An Untitled, Unfinished Work (Short Story/Flash Fiction)

We laid in the grass by the pond, my head resting on his chest, feeling the rhythm of his breathing slowing to a serenity that transferred to my own lungs.  We silently watched as the periwinkle evening slowly slipped into a dusky violet, sinking deep within indigo, until succumbing to the pitch black; far and wide, a sky lit with star and planet shimmer, about us firefly glow.  The night birds, frogs, and insects were alive with songs of wings, throats, and legs that stirred him enough to break our silence with the hushed words of an exhalation, “Marais la nuit.”  I loved hearing him speak French, and since it wasn’t often that he did so, I closed my eyes and let the words, carried in his husky voice, nest within my ears.  I replied with a pleased, “Mmmm.” 

We lay there stargazing for quite some time in the quiet of summer, until I interrupted the silence.  “I’ve been thinking lately about something.”

“Oh?”

“When we’re in utero, we’re attached to our mothers by a cord.  This cord is our link to nourishing and nurturing, and when we are born this cord is severed and in its place a hole is left.  I can’t help but wonder if that’s how it is with all things that nourish and nurture us, when they are no longer there…be it a life or a love…due to some tie being severed, is a hole left in its place?  Keep in mind this could also be said for those people and events that hurt and drain us as well.”

“Hmm?  Why do you ask such a question?”

“Because I feel holes within me, only they feel more transparent than like an abyss…more like windows.  And I’ve begun to come to an understanding that as a window, these ‘holes’ have two views, and I could choose to stand outside looking to the past…to all the lives and loves and hurt that have contributed to their existence…or I could stand inside looking out on all that lies before me.”

“So which do you choose?  The second option?”

“Neither.  I think I’d much rather choose the third…to smash through each window, climbing down, and stepping outside into the vast unknown before me…walking blindly, but nonetheless walking, towards something, anything other than the reflections and views that have held me back and kept me stagnant within myself.”

He stayed quiet, but took his arm and wrapped it about me, placing his hand above my heart.

E.A. O'Connell