LeBlanc / 7

[qdesjardin]

7

In the wide open field of roses, he wanders. The sky a vast, open vale of deep blue hues. He could call the tall flowers roses, but they are not all red, some of them are white and fuchesia and even golden, and they bear no thorns upon their stems, so it is alright for him to move freely through the field, for they would want no harm to do him.

A breeze blows, and some of the pollen from the pedals float up and get carried away in the airs, and some of them would get caught on his face, near his eyes and his nose, and it would make his eyes water, and his nose want to sneeze in pleasurable exhaultation.

He doesn't remember ever being allergic to anything, let alone these flowers.

It is ticklish, being in this field.

And who is that waiting for him in the distance, with her back turned? He sees her wearing a pure black-and-white silken dress, which wavers as the air blows, and the loneliness of solitude getting to him, he decides to run over to her.

He knows her black hair, and her delicate form.

The same sadness is there in her eyes, as he's always remembered. He can stare into them, and it is Chopin's music which echoes in his recognition of the depths and the hypnotic abyss where all notes echo in the emptiness.

And when she smiles at him, it is a real smile.

So he is with her, and now they are on a bare, dark stage, with the dim lighting revealing only her lithe silhouette and her face is cast in shadow, and he smells her very resonately as she cradles him in her arms as they dance, bare feet on the black ground.

One two three, one two three, like how his dance teacher would always say when the timely music is playing.

He is so close in her presence, and his skin is touching her bare skin, and it is both warm and cool as they hold onto each other against the chill air, for warmth is a feeling foreign to this abstract environment. They must make their own warmth, the warmth of breathing, of being, of their hearts beating and their exhaled breaths expelled from their lungs.

So she holds him against her ripe breasts, and her nipple rubs by his cheek as he feels the bone of her rib cage, her heart thumping faintly yet vividly, and the little quivers of her breathing now getting excited.

Her fingers slide down his back, her hands reaching under his arms, and it is like she draws out the sweat from within his epidermal shell, and a strange aura of excited arousal runs through him; he is spinning around and around with her, the eye of the vortex centred by the space between their feet, and the air whooshes around them, riding a merry-go-round at the amusement park, the ride floating over everything else on the Earth, blue oceans and green fields and all the city lights which resemble stars and Christmas decorations and the pinball machines at the arcade.

And he can see the game machines with which he used to so eagerly play, as a petite child, before they've renovated the area and it became a mere coffee shop, the tables lining by the windows, the serving counter where Contra and BioMenace used to be.

See, this was the game he's enjoyed so much, on BioMenace when all the mutant monsters have flooded the underground base, and it is up to him (as Snake Plissken) to set up all the turrets and obtain all the ammunitions before the mutants arrive in swarms after swarms, and it is an endurance test to see how long he can prolong their numbers until the timer runs out.

All the people would stand by and cheer him on, waiting until his win or loss, upon which he would relish the excitement he's felt and watch how the other kids (and sometimes grown-ups) would play the arcade game.

He teaches her the controls and time seems to fly as she tries and tries again, pumping an endless number of quarters into the machine until she makes it to the top #10 list, upon where she is asked to input her name to be recorded in fame for those to come.

As much as he wants to see her actual name, he doesn't get to; instead, she inputs his own name, because, as she tells him, he was the one who wanted her to play, indulge herself on a taste of his cherished fun.

Then he starts to grow tired, his eyes gnawing with the ache of his mind having exerted itself in continuous activity for too long.

He thinks of a cozy bed he would like to rest in, the best bed that he's known, and fear not, for he is in an exquisite bedroom where the dark rosy, velvet bedsheets await the imprint of his body weight.

But first, he must wash, and he enters the blank washroom without the curtains on the shower, and the tub is filled almost to the brim with comfortably steaming water, where he gladly sheds his clothes and peeks his toes into the liquid, finding it the perfect warmth (not too scalding, nor lukewarm) and dips the rest of himself, legs and thighs and torso and finally his chest into the ocean of peace.

What comes to mind is the yellow duckie he played with as a young toddler, when he would take baths with mother who would rub his hair and skin with bubbly lather from the soap; how he wishes he can relive such an innocent time, an era bygone before the word 'independence' is thrust upon his life and he must learn to endure the separation from the intimate touch and warmth of mere, and the eventual absence of his pere.

His eyes are closed and he imagines swirls of sparks and gaseous forms that emanate from the canisters of that shadowy figure, chasing him down the hallways, the school hallways whose layout is unfamiliar, and he remembers the desperation where it is like his voice is a mere squeak of a chased mouse scurrying from kittens, the kittens who make his throat hurt and ache with bittersweet bile when he looks at the mental image.

He is sad now, for some reason.

He can never come home again, even though 'home' is a place which has lost its lustre over time, and his real mere must be withering away with numbness, and he wishes she could be happy again, just like the way she was before it seemed she's lost all her purpose in life, her raison d'etre, and the wrinkles overcome the youthful, smooth skin and turn it all into coarse, dry sandpaper.

The tears pour out his eyes until he hears a squeak, and rubber duckie is floating on the current of the water slide, tumbling down the meandering curves, and he gulps with anticipating fear again as the other kids with their parents are standing in line behind him, awaiting the moment he slides down inside.

He has very little choice, for to turn back now would be tantamount to cowardice, and people would laugh and tell him "I told you so!" when he just wants to escape the cycle of normality, and only wind up proving them right in that he is only meant to be fixed down the life path they've set in stone for him. The grown-ups 'in charge,' like his teachers and principals.

So he leaps down the slide.

Into the blackness.

He feels himself being carried by a strange gravity, his direction uncertain, his ultimate destination a mystery that is found best by groping whatever comes next in the darkness.

The lights of the train subway pass him by, and he remembers the howling of the train in the tunnels, hearing it now.

And..