Reach out for the Sun [UsUk]

One: In the Stupidest Way

It was cold.

Autumn just started to wash over the British isles, bringing their nature a whole variety of warm colours, as if it was an invisible brush painting every single leaf in shades of red, orange, gold, and perhaps light brown here and there to add to its magic.
Wind encircled the country, and left the citizens with only one option, which was to start shopping for clothing that would finally keep them warm. Of course, that wasn't all to this season of the year. Underneath the pale blue English sky, one could always see different colours of umbrellas protecting people from the rain which could fall every five seconds and then, sadly for some, fortunately for others, stop. It was unpredictable, that English weather. Everybody knew that. But its endless skies and majestic seas were always gorgeous to its people - shining at its finest, all shades of blue visible at once, waves dancing around under the tight grip of wind.

But for Arthur Kirkland, it was grey.

Since he was only a small child, he was never able to experience that magic of blue that people around him talked about. Not all of them, of course - some sighed with him and stared at the dull sky, waiting for some kind of force from above to gift them with the colour.

His mother always told him: "One day, when you meet a special person, you will see it, too. It will be beautiful, magical, and it will last forever." But he never believed those words. His mind kept telling him that he would end up alone, and that the sky would always be so sorrowful.

When he was in his teenage years, surviving through high school, he looked everywhere, absolutely everywhere, to find that mysterious person that would make him see the colour. Yet he was, apparently, impossible to find. Arthur didn't want it to a be a girl, he really didn't. Though he had always been good friends with a few girls, he just couldn't see himself spending the rest of his life with them, kissing them and doing all the other things lovers do. But when it came to boys, it was different. He hated himself for being like that, for being a minority, but there was nothing he could do about it.

He just had to wait for the person to come into his life unexpectedly and turn everything upside down. And he was scared, incredibly scared that it would never happen.

Arthur was now twenty three years old, living in his lonely little apartment in the center of Brighton - stuck in the crowd, but always alone.

His best friends were a paper, a pen and a laptop. Writing was his everything. He wrote as if he was running out of time, all day and all night, in a constant whirlwind of thoughts, stories, poems, different worlds and dimensions.

It was clear to say that Arthur lived in a story. And he didn't wait for some random person on the streets to show him the true colour of the skies and seas - he created it himself. Perhaps he didn't see it, but he could imagine it, and imagination was what still kept him going, kept him alive. There were times when he wanted to give up on everything, but it never even occurred to him he could stop writing. At this point, he only left the house when it was obligatory, like going to the store, and didn't enjoy other people's company whatsoever. And when writing wasn't an option, he could easily spend hours and hours stuck in another universe of an already finished book by another author.

He didn't want to give that up for anything or anyone.

But what Arthur Kirkland didn't know was that one simple September morning was going to change his entire life in the strangest, stupidest, but the best way possible.

Still, was it really for the better?

- - -

"See, the right one is certainly much more efficient!"