Tʜᴇ Pᴀᴛʜ Tᴏ Hɪɢʜɢᴀᴛᴇs

Iɴ ᴍʏ Aʀᴍs

Cʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 57

You pulled the rest of your body up and over. Heaving as your arms buckled under the weight of yourself.

The air was warm— a subtle breath of moisture clung to the breeze. The remains of rain hanging lowly in the clouds, your breath stifled.

Your legs kicked as you rolled onto your back, gazing at the sky above you— auburn in the atmosphere. Clouds of pink fluttering with rounds of buttercup, the Sun's last reach grazing across the still world, sending beams of light from its space-bound home.

The leaves rustled, the last raindrops clinging to petals as they slipped down, splashing on the ground below, mellow tonality flooding into your mind one drop at a time.

Birds sang above your head. Wings flapped towards the horizon, the Sun calling to them— beckoning for them to join it at the gates of freedom.

You caught your breath, then rolled to your side and sat up, clawing your way upward, onto the flat part of the roof. Then sat down— your head turned left.

Eyes met yours.

But they weren't white any longer.

They were red and grey. Sleep sticking to the inner corners of his sockets, slick and slimy under the hum of the light around him. His lips were taut, dry and parched, vomit dabbed in the corners— stains of it all over his shirt, in his hair— blood mixed in between. He looked older than how you remembered. His face creased and tired— his eyes hollow with bags that sunk his skin in. Snot bubbled at his nose, crusted and dried against his skin, his exhaustion evident.

His hands were shaking over a pen, a sketchbook in his lap.

He sat a bit away from you, only staring into the dark of your eyes, as if he was looking right through you. His teeth ground against each other, his jaw clenching then relaxing. His body swaying unevenly in the breeze.

Something was wrong with him.

"Vat are vu doing here?" He called into the silence. Reaching out with his hoarse and croaky voice— his throat dry and painful. The smell of vomit and wine wafting from his mouth. You didn't know what to say to him, so you scooted your body closer, stopping just a bit from him, eyes never leaving his. "Hey." You mumbled.

Then pointed to the gap between the two of you, still just as quiet. "Do you mind if I...?

"Go ahead." He dismissed. Turning his head back to face his sketchbook.

Little at a time, keeping his hand low on the page, quelling his uncontrollable shakes, he drew leaves pointed across a tree. Granite ends met each other in little bows, careful tracing of his eyes translations— his hands repeating.

You watched him as he did so. How, every now and again, his hand would jerk, drawing his shoulders up, the shakiness in his body completely unavoidable. "I um— I found this." You stammered, putting a hand into your pocket and pulling out his hat.

Reich looked over with his hollowed-out eyes. His head bobbing— eyes shutting and opening sluggishly, like he was about to pass out. He set in pencil down in favour of meeting his hat. His fingers brushed over yours, your damaged knuckles in line with his.

But whether or not he noticed them, you didn't know. You weren't sure if he could notice anything in his condition.

He could hardly tell where the sky ended and where the ground began. He couldn't tell where his body was, nor if it had recovered or not. He felt nothing— everything was a blur of colours in a palette washed together by a murky brush.