Chasing Clouds

Two - Chasing Clouds

The cloud had not yet disappeared, pink as ever, but had begun to recede below the horizon.

The child noticed this, and a whimper sounded from the back of her throat. She had not yet reached the cloud. She set her shoulders in grim determination. She would not sail home until she had reached the cloud.

The child's food was gone, save for a potato she would not, could not eat. She hated potatoes, and always had. Like a child, she would never eat the potato, no matter how hungry she was.

The water was gone, finished days before. She had not rationed it. But the child was not thirsty, nor hungry. All she could feel was the beauty of the cloud. It seemed to pulse with her own
heart.

Pum. Pum pum.

She had sailed for so long.

The child's delicate eyelids fluttered. She had not slept on the journey, for fear that the boat
would not stay the course. But now, she did not sleep for a different reason. If she slumbered, she would not wake up.

Pum. Pum pum.

The child's eyes had never left the cloud, not once in all the days she had been sailing. The
cloud absorbed everything. She could feel, could see nothing but the pink and golden puff on the
horizon.

Pum. Pum pum.

She could not feel her thundering hunger, her aching thirst, could not see her emaciated self.

Pum. Pum pum.

Her strength left her, then. She could not lift the wooden oar. She was so weak. But the child did not notice, and if she did, she did not mind.

Pum. Pum pum.

And suddenly she was there.