‘Do you also know how Min got to know my grandmother?’ Sol suddenly cut trough his monologue, trying so very hard to not show any hint of distress on her face.
‘I don't know every detail but the kid did say that his sister daily visited the Smiling Gerbera. He said that he remembered the vase by their mother’s bed always having a fresh gerbera. The colors changed but there was only ever one of them. So one day he visited the shop as well and saw the bronze boy smiling at his flower,’ Lion briefly paused, a faintest smile being drawn on his face. ‘Maybe she just wanted to see her mother smile like the bronze statue.’
Lion also explained the background story to celebrating the infamous New Year at Sol’s house. Min’s boyfriend at the time, worked as an assistance for a tattoo shop by the bar, where her father drunken himself many times before. Apparently, he didn't want to pay and persisted on his end so strongly, that a fight naturally came about. Min decided to pay his debt off and drag her alcoholic father away.
However soon enough, Lion and the boy came to the site, and just like the blink of an eye, the boy pushed his stumbling father under the car, blood coloring the concrete ground. At initial shock they thought he was dead, but his heart kept the beat steady. He managed to survive the first death experience, and as for the second time, the blow was much harder and eventually irreversible.
***
Sol wandered into a wasteland, into a place nonexistent. There was no thought she could receive from that land of nothingness, and no clear understanding of the content she just heard. With the best of her abilities she tried connecting the story to the faces from the past - the beautiful Min and her lovely young brother. In her memory they both stood so strongly on the ground, so full of irresistible attraction and honesty. But as soon as she attached this tragic story to them, creating a backdrop for their future events, something happened. It was denial and at the same time explanation.
Their childhood painfully fitted their characters, it made them more real, relatable, but also so very distant from her own life – the world, she tried to build with her bare hands. There was no way she could ever relate to them, become their family in any sense and this obvious fact, send shivers down Sol’s spine. However, these shivers weren’t conceived from a place of shock or fear – they were from a place where deep sorrow rested and where she could never fall fully into it, nor she could blend into it like the sun does.
It was only after she took a seat on the train – that would transport her away from the story and experience in itself – did she recall Lion’s firm hug and words of encouragement saying, ‘you however are a different type. People who are that strong can never fall so low to forget flying.’
The question is, do I really know how to fly? Or have I only ever been pretending while all I can do is to crawl?
She opened her black carry-on canvas bag, searched trough a few light dresses, toiletries, and a passport, to finally hold onto the knife. Without much consideration for any potential travelers along her line of seats, she spread the blades apart, staring into her own reflection. Earlier when she left the bar, where Lion shared a heartbreaking story, Sol almost levitated among the people, until she came home again. She wanted to see the girl so badly, but of course she was long gone, all that was left behind her metal gift.
Out of the window, scenery changed with rapid pace. The endless designs of concrete and deceit transformed into houses where warmth resided and where laughter echoed.
Sol tried to envision a perfect world. A world where everyone smiled for simply waking up in the morning, where the man made machines existed solely to serve us and not the other way around, where children didn't know violence or abuse, and where adults understood what it meant to hurt a weaker being – be it human, animal or plant.
Inside of her daydream, she saw Min and her brother living under a caring household, their father not bending to alcohol or their mother suffering from emotional trauma. Each day was a bright morning resulting in a crystal clear night. Sometimes the air was cold or hot, but it never made you shiver or sweat excessively. However sooner or later there came a day when the cold gave you frostbite and heat gave you burns. In either way you became scarred and these scars lasted for a lifetime, reminding you of how much turbulence you went trough, and how much the future still stores it in especially for you.
Sol released a warm breath on the window glass, her finger unconsciously shaping the characters out: truth. She remembered that – no matter how much blazing fire one could withstand, or for how long one could sleep under the blizzard without slipping of the edge – it all meant nothing if the truth didn't revealed itself.
One can only be a slave to the lie and not the truth – because truth is one, universal and freeing. To be free means to live in truth, while lie can only be enslaving and multiple. And sometimes, living trough a harsh rightness is more rewarding than to live a life full of pretentiousness with nothing to offer but an inauthentic expression.
Where trees started to grow bigger in numbers, she naturally stood up, waiting to exit the train. Her mind rested somewhere above her head – detaching itself from surrounding space, objective in its opinion. For the next hour her movement became inorganic, machine like. She was a robot until she reached a spot, a house, and a door. Sol briefly rested her palm on the wooden surface of familiar texture, before her knuckles produced a knocking sound. While waiting for response to happen, she bent her neck backwards, lifting her gaze up towards the blue sea above. The wish to disappear had never before make an entrance so strong. And if, at that moment, that could indeed happen, there would be nothing else Sol wanted to experience. To evaporate into the air, the same way her skin evaporated accumulated sweat in the summer heat.
‘Sol! You finally came,’ a voice exclaimed then suddenly, just as it was being perceived with her ears, she entrapped herself into a tight embrace. Luckily enough, the mother’s face stayed turned away for a handful of long seconds, or else she would behold to a sight of her daughter’s distressed expression, barely holding the sanity in.
It’s been more than a year since the last time Sol visited her parents in their new residence – belonging to her late grandmother.
After she decided to become a part of city folk, her father withdrawn his resignation letter, then not much after his abrupt leave, mother also followed along the traces and retired from her piano career. In Sol’s head, the sudden abandonment of their jobs, especially her mothers, who lived for piano, seemed more than absurd. It was downright foolish. However, after they adjusted to their new lifestyle, it made so much sense for them to live here. They truly did become happier and overall more relaxed.
Father took care of the Smiling Gerbera, which was already his lifelong dream. Only now, he could focus on flowers with a joyful heart, without shame or guilt of someone pointing fingers at him. The mother, on the other hand, still sometimes offered her tutoring skills to young children and teenagers, often without the obligation of payment. But her main reason to wake up in the morning, and smile trough out the day, became a life of simplicity, a life of being a housewife – which she oddly enough never experienced due to all the practices, concerts and rearrangements.
Saturday passed in the same fashion as Sunday – devoid of any connection to the outside world or any internal turbulence.
Sol trimmed a few bushes her father missed, read a book under the shade with a cold barley tea on the side, and occasional visit to the dreamland. She felt she visited a distant land, where one could do nothing except absorbing oneself in the moment, becoming one with the nature. However like any vacation, this too came to an end far too soon.
On Monday Sol switched her phone on, preparing to be hit with a suffocating wave of negativity over her interview. Strangely enough, there was no unread message waiting to be opened or a dizzy amount of missed calls. There was nothing to respond to and it felt almost unreal.
Was she really just another fleeting moment, another artist easily being replaced? Did she perhaps think
she was something special, while in fact she was no more than a forgettable story? Either way, as she turned her perception around, Sol felt a sense of relief and certainty. She was confident in her decision of never stepping back into hellish land of sculpting, and now was the time to stand tall and not look back.
As she slipped on her mother’s simple knee-length dress of mauve shade, a short melody played trough the tiny speakers of the phone. At first she thought the source came from somewhere else, but when she picked up her phone, unlocked the screen, she sure was staring at unread message. It was an email from an old account, and the loud sigh came out instantly, as if saying, why on earth do you still have this account active.
Sol tapped the email open, the short, four-sentence message quickly read. However something didn't fit right with her. What were these words even supposed to mean and who speaks a language like this. Did it came from another planet or another solar system?
The Monday turned out to be another perfect day to spent digging ones fingers in the cold soil or sitting back reading a book. It was too perfect to be true, but the news made the whole landscape lose its color in an instant.
There it was – the end had come and like all things, facing their final consequence, there was nothing to be done about it. The finality fell heavy on her chest as she tried to calm herself by reading the email once more, reassuring herself that perhaps it was just a sinister joke pulled at her.
‘I’ll be short. I would like to order a funeral flower arrangement and if it’s possible it has to be you who does it. It was Min’s last wish before she passed away on Friday. Tomorrow is the funeral and I’ll come pick you up at the store at around 11AM – Take care, Lion.’
Sol was looking trough a window, breeze playing with her hair, when the tears started to fall down her mother’s dress. One by one, the soft crying turned into sobbing.
This is no joke, and these are no laughing tears. This is the final, and tomorrow I will get to say, goodbye Min.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
UNTIL THE END COMES
Right in the very center of the sky stood the magnificent Sun, virtually casting no shadow. Sol waited no more than two to three minutes, before Lion’s car hit the curb to help transport them to the mourning site. The better half of the ride had been soaked in silence, however not that kind of awkwardness or avoidance, but that of remembrance.
Trough Sol flashed various images of the girl and inside of all shared memories, one instance kept returning back for more reflection – their last conversation. Min’s speech resonated deep within her, reminding her of her biggest flaw: fear. It was as if she already knew it would be their last meeting, and as an extra lesson she showed her some additional wisdom before saying farewell forever. Perhaps one day Sol will really wake up properly, abandon the fearful heart and exchange it for a stronger version, the one Min also carried. But at this very moment she was incapable of nothing other than staring over the front window glass, slightly swinging at every turn the tires made.
In the last ten-minute ride ahead of them, Lion broke the silence. ‘It was not a heroic death as I imagined it would be. Plain stupid actually.’ He said in a flat tone, after releasing brake when the green light showed up. ‘She was at that one bar, like any other night when a brawl happened. There are just two words you need to know – drugs and money, and too little of any of those make people lose their mind. Somehow me, and the kid, passed them on bike and of course we stopped. But by the time we got around the block one more time Min already got stabbed a couple of times. I took her to hospital, while Hell stayed behind and got himself a really good looking scar,’ they took another turn on the right and in the nearby distance the cross could be seen. ‘But as it turned out, she couldn't make it. And honestly, it would be a miracle if she did. There was just too much blood.’
Lion’s voice became strangely mocking like, however Sol didn't judge his sanity, considering the circumstance. In fact, even she felt rather odd. As if anytime now the curtain would be pulled down, applause roaring trough the theater for a great show. The only difference was that this show was reality, where no curtain ever fell down.
‘The funny thing though, was not a fight that took her away but that knife. That stupid knife she always carried with her.’
After Sol heard the ominous knife again, she looked at her palm, where white trace of scar ran, imagining if, that night so many years ago, when she was being cornered, something similar could happened to her.
Lion parked the car effortlessly, killed the engine then added, ‘life really is one huge irony. Isn’t it?’
They slowly walked down the hall to where Min’s mourning site stood. Not many people showed up, which was of course not surprising, however what caught Sol’s attention was that between all the present faces all seemed unnerving to stand by. They were more than definitely dealing with dangerous lifestyle and Sol never once shared a gaze with any of them. She focused solely on Lion’s back that lead her to a private section reserved exclusively for family members.
The room was eerily empty, so Sol took this time to pay respect by kneeling down and making an offering of her handcrafted flower arrangement. Lion hugged a sudden appearance of a person right next to her, and once she got to her feet again, the face was revealed. It was the boy.
Well, he was certainly not a boy anymore – he transformed into a young man with envious looks. Sol stepped closer, holding her hand for a handshake, when he retort with, ‘again?’ clearly remembering that time at her backyard when they first met.
He opted for a more reasonable choice and gave her a hug instead. However the hug didn't remind her of anything other than Min, and in her mind’s eye she saw her soundly sleeping in her apartment bed, unaware of being observed. This brought tears to Sol’s eyes, which in turn made a few wet patches on the boy’s shoulder. He gently patted her back, saying in a voice below a whisper, ‘I want you to know that just before she passed away, she said I’m happy. So there is no need for you not to be. Death is after all inevitable.’
His words appeared too blunt and even inappropriate, considering the close proximity of his dead sister, but the tone of his deep voice was hopeful. There was hope, and that was all that mattered to her trough-out the entire process of waving a farewell.
***
Just when the dawn started spreading across the horizon, Sol took her canvas bag and headed towards the meeting spot. She might’ve come home after a year, but she nevertheless left without saying a single word. All that was left behind, giving a hint she even visited her old home, were two letters.
One was addressed to her beloved mother and father, telling them not to worry as she decided to take a leave from her sculpturing as well as following her instinct by going on a vacation – location unknown. The other letter carried much more weight, more meaning, and was as such resting silently in the drawer upstairs, to others not existing.
Sol paced up her walk down the empty streets all very much in waking state, when she finally reached the corner of a bar she once visited. After additional ten minutes she received a call from Lion, excusing himself for not picking her up.
‘How am I supposed to come to wherever you are?’ she asked.
‘The plan changed a bit. The kid will drive you.’
‘I thought you would come by a car,’ she voiced out her opinion, trying to calculate how is this trip even going to take place.
‘Don't worry, you won’t fall down,’ he joked. ‘He’s a skilled driver.’
And as soon as he finished his sentence, a bright light turned around the corner, loud rumbling sound rolling trough the asphalt. The guy stretched his legs out in order to stop on aimed spot, and begun taking off his scratched helmet off. Sol stood directly in front of this freshly materialized motorbike, looking at the young man’s movement. Once the helmet dangled over his wrist, she could see a slight smile forming under the shadow of his longer hair. With his other hand he pushed back the fallen hair, exposing his face.
How could that be true, Sol didn't figure out, however the face she started at was nothing like the one she saw only yesterday. Perhaps it was because of the early hour, or because the young man at the funeral didn't make an impression, due to her freshly wounded heart. Either way, the guy she looked at, with confusion and disbelief, bared the exact same face as the one who occasionally crept trough her dreamland.
Hell was in every sense the representation of the mysterious dream figure. The only difference was that he was a real living person, breathing and moving, which honestly frightened her. When they greeted each other and once he offered her his helmet, she caught another unnerving detail. The harsh scar running down his cheek all to his sleek jawline resembled her very own sculpture. It was as if she created him herself and now he decided to come to life, tearing her apart.
The ride seemed to never end, and all those unnecessary connections Sol’s mind twisted and turned to, to try and explain the coincidences or premonitions, didn't help to ease the shocking reality. It was only after the heavy scent of seaside burst inside of the helmet, that she forgot about her pounding heart and spinning head.
The summer was coming to an end and this change could be felt even on the breeze that persisted so strongly, whenever she took a walk down the beach. In these four days they spent together in a summerhouse of Lion’s uncle, marked as being one of the highlights of Sol’s life.
Sure they only fooled around like teenagers, swam in the cold sea and shared a few drinks when the night hit the sky. However it was exactly that which she missed the most – having a bond of real friendship, one that is unconditional in its accepting, that doesn't force hurtful opinions on purpose and that doesn't judge based on any exterior characteristic.
These two young men never tried or even forced their way onto Sol in any way. What both of them had in common was immense respect for all kinds of people. One could say they even had it for the whole humanity. They only ever judged their own lives; the things, which they created by their own effort and never the things that couldn't be controlled by them. This was perhaps the biggest reason of Sol’s adoration over their personalities. Of course they had flaws, like any other person, but they were in many ways extremely balanced people.
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