It wasn't even a cold night. You'd think it would've been. Or raining at least - cold and stormy, that's when these things happen isn't it? But it wasn't. There wasn't the slightest hint. In fact it was warm - one of those strangely uplifting nights, when summer dances on the wind and the stars are bright, and everything feels a little crazy and anticipatory. That might've been the hint, but if it was, I wasn't paying attention. I felt totally light. In retrospect I should have known better. That kind of lightness is always followed by the world screwing you over completely. But I guess that 'enjoyment of the moment' thing motivational speakers are so high on had me firmly in its grip, holding me over a chasm, about to drop me into it. Quite literally. Although the ground didn't quake and shiver and split open, and the sky didn't roar and flash fire, and, well, to be frank, it was all pretty unmythic really.
He's small. Much smaller than you'd think he would be. And that night he gave me no reason whatsoever to think he was a threat. I guess someone like him doesn't need brute strength and size, not when he has so much at his fingertips. He struck me as almost weedy, to be honest. He wore jeans and a t-shirt - nothing to suggest, well anything. You have to understand, I have gone over and over this in my mind, trying to find something that might have warned me. I find it so hard to believe something like this can just happen. But there was nothing about him, nothing about the night, absolutely nothing at all that could have been a warning. No foreboding whatsoever - and there's me, ever the believer in intuition. I guess intuition was away that night.
Anyway, like I was saying, jeans and a t-shirt. Only slightly taller than me (and I'm a little thing - 'petite' my mother calls it) and relatively skinny. In fact, on sight I'd have said I could probably have taken him, what with the self-defense classes my mother was making me take. So it's not a big surprise that I stopped to talk to him. Asking me the time - I mean really, you'd think a god could come up with something more original than that! And then the usual - where was I from, what was a pretty girl like me doing roaming the streets at that time of night... It was only when he caught hold of my wrist that I knew there was anything strange about him (again - how can you engage in small talk with a god and not realize that there's something a little odd about him? And I just thought he was shy and a bit awkward!). His grip was uncannily strong, but that wasn’t what alarmed me. It was also freezing. In fact, his hand was so cold I gasped. I looked up in horror and noticed for the first time that he had eyes like ice. Ice blue and deeply cold, there wasn’t the slightest bit of humanity there.
"Well, my love," he said, and the voice had changed - it too was like ice now, cold and hard. "Enough small talk, let's go home, shall we?"
I couldn't answer. The cold from my wrist was shooting up my arm and agonizingly into my shoulder. Suddenly my ears were full of the sound of wind, but not the warm balminess it had been all night. This wind was cold and violent, biting into my skin, and cutting straight to the bones beneath it. I couldn’t feel the ground beneath my feet, or see beyond the cold blue of those eyes. Staring into the eyes of a god (although I didn't know that yet), I was sucked into hell.
He's small. Much smaller than you'd think he would be. And that night he gave me no reason whatsoever to think he was a threat. I guess someone like him doesn't need brute strength and size, not when he has so much at his fingertips. He struck me as almost weedy, to be honest. He wore jeans and a t-shirt - nothing to suggest, well anything. You have to understand, I have gone over and over this in my mind, trying to find something that might have warned me. I find it so hard to believe something like this can just happen. But there was nothing about him, nothing about the night, absolutely nothing at all that could have been a warning. No foreboding whatsoever - and there's me, ever the believer in intuition. I guess intuition was away that night.
Anyway, like I was saying, jeans and a t-shirt. Only slightly taller than me (and I'm a little thing - 'petite' my mother calls it) and relatively skinny. In fact, on sight I'd have said I could probably have taken him, what with the self-defense classes my mother was making me take. So it's not a big surprise that I stopped to talk to him. Asking me the time - I mean really, you'd think a god could come up with something more original than that! And then the usual - where was I from, what was a pretty girl like me doing roaming the streets at that time of night... It was only when he caught hold of my wrist that I knew there was anything strange about him (again - how can you engage in small talk with a god and not realize that there's something a little odd about him? And I just thought he was shy and a bit awkward!). His grip was uncannily strong, but that wasn’t what alarmed me. It was also freezing. In fact, his hand was so cold I gasped. I looked up in horror and noticed for the first time that he had eyes like ice. Ice blue and deeply cold, there wasn’t the slightest bit of humanity there.
"Well, my love," he said, and the voice had changed - it too was like ice now, cold and hard. "Enough small talk, let's go home, shall we?"
I couldn't answer. The cold from my wrist was shooting up my arm and agonizingly into my shoulder. Suddenly my ears were full of the sound of wind, but not the warm balminess it had been all night. This wind was cold and violent, biting into my skin, and cutting straight to the bones beneath it. I couldn’t feel the ground beneath my feet, or see beyond the cold blue of those eyes. Staring into the eyes of a god (although I didn't know that yet), I was sucked into hell.
2 comments:
I am very proud to know you sunshine. tickle me intrigued...
love
wacky witch
*grin* Thank you ww. :)
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