03-31-2021, 02:47 PM
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T he darkness twists her dreams into reality. Even though it feels unnatural and heavy on her skin, it calls to Kamaria with a mysterious song. It whispers about what used to be, what could have been, and what will be. In the hazy moments between awake and asleep, Kamaria sees her father fill their cave’s empty mouth. She hears his laugh, smells his warmth, feels his touch. Tiercel’s face is different every time; sometimes, he is a brilliant white to mirror her mother. Other times, he is darker than the shadows. Most of the time, he doesn’t have a face at all — just a soft glow radiating from atop his strong neck and a feeling that brings her peace.And as Islas talks, the shadows draw away like the beginning of a story. Kamaria pictures the vast expanse of Loess highlighted beneath a light that paints color into the stone. She imagines the twisting trees cutting their place out from among a crystal-blue sky. She watches as the shadows drag themselves into their homes, finding the shape of her body below her legs. When her eyes move toward Islas’s face, the girl sees how the warmth of the sun makes her mother’s ivory skin sparkle. Islas mentions the nighttime, and a mirror image dances across the girl’s mind. Her cream-and-navy face turns toward the sky, and she can almost see the stars. A galaxy spins above their heads, hundreds of perfectly-circular orbs floating through a swathe of midnight. Kamaria feels something call to her, a deep, primal instinct that makes her skin itch and her heart want to leap from her chest and run among those picturesque stars. She cannot understand the torrent of emotions that blossom within her mother, but Kamaria can sense their kindred spirits; she feels the twin cords tying them to something higher than Loess. “It sounds nice.” Perhaps one day, she will experience the things Islas mentions; eventually, she might witness the light and dark she sees only in her mind’s eye. “Do you miss it?” Then Kamaria pauses, another question burning so profoundly into her tongue she must spit it out. “Do you miss my dad?” |
credit to nat of adoxography.
@[Islas]