Romancer's Drift

The stars all set fire, all at once.  I was there as the midnight sky burned before me, igniting the horrors of the mortal coil, speaking what could only be spoken to those who knew they had not long to live.  As if the burden of asking for a few moments more was a privilege, I stood in the green of my garden accepting the bounty of my insignificance.   The world was carnage.  Hundreds of people stormed in front of me, some pulling on my hair, grabbing hold of my arm, pleading with me to share whatever rations I had before the torment began.  I had little, nothing in fact, nothing of worth or value, just my love for a girl who had long departed from my life, not through death, but through the consequences of my abhorrent actions.    

In between the streaks of terror and violence there was a girl before me huddled up within her own arms, was she frightened at a world gone mad?  I walked over slowly, showing my honest intentions.  Nevertheless, as she raised her face towards mine I was so aware of her nature.  She had in her hands a cat massacred, used for food, pulled apart and butchered by the merciless mob.  I asked her to take my hand, to tear ourselves apart from this world, to find solace in some way, some form, to escape to solitude away, if anywhere, from here.    So scared and so in need of companionship, to comfort the dead in the way that she knew was hopeless but nonetheless wanted to show love to a tragic life lost.

I took her to the safest place, and although eerie, it was obvious no one in this city was to go into the cemetery.  It was a fortress, bricked closed, a last minute action taken by the last sane populace, to respect the lives already perished.  I found rope and hurled myself to the pinnacle of its steep wall offering my arm to pull her over.  We settled by a gravestone, so morbid was its epitaph “I have suffered”, that I wish I had chosen more wisely.  The girl was so fatigued I dared not move her again to somewhere less depressing. I was soon so very aware of the irony that I was trying to find a happy place in a village of the dead.  

“This place” The girl finally muttered.  “Is just a field of skeletons waiting for our bodies to give in and die is it not?” I knew she was upset and I could not spare the heart of trying to lighten her mood, so much was gone and I myself was in no mood to be anything other than melancholy. 
“Death is a toll we all pay it’s not something to worry for.  Is it not wise to concern yourself with responsibility?  As once death approaches you at least need not threat over the consequences of your death, for you will be dead.  Responsibility has always been my greatest fear.  It’s far more worrying and it will never escape you, you cannot run nor hide from it”.

The girl, long blonde hair, brown eyes and a face so youthful, on any other day would have brought a rage of jealousy for my lost years.  Today was so different.  Today I wished I could just protect her from the violence.  Never did I think that paternal instincts were so much an existing thing as a tangerine moon, a myth or spoke of fiction.  Here I was however, wanting nothing more but her protection.
“Why are you alone mister?  Where are your friends?”  The girl seemed genuine, almost concerned that I had left them for her benefit.
“Friends are fickle”.  I needed not to say any more, for I felt that if I did she’s know just how unsubstantial a person I was.
“And your wife?”  At this I felt she had opened the inside of my heart, she had looked at the ring on my finger and the sadness in my eyes, knowing that I needed to spill my heart.
“I wish I was a kind man, I do.  But even with my earnest and humble intentions, I have made some judgements what I am so very ashamed off.  I made mistakes that are so easy to make yet so hard to be forgiven for”.

The girl had lost her boyfriend, persecuted for adultery, something I am only too aware of. The town ready to stone and maim him yet it was at that moment the sky caught fire.  The balls of gas exploding sending ignited bullets of rock onto our planet.  The boy’s fate was never determined par from the shouts of strangers “the bastard’s dead!” cried one, with so many others to the girl.   So at that she could only accept his fate and realise that hers would surely be inevitable doom.  I awkwardly realised by this time that I had never asked her name.  As I was about to enquire we both heard a cry from behind the brick wall, “Get away from me you monstrous freaks.  Call yourselves human, you don’t even deserve to be a part of humanity!”
“Quiet you blasphemous adulterer, pay your dues and meet your fate and the hands of the people!”

The girls ears pricked.  I had never seen anyone in my lifetime act so instantaneous to hearing another person’s voice.  “Please it’s Tuxton, you need to help him. Please”.
If I were to be honest, I was reluctant.  As sad as it is to admit I was enjoying our despair together.  The end of creation is an effervescent beauty in the company of a single other.  Yet here I was, the thread of two lovers reuniting, all judged on my actions.  I would like to write that I spared no time bringing him to outside of the wall but I did take my time, maybe hoping that if I left it a minute or two he would be over succumb by the mob who were so hungry for his bones.  

As I reached the wall he had somehow managed to protect himself from slaughter.  There were little options to choose from, I could throw him off the wall but I dared not in the presence of the girl.  So I hollered out to him, although my voice was foreign to him I am sure he recognised the sincere friendliness in my tone as he grabbed me by the arm and pulled his body in a large heave across the wall.  The mob had gone at this point, par one who was trying to attack Tuxton with a pitch folk. He scurried away as Tuxton climbed over, his long legs clumsily flowing between themselves.  I was left with a sunken conscious as the girl embraced him knowing how my actions weren’t as noble as I intended them to be.

“Sweet Lilac, you’re safe.  But who is this man? Whoever you are Sir, you have my deep rooted gratitude, you’ve protected my love”.  I was confused to say the least, did this man not betray their romance? I asked tentatively, unsure of how they would react.
“Yes. He’s been a fool, a wreck of havoc on my life. You need to heed that even though he was a monster towards our cherished bond of love he’s redeemed himself in ways what I can’t explain”.
I had been in this situation though my own sweetheart was not so forgiving.  I pried further into knowing how they once again bonded.
“You see stranger. I had wealth once, I had a job that paid handsomely, I had people who respected me and I lost it all the moment people learned of my misdeeds.  All of it was just, and I did not complain, for the thing I regretted was that I lost Lilac, she was the one I missed out of all my wealth.   I wanted to do anything, would have done anything to claim her love back once more. 

“It was a year after I had committed my acts that she had moved on with her new lover, my heart sank with sorrow every day, words and actions would just bring back the memory of her, she was everywhere in my waking day.  I had learned that this cretin had done a foul crime, not only was he an oaf and buffoon unfit for the likes of humanity but he had drunkenly murdered the daughter of the mayor.  In his cowardly defence he had blamed it all on Lilac.  As soon as I heard I went to the court house and told them all it was me.  I had no intentions of reclaiming her heart but just her freedom.  Alas, it did just that”.
“And as soon as he was to be stoned for his crimes the stars fell... it was a miracle”.
“My dear I have a confession, and for you, stranger.  I fear that I may have prayed for this all to happen.  When I had the noose around my neck I had prayed to whoever was looking down out in the reaches of eternity that they would give me the chance to see her once more, and to my solemn surprise it was then that the sky lit at once and darkened as quick as it exploded.  Can one man’s prayers be so strong? Did I cause this havoc on us all? Darling, I just don’t know.  As callous as it may sound I’m just glad you’re here, that we can be together, just this one last time”.

His words truly sent bile into the pit of my stomach, so honourable I thought I was to have this redemption hero thwart me in every way. With the girl, and my own pitiful attempts and trying to win back my own old love. 

“Stranger, I can only assume this world will end at any given minute.  If it does not however I ask that you help us escape this city, to find a place we can live our lives out in harmony.  You have been so kind this far, will you accompany us on our journey?”
There was something in the boys eyes, a purity I had not seen in so long, maybe in my own once when I was his age, looking at the reflection upon the lake as I fished for the very first time, the boy had done so much wrong and had sacrificed so much to put things right.  However, there was such a hatred for him too.  For I could not bring myself to really be able to help the young couple, arguing to myself that no one should be allowed to embrace, should we not all die alone? 
I inhaled, ready to give my stern answer but then the girl took me in her arms. 
“You’ve been so heroic, I’m so glad you came I think I would of just stayed there till I was carried away if you had not come and been so generous.   Even if you decide to stay both of us will be indebted for you for as long as we still see the beating hearts of our kindred selves”.

It was then that I knew I could not leave them.   Maybe in turn for my own redemption I will never be able to win back my sweetheart but in turn be able to help these lovers be together, just how I did not know. I asked her what they needed, I should not have been so surprised when they could not give me an answer, and just like a flash of light in a heavy storm I suggested what to do.

They began running, a boat was laying away in a dock, one of my own that I had not used in so long, but needed fora keepsake of a better time. They hurried as quickly as they could as I climbed the walls, I shouted to the mob that it was I who murdered the majors daughter , and I had committed adultery, I mocked them, condescended them for never figuring out that it was I all along.
The blood will carry on pouring out of my system, and soon I will be cold and useless.  It is all in hope that this one good deed I have done will inspire one other, just at least one, I have done my utmost to transcript my last day on Earth, if not to inspire but then to aspire someone to avoid the mistakes man makes without his mind being fully ware.  I swear that I could hear the boat sail, drifting to a better place.  I truly hope that it reaches wherever they want to reach, for if I needed to live out my last moments in solidarity so others need not, then I have done my part.