Under the White Light

Chapter 3 : I Listen to Silence

I don't want to live a life of sadness

Tine wakes up to his cell phone digging nastily against his side from inside his pocket. He turns over, groaning, and slowly opens his eyes. Blinking, he notices that it isn't quite dark anymore; the sky behind the long bridge is already lighting up, making the sea turn into the loveliest shades of warm orange.

He stares outside in awe. No matter how many times he's watched the sunrise, it's never gotten too old for him.

Turning around, he rests his hands on Sarawat's shoulders, shaking the man gently.

Sarawat whimpers, curling into himself.

'Come on, wake up!' Tine isn't going let up. 'It's sunrise! This one's pretty amazing!'

Sarawat scoffs, turning his back at Tine.

"I wanna sleep, Tine," he mumbles, his brows furrowing as he tries his best to ignore the other man's stubborn and insistent shaking.

'Come on, get up! Now! We have to go look at this.'

"Who the fuck wakes a blind person up at the break of dawn just to see the sunrise?" Sarawat grumbles silently, trying to pull his blanket over his head, feet sticking out from the other end. "I'm blind, Tine. I can't see the sunrise."

'Oh come on, please,' Tine whines, tearing the fabric off the other man's body.

"Okay. Okay." Sarawat sits up, rubbing his eyes with open palms, before Tine takes Sarawat's hand to stand.

He leads Sarawat to the roof, sitting down cross-legged on the edge when they made it. The sky is already quite light, beautiful shades of orange, yellow, and pink fading into light blue, making the familiar form of the Sathon bridge look new and almost foreign to him.

Sarawat settles down next to him, wiggling his toes against the cold ledge.

"So," he began, "how do you plan to make this worth my time?"

'Umm ...'

Tine isn't quite so sure what he had been thinking anymore. A mute describing the sunrise to a blind. Yeah. Great idea. He does have the tendency to change act before thinking, after all. 'Well, you've seen colours before. It won't be that difficult, right?'

"Gee," Sarawat jeers, "that sounds about as interesting as watching a pot boil."

'Uhm ...' Tine is starting to feel ashamed.

"Gotta say, your lack of concern over my blindness is pretty refreshing," Sarawat admits, leaning down to rest his weight on his elbows, legs stretched straight forwards. "Usually people don't bother to include me in things like this. What's the point, he can't see, am I right?"

Tine is hanging his head down, embarrassed over his act. How had he ever thought this would be a good idea? Watching the sun rise with an unseeing person is like asking a mute to give a speech in a wedding. Humiliating. He can only imagine how stupid Sarawat must have been feeling, sitting there in front of the rising sun with gradually lighting up shades of grey over his eyes.

Sarawat can sense the other man starting to get apprehensive, and he decides to relieve him of his most probably unfound worries. To be quite honest, he is only happy Tine had expressed the desire to share such a moment with him, even if the idea didn't exactly make sense.

It's the thought that counts, right?

"You could just describe it to me, you know," he suggests, trying to sound as amicable as possible. "That's what people usually do."

'Oh,' Tine brightens at the proposition. 'Well, the sea is kind of reflecting the sky so it's like, twinkling like glitters.'

"Uh-huh," Sarawat makes an encouraging noise at the back of his throat, "Go on."