we drift apart {kousei/rook}

[rook]

LEIGHTON "RILEY" REYE

I try to find my way back to all the different places that we used to go on rainy days: hollowed out trees that we made into houses, the rivers of mud over the old hill that we used to slide down in our clean clothes, the old abandoned wells that we would talk about venturing down, but never had the courage to.

But I have forgotten.

I tread over a bed of burned orange leaves, weaving between conifer branches and low-looming pines. The autumn air clings to my skin and wraps it's chilled fingers around my exposed neck. I turn my collar up, turning away from the wind and pressing onwards with my head down. There is a mist that intermitantly swims over the roots around me, dissipating and then reforming again, around the trunks of the redwoods and out over dipping banks of dirt. I exhale, and my breath hangs in the air, like a reminder of the coming winter - and then it's gone.

I feel a presence behind me, a hot energy radiating, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I swivel, my eyes darting to the spaces between the trees, looking for movement.

But the forest is still, and the only sound I can hear is the melancholic singing of woodland songbirds, softly resonating with the whistle of the wind that carries with it the whirring of distant chainsaws. I pause, eyes still scanning, trusting my instinct. There is nothing immediate, but still I feel uneasy, like I am being watched.

I used to love the woods, these days they make me on edge. There is a sickness about the trees, they don't have the same life that they did when I was a kid. They seem colourless to me, tired and without purpose. The woods used to be magical, full of adventure and possibilities, and now it's just a slaughterhouse for the great pines and ancient furs - and it feels like the trees know that.

Still, I like to lose myself, especially when there is so much on my mind. Dendrology is something that I will always find interesting, but my exams have not been enjoyable. Studying takes up most of my day, and come the end I'm so tightly strung that I either need to blow off some steam in the gym or fall straight asleep. Both of those options aren't appealing to me today - so I've set out in search of fuck-knows-what. Maybe a hit of nostalgia.

I stumble upon a path that seems familiar to me - it's a winding trail of old cobblestone, weathered by the elements, but still distinctly recognisable amidst the twigs and leaves. Yes, this path is where my brother and I used to play gate guardians.

"Who wishes to pass through the gate?"
"I do, the mighty Leighton."
"You must first pass the trial of courage!"

I never failed - I'm older than him, and I've always been braver. I'd gain access to the gate - my feet dance one-step, and then two over the cobblestones, retracing my steps from a decade ago, and then up the incline and over to the old oak tree clearing. It is still there, standing tall, ten years a mere blink for this magnificent tree.

I trudge over, my feet dragging wet leaves as I circle the trunk of the great oak, and behind it I find our carving.

L Reye, S Reye

My name chiseled, and then Solaris' carved more jaggedly beside it. I cut my hand doing mine, but I didn't care. I thought I was being cool.

We wanted to be great adventurers who would travel the world, but we ended up being a bookworm and a drug addict.

I think if we met our ten-year-old selves, we'd be disappointed in what we have become. In fact, I know we would.

[kousei ♚]

P O L A R I S .

Chasing the unknown has never hurt so much.

Once, I would've been content with sending myself into a high to drown out the wears and tears of habitual behavior with my back pressed against brick walls within darkened alleyways and unstable buildings that only know to creak and tower over me. Except today, where I avoided the darkened streets and found myself a tree to bury needles into my skin and fill my veins with bliss, I'd shoot through every vein in my body if it meant I could find whatever is making me lose pieces of myself as I chase.

Sunlight breaks through the crevices within my chemical fantasy and I'm no longer deathless. Yet I am still sporadic, the pain pounding on the insides of my head follows no set pattern, I am forced to squint and lift my hand over my eyes as sunlight weeps through leaves and branches, across my withered form and I'm left with small rays of warmth kissing the surface of my skin. Nothing I do comes full circle for I base my routine on the sporadic; the nights I get my hits, the nights I'm vagabond and the nights I climb through Rosie's window. It all merges together in a figment of marred memories.

Yet a couple of quick glances around the forest and recognition hits me before the next burst of pain in my body. I'm left scrambling between the boundary two definitions for Polaris Reye; one being outdated and the next only being a synonym for despicable in the eyes of society.

A boy of nine and a girl of ten, wandering through a forest their grandparents told them was magic. I swear, when I squint and press my thumb to my forehead I can see the the cynical sun in the boy's eyes. Never superstitious but forever gullible, he would always push the bounds of whatever mythical taboos that were set as boundaries in the name of being able to call himself brave and courageous. Following his older sister like a lost dog because she was his light, once. He would follow her footsteps until her sun set and play whatever games she wanted to play, avoid the areas they weren't supposed to go because she didn't want to go there.

They carved their names on trees and watched the stars, once.

"Fuck." I croak, pushing myself up so my back is propped against the oak tree. It's strange, how much can change from the ages of nine to the edge of manhood. While I once sat on the boundary of admiration and brotherly love, now I sit on the boundary of contempt and hatred. Yet when the fateful question was posed I never confirmed or denied -- "Do you hate me, Polaris?"

I don't even know anymore.

All I know is that I'm not that kid anymore. No longer do I have a cynical sun tattooed along my hip and ideas for games sitting on the tip of my glass tongue. Instead, I am a slave to the thrill and a servant to chemical bliss, a boy who belongs in the moments that are sporadic but falters in the eyes of a world of structure. A shadow to the better sibling, that fucking bitch.

I hoist myself up, sighing a running a hand through tangled hair matted with dirt and blood and wince at the red scratch marks marks along my hands and bruises that kiss my skin from fuck-knows where. Turning around, I'm faced with a mirror of the better woman.

"Riley?" I ask, clearly taken aback by her presence. No longer the ten year old girl who took me to play games and see stars, now a woman who only brings bitter scowls as opposed to laughter. "Why the fuck are you here?"

I never held sentiment for dead children anyway.