on the river’s surface meant that autumn had already begun desolating the landscape. Ice holding the river captive assured me it was wintertime. And spring: it vanished with the last piece of me that belonged to the world beyond this place.
I cannot recall the last time the flowers began blooming anew. Have we ever really woken up? Has spring ever occurred?
It seems to me as if it has always been this way.
“Is this really what is left of me? And all else?” I say to myself as I step foot out of the freezing water and reach the coast.
The entrance to the path remained in the same place, but shrunk considerably in comparison to the moment it appeared. At the end shone the light of It. I rush forward.
A step away from the entrance, a familiar voice calls to me from afar. A phantom of a distant memory. Mother. As I turn around to see her eyes for the last time, I see her rushing towards me with arms open wide, exclaiming my name.
No more.
I step foot through the entrance. Turning around to bid the world farewell and have one last look at the hut, I’m greeted with the sight of a mother’s kneeling and weeping. That was all she ever knew.
Was it worth it? Has all the time you spent making me feel I was worth more than all others brought you any good in life? Your never-ending patting on the back, treating me like some sort of creature incapable of an independent life. Your constant wailing about the difficulties you faced providing for me.
And you got nothing in return!
The more I look at the path before me, the longer it appears to be. Its light lingers at the end and grows dimmer. A clock hangs from a branch. Time stretches here. What feels like a second passes slower than an hour in the world below. I hold my breath, close my eyes, and count to ten, only to open them and see the minute hand had only moved a fraction of a millimeter. Is this how It spends Its days? Perhaps that is how It reaches perfection. This place offers almost an infinite amount of time for contemplating every word and action.
“You held me too tight,” I murmur, voice barely a whisper. “But I never asked you to let go.”
No answer was to be heard.
So I advanced towards Its source. Towards the light. Burning whispers repeating my name, the branches descending onto the path to block the only passage towards the source. I lie low and crawl through them.
“Why do you hide?” I say as a tree collapses onto me and pins me to the ground, almost suffocating me. There is no way out now.
“What is it you want?” It responds.
“To see you. And to be seen.”
“And to be me, I suppose?”
A chilly wind blew. The tree pinning me down stripped me of my clothes and carried me to another place.
“I could never,” I say as the tree winds me up into a sling.
“You know it all too well. Let me go. There’s much more ahead of you.”
Clouds pass over me; I enter them. They thicken and congregate around my body. A belt strangles my neck. Breathless, through them I watch Its light shimmer in the distance.
All is fading. Cold and blank.
“Is this really what is left of you?” It asks.
My thoughts speak as my mouth remains silent. The image of father hunching his back with a wood planer in his hands appears before my shut eyes.
“I see.” It responds. And I realize my thoughts are Its. All my visions.
My throat released for a second, the clouds dilute.
“Am I really you?” I ask, gasping for air.
“Always were.”
The clouds thicken once more. Pressure building around my throat. Suffocation.
As my eyes shut again, I utter one last sentence.
“Never let me go.”
A forced entry into my mind, they emerge from the world I left behind: mother, father, the first love and heartbreak. I see before me a world worth living in and dying for, a world free of Its presence.
I see myself growing old, a footpath in front of me leading to our house, in front of which our children play. I see them growing up. Him by my side.
An apple tree blossoms. The grass is green. I see with my eyes spring for the first time. We approach our kids and sit beside them on the porch of our woodland cabin.
I gaze at his eyes and find in them the meaning of life. Warmth from his acceptance overtakes me.
Mother and father appear in front of us.
“We love you for who you are. Always and forever.”
Their faces young and full of life, they smile as we walk towards them to shake hands and start chattering about our everyday routine.
Mother is standing before me with arms wide open. I fall into her grasp feeling her arms tightening me stronger than ever before.
I close my eyes and whisper, “I love you.” All goes silent. Mother’s arms drop to the floor. I open my eyes and see nothing but darkness.
I feel a winter breeze bringing snowflakes my way. One hits my eye and the darkness dissipates.
To my side is the boulder, beneath my feet is the river.
Am I dreaming?
The water is frozen again.
All remains still.