rain » vkook

four

he is a parasite. i can't stop thinking about him and his purple bruise.

"concrete jungle." i hesitate, let my words waver into the air and disappear. because it's not raining. sky isn't here to hear them.

"concrete jungle."

and that is all.

today is a sunday, which means that i do not have to sacrifice my art. but i do have to sacrifice my time.

i throw on some clean clothes and leave to do some shopping.

the thing about shopping is that it's noisy. i can't help but hear conversations that make me want to drink acid. i can't help but become subject to the torture of society, in the most abstract generalization of the word.

i hate it.

i hate how superficial everything is. i hate how people hate how they look and that for their paycheck, they can become a different person entirely. i hate how the world has pushed us down so much that we push each other down even further to feel like we are someone.

hell isn't real because it's on earth and we're all falling deeper.

we're falling through the earth's core and maybe we'll fall straight through to the other side and float in empty space forever. maybe then we'll rethink our ideals.

or maybe we'd efficiently set about making space ugly, too.

humanity is defined by its victims.

the day passes uneventfully, until i reach the supermarket.

i see sky.

and next to him is a man. they look to be the same age, but something about this man makes him seem towering, a looming figure. they're holding hands, and for some reason, my stomach churns. then i look again. they aren't holding hands.

the man is clutching sky's wrist, and his fingers dangle almost like they're dead, as if all circulation had been cut off.

judging by his grimace, i'd say it had.

an eclipse cutting off the sun.

his bruise almost seems more violent, and he's standing like he's favoring his left leg. then the man begins to move, harshly jerking sky along after him.

my blood boils.

sky looks as though he's resisting, and the man leans in close and whispers something. with that, all fight drains from him and he allows himself to be dragged away. but then he looks back and he sees me.

his eyes widen and his mouth drops open, panic splashed across his features like bright orange. i can feel his gaze on me and it weighs me down. even from this distance i am paralyzed.

his eyes. i can see them clear as day.

(The Sky Knows That Picasso is Too Far Away to Break His Fall.)

my last view of him is his other hand, just barely reaching out towards me. then the man whisks him around the corner and sky and his panic is gone.

the encounter remains with me all day, like a sickness in my chest. who was that man? why did sky look so afraid?

i have a horrible, terrible suspicion and a choking desire to become a hero. but i am not a hero.

i am not even picasso.

but i paint anyway.

the thing with picasso was that he was always inspired. his mind captured his hands like a powerful current and he was able to create, no matter what the medium was. drawings, sculptures, costumes. he knew no bounds. he once said that painting is a blind man's profession.

so i close my eyes and i paint sky's panic. i paint him as radiant yellow, but the man as a swirling dark mass next to him. and me.

i paint me as barely there, the only distinct feature being my hand, reaching for sky. but when i'm done painting, sky's yellow has been muted and swallowed by the man, and that man stares at my hand as if i am next.

mockingly commending my pathetic efforts because i am not a hero. i can never be. i am an ocean full of water that is constantly overflowing, i am bigger than the sky, not sky but the sky- i am the entire universe - but i am not enough.

i'm not enough to matter but i am just enough to be too much for myself. my bones are too big and they force me to grow until i'm choking on clouds. until i pass sky and now i'm too far away for him to reach my hand like i always am, even though i just wanted to help.

his eyes haunt me.

even though the sun is bright, getting brighter as the day draws to a close until i think that it's going to live in that spot forever, his eyes haunt me. they ask me, why do you have to be you and why didn't you save me until i am ravaging my kitchen, scrabbling around my junk drawer until - i find it. i grab the earplugs and stuff them in my ears but i can still hear his voice.

and in my head, it sounds more like a still pond and birds chirping and the air sighing than a voice. i want to sleep, but his voice and the sun keep me awake.

it's now three in the morning, the most cliche time of night, and the sun is so bright. it infiltrates my room, painting everything in gold like the edges of a masquerade ball mask. it touches everything except for me.

because i am the man. i am the swirling darkness. i am no better.

i did nothing. no saving, no speaking. i was a fly on the wall and the entire world is a flyswatter. but sky is UY Scuti. he is a star 2.4 billion kilometers in diameter and 3,300 kelvins. he could burn us all alive. i can see him no matter where i go.

and yet, he seemed terrified and small next to the man. he wasn't a star. he wasn't even sky.

he was just a boy.

he is just a boy.

and i am, too.

i am just a boy whose feet are on backwards and whose mind is a helium balloon. i am just a boy who thinks too much and doesn't think the right things. i am just a boy who obsesses over things that others deem nothing at all.

but sky made me feel like my head was the right size.