Crackles and pops emanate through the silence. Feet move like clockwork. As with all great things, it starts from the bottom. My soles have been worn thin by friction. A pesky thing friction is, always getting in the way, making things more difficult than they must be. How bothersome.
Soon enough, a new sound can be heard. Do you hear it too? It is the squishing and slushing of bloodied soles along paper-thin insoles. The noise is unbearable. Let the pain remain, take my ears. I have no use for them, no feasible function for their sole purpose. At this moment, this very moment, they are of no value to me.
Woah, easy now. Are you sure that's what you want?
At this point in the journey, I find it tedious to recall what I could have possibly been doing before I had started. The memories bind together like flour and water, becoming an inseparable lump of plain dough. I need to knead it into something resemblant of a palatable confectionary. Yet, no matter how hard I try, the dough remains as it is. In fact, the more I press and roll, the firmer it becomes. I read somewhere that water temporarily softens the dough, but I do not have any. My hands have a mind of their own. The more I knead, the more I lose of myself.
My legs kind of look like the wheels on a bicycle. I imagine that is how they would look like if someone were to look at me from the side. If only someone was here to tell me if that was true.
Well, I...
But I am alone, left to my own devices. The gravel road stretches for as far as the eye can see, extending into the large orange semicircle that looms up ahead. Its warm, soft glow welcomes me, emanating light rays that are cool to the touch. They dance along my skin, embracing every inch of me, from my black hair to my red shoes. I can feel it in my chest. A sense of calm washes over me likes waves along the shore. Engulfed by this sense of peace, I begin to slow down. Like the sun, my eyelids grow heavier with each step I take. They sink lower and lower, causing my vision to blur. Struggling to receive the light, my pupils widen in a last-ditch attempt to prevent the inevitable.
This is my favourite part of the journey – the release. The spots of blood fade from my shoes, the same shoes I have been wearing for the past decade. The same shoes whose polyester strings cling to each other for dear life, literally hanging on by a thread. I must have made at least a thousand journeys by now. Each journey tests not only mine, but their tenacity as well. Up till now, each one has ended the exact same way.
My feet shuffle along the rough gravel, anticipating the drop. A chaotic lump of catastrophe that wells up inside me, shoving my stomach to the side and sitting beside my liver as if it owns the place.
By now, the big orange star had buried itself into the ground, allowing the smaller stars to take centre stage. They dance across the sky like children at a playground, going everywhere and nowhere, all at once. Crackling under the weight of my flesh and bones, each step feels more tedious than the next, consuming my soul. The lump remains seated upon its throne. Anytime now. Anytime now.
Do you have a moment?
It should have happened by now. Why is it not happening? Am I not there yet? I swear I did everything right.
Can I help you?
"No. No, thank you." I need to focus. Beads of sweat colonise my forehead while one singular bead makes a dash across my face. It seeps into my right eye, then my mouth and carries on south, sliding across my chin to the point of no return. Hanging off my chin, the wind swings them to and fro but it stays there. It clings on to me for dear life, slipping its cool, buttery fingers into my pores. Frustrated, the wind attacks me with a vengeance, like a toddler trying to blow out birthday candles. But there it remains.
You can stop now.
"No I can't."
You can stop now.
"No I can't."
You can stop now.
"I won't!" I snap back at him. But there is no one around me. No one to tell me how I look when I run. No one to tell me when enough is enough. No one to wipe the sweat off my chin.
You can stop now.
And I did. The wind sensed the tension in the air and decided it was not a time for toying with me. The moon read the room and soon, the sky was a black canvas save for a few stars sprinkled across it. It was dark and I was exhausted. There was no road left to travel. It blended in with the sky, rendering my sight useless. Let the uncertainty remain, take my eyes. I have no use for them, no feasible function for their sole purpose. At this moment, this very moment, they are of no value to me.
Let go.
There is an assortment of ingredients that go into it. Broccoli (keep the stems), carrot, fish, seaweed, ginger (use the young ones) and most importantly, rice. You need to cook the rice well. It makes up the bulk of the dish. It absorbs the flavours of the other ingredients and mixes them together into a delectable concoction I recognize as porridge. It has been a while since I had a steaming, tongue-scalding bowl of porridge.
Let go.
I feel it creeping up inside me, tugging on my hips, bending my knees forward. I feel it gingerly working its way down to my calves, then to my ankles, then to my littlest toe. A warm bowl of porridge. A warm bed to fall into. As gravity reigns me in, years of practice and hence, muscle memory kick in. Twirling in the air like a fish on a hook, I somersault into bed.
If only there was someone else who could see that I fell face first, to let me know that I was not as elegant as I thought I was. I am not the person I thought I had become. But the sea saved my face and my life.
It stings. My eye-less, nose-less face. Yet, it was met with an instantaneous, soft caress from the same liquid which hurt it. Air bubbles shoot out from my mouth, indifferent to my plight. Who knew water could be this salty? If this was a soup, whoever made it was definitely not cut out to be a cook. Who could possibly enjoy such a creation?
Although my lungs cry out for help, no one makes haste to help them. Soon, it will all be over. This is the final journey.
Stay with me.
I always thought such a momentous occasion would have required a certain grandeur to it, a certain formality even. Yet, I found myself in such a situation on the most normal of days. It was the kind of the day which blends in with the many other, average days we have lived. It was an average day which brought the blue moon out, shining in all its glory. Its luminous glow was more than a cry for attention. A cry that no one heard but also a cry that might not come again. You might not have noticed but I cried, knowing no one paid the blue moon any attention.
Stay with me.
I am almost there. But something creeps up on me. I can feel its hands all over my body. Guilt overcomes my anxious heart, sending it into overdrive. It beats like a drum, shouting its rhythm into my ears. The glow of the moon is so beautiful yet piercing that I struggle to keep my eyes open. Someone pulls me in and whisks me up, out of the water. It happens so quickly that I realize how shallow this ‘sea' was.
Gasping for air, I look for you. My head spins like a top. When I finally catch sight of you, I heave a great sigh of relief.
"You can stop now. Let go." I remind you.
Just stay with me.