Leaves chittered outside of century-old windows.
Io buried his face deeper into Amory's back. The wool blankets covering them didn't seem like enough. Io strung his arm over Amory's side, although the boy was much more broad than he. He had to stretch, but that didn't matter. Struggling for warmth in this creaky cabin during the winter was something both were quite familiar with.
"Are you awake?" Io whispered.
Response: only faint breaths coming from Amory's thin, straight nose.
The boy sighed.
All his life, since he met Amory, he had wondered how it was so easy for people to sleep at night. Io had never been able to. Several acquaintances thought he was an insomniac. But no, Io simply couldn't sleep at night. He spent his days in dreary trances, during which he would nap, or watch the television. At night, he woke, and became alive. His eyes shone with a silvery, mischievous sheen. His skin, pale, almost glowed in the darkness.
Why would you sleep when the most interesting living things in the world were just beginning to awaken? When the stars filled the sky, and it came alive, and cosmic clouds signaled solar storms of pretty dust or fragmented gems? Moreover, Io didn't understand how one could work through the day, under the heat of a searing massive ball of glowing gas, with a dead, opaque blue expanse and a few white puffs being the only things to greet you?
And the bugs. Oh, the bugs. No, Io preferred fireflies. Not cicadas.
Then there was winter to think of. The moon and stars always shine so brightly off of the snow. The world became light, and life, at night. But during the day, snow blinded the eyes to the nature around oneself.
No no no, thought Io. Day is a wast of time. Even my name means moon.
However... the one thing about day that Io always missed was Amory.
Amory was normal. He was the day, he was the sun, he was vitality, and plant life, and animals, and bugs. Amory slept at night and lived life during the day. And Io missed him, at night, when he fell asleep and became nothing but a warm breathing shell for him to hold.
It was hard, without Amory. Some nights he stayed up, for this nocturnal counterpart, but that was not tonight.
Io sighed and pushed his face back into the back of his Amory.
"Goodnight."
YOU ARE READING
The God and His Moon
Spiritual"Is the journey a difficult one?" Amory whispered, his voice a dull ghost in Io's soft, snowy hair. The breath that brushed over his skin made goosebumps rise on his neck. "That is yet to be seen." Io replied, reluctant with his words. His head lay...
