(GE Copy)

Chapter 2: Beyond Our World

“If you take everything from him, will he still love you... If he never learned your ways would he still learn what you call love... If he finds someone better, will he still remember who you are in the end?”

Dawn came. Morning dew overhead, chill under their sheets returning them to the grime and musk between their teeth. Peeking before the sun, eager hikers making their morning routine could be heard jogging the steep embankment at the campground basin; tumbled rocks rolling in the hardened clay sands. It's a wonder why no one ever fixed the path. Just another set of prints to erode the hillside from under itself.

“You hear that?” Aaron spoke, a filament coating his groggy throat.

“Yeah.” Glued to his hard rock bed, slowly making a crawl to his lap, Zack collapsed his head into his knees. “We gotta get up... Don't we? Damn locals.” Leaping to his feet, “Come on.” Rolling Sophie out, who was still cranking out a mean snore. “Don't make me drag you, the sleeping bag won't take it.”

Hiding the empties into a bush, their visitor’s face’s could be soon visualized. Two, soon becoming three people over the horizon; a man and two girls, mid twenties. The man was dressed in floppy tan hoodie with the strings all beaded, flapping against the open sweating chest of his cotton wife beater. The two woman, more athletic of sorts compared to the modern hippy that they accompanied. “It's summer alright.” Aaron confirmed.

They looked onto the sleeping princess, smiled and tipped to the younger party. With a light hearted rebellious tone, he assured, “We won't tell.” Before passing by the youth.

The morning sun poured down, finally breaking in the neighbours trees outside the family home. Cooler, but still warm air pumped fruitlessly through the broken AC unit. Mom with a bowl of ice in front prepared for the blistering heatwave this afternoon. “How was your sleepover? There wasn't any funny stuff was there?” Crystal asked.

“Sophies?” Aaron answering his mother dryly. “Boring, quirky, but boring.”

“You look absolutely restless... Did you get enough sleep?”

“I’m not sure how anyone can sleep with her snoring.” Waddling towards to the stairs.

“Well, it's nice of you and Zack to spend time with her, but you guys kinda outnumber her, I wish you had another girl there so it wasn't so uncomfortable for her.” She said, fixing the scattered contents of the coffee table.

“You don't really get her, do you?” Intently fixed on climbing the stairs to get to his room.

“As her dad puts it, most people don't so it's nice that you can make her life more enjoyable.” Her tone shifting to try and get some attention out of him before he disappeared. “I can't imagine how hard it must be for her being so alone.”

“Sure...” Crawling the last stairs. “As she puts it, being alone is favourable but she needs to get out.” Chucking the bag onto the bed, he closed the door behind him, and collapsed onto the old bed. With a nice breeze blowing in from the window, Aaron soaked up the chill from the sheets. He flipped the pillow, plastering his face into it, and melted into the support. In time, he turned, taking his gaze to the popcorn ceiling, watching it turn to a starry night of mica upon the white background. His thoughts showcasing the night before vividly onto the bright speckles. Her glow, similar, a type of light that looked neither reflective nor emanating. The strands of hair which he could scarcely make out before now fluttering in a way he could not define, unable to isolate just how they moved. Heating up, the room was quiet. Looking down his window closed.

“Hey... Kid...” Aarons gaze unfixed to the annoyance. “You're eyes got quite a shimmer today, looks like you saw something real nice, huh?” Turning away, Aaron peered to the wall. “It's eyes like those that kindle a very special kind of person, a real go-getter, a man of passion,” Flipping the bird to the voice, it crept closer. “There we go, passion at it's finest. A real, genuine man, who does genuine things, visceral momentary things, unapologetic, a man who's living his life... It's a real gift you got there, unlike the sheeple you go to school with... Not for long though, a year? Two? Then off to collage to learn how to be a sheeple and teach the sheep how to crow and bark like a real lamb. When are you gonna give them up, huh? Their lying to you, making you nod, dance around.” Mimicking his words outside Aaron’s sight though he knew what was going on. “Isn't it great to dance, to dance, a pretty dance, the prettiest of them all. This one is extra special, because I feel FREeEeeee!” Now crawling to his shoulder. “I know you hear me, and you hear them, you understand it. You could be great, the world, the true world, a world more real than you could ever imagine...” Aaron rolled the pillow over his head. “HEY ASSHOLE!” The creature reconnected, smacking the pillow aside, knocking the lamp asunder. Aaron turned to meet his assailant. Aarons eyes burning mad. “Those are the eyes I'm talking about. Such life, such passion. You are truly alive.” Cowering at the sight.

“How long have you bothered me?” Aaron scowled.

“Oh, a few minutes short than our average appointment.” Though he couldn’t see him, Aaron knew he was there.

“Since you started.”

“Probably since your rebellious age kicked in and we were no longer friends.” The voice patronized

“And you're getting more desperate.”

“Happens to a man at that age...” It remorsed, hopping off his bed to pace the room. “Hormones, don't know what to do with them, always screaming at daddy because your man-tampon is on crooked. It's only natural.”

“I'm really starting to wonder if you are real or if I really am just loosing my mind.” Aaron said, creasing his eyes, trying to make out the shapes before him.

“Kid... Aaron, come now, be sensible. We all know what you saw last night? Doesn't it riddle you? Doesn't it?...”

“So, you were spying on me last night too?”

Dancing about the room, his form slowly coming into vision. Short, stubby, like a fat little gremlin, dark blistering ugly skin, somewhere between red and purple but every time his sight caught gaze it took a new form of hue. As though it was merely a colour he couldn't interpret. “You got a guardian angle, why not take it for a spin?”

“Eat me.” Falling back to his rest. “I know you can't do anything to me. You would have by now.”

“Ah... So hurt I am, ah, AH...” Staggering to the bedside, peering up, with a tear in his eye. The facade of sympathy as he bent to the ground, still empathizing to the tormented soul. “And what to your poor lamp? The sad little thing's broke since I cuffed the ingratfulness off your head!” Sighing sorely. “But, alas... I'm not bitter.” The pieces of the lamp found their way back together seamlessly reconnecting without movement. “Some part of you understands this, yes? But, right” Shaking his head, his tone changing to aggressive pity. “Yes of course, foolish me, you choose to reject these things. You see, your problem is that you are stuck in the middle. Can't look right, can't look left, it's not below you, it's not behind. You squander your gift at your leisure, as you see fit. The world doesn't give a shit.”

“Neither do I.”

“Listen here, and listen good...” A spark of malice pouring from his voice. “You can't always be on the winning team of both arguments. One day, you'll have to face up and take the one who's got everything you need already taken care of.” Sitting in the chair by the corner. “Family,” He boasted. “It's family... We don't mind if you're a little fucked in the head. We'll be there for you, aid you, teach you everything.”

“Don't come back.”

“Ah,” Smirking wildly as his chuckles warmed his coldened heart. “But, I already have you booked in some time next week,” Pulling his papers around, he rolled his head sounding tiresome. “And the book work to fix it, ah, just ain't the same on paper.”

“It's called white out, and use it on yourself while you're at it.”

The room quelled to a silent form. Aaron laying still, tense, hoping to finally relinquish the moment and return to normal. Up he rose. Vacant plus himself, the torment released. Lifting the window, Aaron plugged the pin to withstand it's weight. “I'll just leave this here.”

“Eerrr!” Aaron shot behind him, his gaze unmet with the impish mongrel. The chair now sitting a written contract. “I'm getting really tired of this shit.” Grabbing the contract from the chair, staring deeply into it, not letting it out of his sights as he walked through the door to the balcony. The hovering ink wobbling above the page, distinctly blurring. An overwhelming sensation of fear began to course through him, as the thoughts of a dozen outcomes came rushing in to hinder him. A heavy weight overcame him, struggling to move, the doorway that he certainly left once again in front of him out the corner of his eye. His feet moved, knowing where he was, instinctively trying to navigate the house so someone else could witness what he had in his hands. Successfully, he passed the door, navigating the hallway, past the garage, with no one in the kitchen, his sight intent on the paper, the world spun around him, still staggering to find someone. His voice called out, silently, inaudible. His pace increased finally making it to the stairs where he could reach someone, realizing the path he took did not exist. Instinctively running through places he knew but weren't actually there. He looked up, still struggling to move. Standing, still, in his bedroom, the paper gone from his hands, but the feeling of it still lingered, fading, disappointing. “Damnit! That C... Nnnn... Every, damn, time!” Falling onto the foot of his bed. “This is getting out of hand.” This was not his first encounter, and it wasn't just his imagination. Other people witnessed oddities, few, but certainly. With some luck, he wasn't actually nuts... But, not yet.

He sat there for half an hour, eventually breaking to wander the house. Out the bedroom to the balcony, down the hall to his right, down the stairs into the living room, just the way it is supposed to be. Mom in the kitchen, chopping vegetables. He turned to the back wall, the bathroom, the spare room, and the back garage before the rec hall. Inside was the familiar scent of old car parts, a sleek musky allure of oil stains and grime. Stepping down into the room, he overviewed the scrapped projects. His father wasn't much of a mechanic so at times he took it on himself to take apart and reconfigure pieces. Often with a failed result or just a pile of pieces without a form. He felt an ambition as the nearing-to-summer air swept in from the open door that lead to their grassy backyard. Finally green after some time watering it. He held the motor into the light, ambitious but unresolved. That moment, of holding the piece there, in all it's intoxicating fresh winds before a vibrant light was all the time he needed to return from his troubles. He looked back to the go-buggy he was working on. Tucked out of kicking range, he slid away the empty jugs in favour of his old love that laid behind them.

His mother knocked on the garage door, opening it regardless. “Sandwiches.” Seeing her son at work. She scrunched her lips, returning the plate to be wrapped for later.

“Back at it are you?” His old man turned from outside, cracking a beer.

“This early?” Aaron squinted his eyes.

“What's a weekend if everyone gets to tell you how to spend it? Your mother wishes to inform me, to tell you, in other words to let me play the bad guy for her... That she'll skin you if you blow up the garage...”

“And you’re letting her?”

Letting out a roaring belch. “And what? Play the bad guy? You know, you inherit my skills with machinery, but I won't let that stop you from at least trying. You're like me, you gotta learn the hard way... Just... Don't blow your damn fingers off. You can plaster the walls but you loose those fingers, I can't put you to work when I get older.”

“This is going to turn into one of those farm stories, isn't it.”

“Not this round, It's coming, but...” Paul assured, quickly summarizing what he wanted to say. “When I was your age I learned just how important it was to have a working hand when old Skinnar and Grandpa went fishing, damn well broke his back swimming to shore. I don't know what they were gonna catch but they sure were determined. You work hard your whole life, it's gonna creep up on you...” Sipping his brew “Shit... That was another farm story wasn't it? Well, I'll cut it short and let you know we had to work for him, and get sassed day in and day out, knowing the only solace of it was one day we'd be the ones slinging orders to our kids. Now, I didn't work that fifty odd years like he did, I got out pretty early, but look at me... Big, tall, muscular, little fat,” guiltily pinching his sides. “A real ox hurdler build. Genetically, I'm gonna be so stiff in a few years, riger'mortis will kick in before I'm even in the nursing home. So... Uh... Yeah... Don't blow off your fingers. I’ll need the help one day.”

“Duly noted.” Aaron's mind elsewhere, sidetracking from the whole repeat anecdote. The more he eyed up the hillside from where he was, the closer it seemed to him. He scooted the project back under the table for a rainy day, finding his way back in. Up to his room, Aaron dialed Sophie, letting it ring. Holding the phone on his shoulder, he closed the window, eyeing into the bush.

“Archent residence.” The phone picked up.

“Hey, Sophie,” Starring up the hill from his window. “You're certain about what you saw, right?”

“Hamster walking on the cafeteria counter, had the stubby tail and everything.”

“The ghost.”

“Oh...” Sounding disappointed. “What of?”

“You up for a little late night hunting?” A fire burning in his eyes. “You know... Sneaking out late, trying to catch another glimpse, get back before our folks even realize we're gone? You know, real boring stuff like that.”

He could hear the clanking and clatter of whatever she had falling from the table. “Beats sitting around here.”

“What do you think that I should bring?” Aaron’s tone getting brighter and more excited by the second. “Should be stuff that wont get ruined running around in the bush.”

“Magnet, water, hydrolyzed soy proteins, trail mix.”

“Sooo... That's all?”

Breaking from a short pause, Sophie issued. “I got some electrical testing equipment at home, plus a few tasers.”

“And you don't have water or magnets?”

“Not around all the machinery, it messes with them.” Already packing herself a bag of supplies on the other end of the phone.

“...In case they get messed up in the bag?”

“Close enough.”

Brimming, Aaron tried to keep his voice down. His careless joy still peeking through. “Meet after sunset, by Simpson, and go up from there?”

“Oh,” Dropping her packed collection of things. “I thought you meant going right now. I was just about to tell my dad that I’d need a ride...”

“No,” He contested swiftly. “No... You're Dad's not a good idea.”

Huffing the hair from her eyes. “Fine, I'll walk.”

“Silent... Like niiiinja.” Aaron said, doing a one handed hand sign. Hanging up, he dropped the phone beside him on the bed. His dad walked by with a load of laundry.

“Sneaking off with a girl are you? That's my boy.”

“Wow...” Creasing his eyes. “You still heard that.”

“Just the tail end. Hey...” Leaning against the doorway. “I've been a lad myself, sneaking out to tip cows, pellet guns at the lake. Dad's beer and Rus's pickup truck down by the bar when we were too young to get in, just to find a sober girl... You're like me, just, city boy and social politics. You're gonna have to try real hard to outdo your old man, just remember your Yellow Balloon.”

“My... My, what now?”

Smirking heartily, he dropped the basket, taking his lean instead against the inside wall. “My brother always did go on about those squirrelly chicks, nuttier than a man screwing peanut butter... That's not how it goes... Good on you for picking up that Sophie chick. A girl that keeps you busy is better than a girl that keeps you sane he'd always say... I got you're mom, she does neither but I love her... Jackson always was an off head though, either way, take a rubber.”

“I'm like nine tenths certain my Dad figures we're going out to... Erm...” Aaron jested. Sophie carrying her bag of goods over her shoulder. The sun now firmly set into the dusk basin of a dark mountainous road.

She processed the information slowly, before it began to crack her exterior, grinning until she could no longer hold it. “HAaa!” She burst out laughing. “As if! You wouldn't even be able to find the hole.”

“Rude!” Aaron stopped.

Looking back at him, Sophie chuckled, still tickled. “You find the hole, and it's all yours bud. I'll see you in ten years though.”

“I'm not even going to gratify that with a response.” Walking a ways up the pass “So, what all in all are you packing to this anyway?”

Retrieving her bag, she opened it to Aaron, “Electrometer, needle and petri, compass, cat food.”

“Cat food...” Aaron glazed over,

“In case we find a cat and it's hungry... Or we starve... Crucifix, metal detector rod, device that I can't tell you what it does or Father will have us both in hot water, one Ouija bored though mine is broken, disposable camera.” Tossing the camera aside. “Because we all know it's going to get broken anyways. Instant ramen, lighter, ceremonial smudge, voodoo dolls, also broken, and a high powered microphone to record our terrified screams for future hikers to find and have nightmares from.”

“Why are your creepy stuff all broken?”

“Never worked, probably got faulty ones... Lock of hair?” Sophie asked, reaching out. Slapping the hand away, Aaron firmly declined the request. “Oh, I almost forgot,” Reaching into the bag. “Two tasers as promised.”

“I like how I'm still not even remotely surprised by the tasers.”

“Also, if you hear ear piercing shrieks, run like hell, because It's probably a banshee.”

“Should I doubt that possibility?”

“I wouldn't hold your breath on it.”

The dry hillside wafted whatever little moisture still latent inside, and without the sun on their skin, the warm evening only barely renewed them. Eroded, clumps of clay-sand swept the shoulder of the road, spritzing thin glass sparse between dead bushes cut short. The town seemed uninterested to the degradation of the road's lip, with pieces of asphalt departed from the ankle high barrier. Old patches that were slapped in among the cracks of stone speckled pavement, were now bleached like the rest of the old tarmac. As they ascended, the houses revealed themselves across the districts. Saskatoon berries still infantile, their blossoms laid upon the earth beside them. At the fork, they turned left, taking the higher pass. Aaron smirked at the sign “Fyffe Road. What kind of name is that? Doesn't even sound native like the rest of the valley.”

“Sounds more like a British name.”

“My condolences to the family.” Aaron pressed forward. About half an hour in, they’d passed two wineries, with sight of houses aside lofty orchards and hillsides. There was a large incline ahead, a clear shot straight up the intended hill if you ignore the property it was on. Though they were tempted to break path, they kept along the road, where there were less farm dogs and shotguns. “Do you suppose we got a ghost around here, being as the graveyard is just up ahead?” Aaron inquired, a little nervous.

“Doubt it, who's ever seen a ghost in a graveyard? Should be full of them right? They only seem to appear in places of great torment, which is why their usually at home where most accidents occur. Besides, If they made a shooting zoo for hunters, would you go there? No, there's no sport in that. Keeping real ghosts out of cemeteries is natures way of making things interesting. After all, we're here to find you a ghost wife, or something, right?”

“You on that too?”

Unimpeded by Aaron’s disappointment, Sophie fantasized. “Maybe a not-meant-to-be love story of laying the maiden to rest only to face the cruel fate that, by saving her, that you will never meet again? Perhaps the love you share will be so strong that it supersedes all natural law, but then she'll outlive you and with having your desires complete she'll be left here alone as a malevolent spirit to claim the world, reaping souls, spitting the very divi...”

“It's really not like that!” Aaron shot back.

“You could revel with me, it'll never happen but it's fun to think about.”

“Look... I can't explain it. There is something so peaceful, yet worried about her that sticks in me. It's like a grip that I can't let go of because I know if I don't go that I'll never have the chance to look any deeper into this rabbit hole. It scares me just as much as it intrigues me, I’m not just some weird fetisticly driven goth kid –And! She is definitely not hot by any stretch of the imagination. There is just something more behind it. For a moment, I could feel her presence. Sympathies with her, empathize and feel... More... Just, more than myself. Like a link, it feels like both a panic, and a worry without even meeting eyes. Something so heart opening that it scares me to feel what's inside. Call it a, a calling, a purpose, something that shakes me from this cold existence of mediocrity. Something interesting.”

“Don't get me wrong, ghosts are still interesting...”

“Not because of what it is, or what's going on, because it makes me feel something truly overwhelming. Something I've never felt before, but yet it feels so...”

“Familiar?” Her calm demeanour contrasting the potential of knowledge, like the experience of a seasoned warrior.

“Do... You really understand it?”

“No, and I wish I did...” Her face saddening. “Just easy to finish the sentence. Some part of me seeks out adventure only to be let down, wanting to know what drives people to the things that they admire. I get a feeling of passion out of you but it's not my passion. I can't feel it like that, though I want to. I want to cultivate that joy, to understand it, but I'm scared that if I do, that magic disappears. That in knowing, it looses it’s glimmer. Still as long as there is inconsistencies in the world, there are opportunities to see outside of myself long enough to be filled with something else. Knowledge, maybe you just seek to understand like me, you just get caught up in the emotion.”

“You are the strangest girl,” Coming to terms with all he could get to convey to her. “Every girl I hear argues with feelings and intents. It's usually the guys that reason and use logic... And yet, I don't see a tomboy in you at all.”

“Life is to be experienced, embraced, I think we share the same value but your method is... Different. I'm not going to tell you that you are wrong but in my experience, things that are at work are lot more normal than you might imagine.”A silent was moment was shared in between, for a moment Aaron could almost see a fragment of Sophie coming to life, one which he lost a while back. Like a mystery that was taken for granted. Her saddened eyes sympathized, looking back onto him. “If you stop looking for them, you'll be like everyone else. The mindless entertainment junkies, living to be catered to, never searching for anything... And there will be nothing linking us after that.”

“Is that why you hang out with us?”

“You're weird, it's the only thing normal to me anymore. Since I moved here, life's been a massive disappointment, until I met you.”

“And Zack?”

“And Zack.” Walking a ways. “And Kratoze... Hey... Aaron. What do your eyes see?” The faint glow on their left

Turning to the field of stones, his eyes wavered in the dark. A few pale lights of the grounds attracting flies, lighting the earth dimly. Scarcely amidst the soil, the uncertainty began to swirl areas in his gaze, expecting something more than the normal ground which met sight into his eyes. “What do you see?” Aaron returned.

“Ff-frick all.” She said, skipping ahead. Her voice trailing as she left the area. “Told you life keeps the good stuff on the top shelves. Ain't no ghost in a grave yard.”

Beyond the graves, a path trailed up the hill. Guessing the best from it, Aaron fixed his boots. An old pair with short tops that was passed onto him from a relative. Heavy and leather, perfect for tripping in. But not yet. “Jumping cactus everywhere. Mind your step.”

“HA! Snakebite kit!” Sophie announced abruptly. “I knew I forgot something.”

“Sounds really assuring.” Taking to the trail. Aaron hesitated momentary before taking the prickly road with his youthful confidence. We’ve all done it, invincible, counting the years until we have to give a damn. Aaron figured it rather unlikely to get bit in the next hour.

All along the confines of the narrowing pathway, their footing degraded to a scarce deer trail. Dry thin flowers swayed with a north wind. Head on and brisk, their ascension winded all along the dry hillscape. He rested at a bush, it's blossoms still too early to nourish him. Stumbling beyond, the thin presence of trees began to finally flesh out their hike, otherwise it was needles abound the grass.

“This is probably the next to be up in smoke.” Aaron remarked in the presence of it's carbon stockpile. “I don't think I've been somewhere this barren since we drove the Princton pass past the dam.” Grasping the arid branches to pull himself up the steep of their path. The bare uneven ground was like the erosion had swept the road below, and in time, the deer galloped it’s lodgings until all that was left were bare cobbles. “You remember where the ghost was on this thing?”

“I'm not a map.” Sophie returned. Her hand pointing northward.

“That way?”

“Heck if I know.”

It must have been an hour, as the dark completely enveloped the sky. With their flashlights doing only enough to catch the next immediate obstacle, they were unable to really navigate much more than up or down, with the occasional approaching bluff or drop off. Favouring north, they realigned themselves back above the residential orientation that they saw her hovering behind. “We didn't even a path for her to be on, did we?” Panting heavily, Aaron braced the naked stone, shouldering it's weight and dropping his own against it's basin along the steep embankment. “I don’t know where it went...” He heard an annoyance, smacking it off. His body giving out after the excursion. “Phuuum... Damn, frickin... Too tired to be dealing with mosquitoes.” Firmly planted, Sophie stood on his side, hosting a slue of airborne asshats. All of which, buzzing, circling her, too hesitant to actually connect, desperate to find an opening but flew back to Aaron instead.“Do they ever bother you?” Swatting his new fan away.

“Never have,” Sophie confessed, “They seem attracted which is rather unattractive. That's a pun... They keep their distance, tics however are another story.”

“Damn, gotta check for those later.” His head falling under the massive weight of existing “I don't think that I've been this tired for years.” Feeling himself slip down the embankment. “Hearts pounding, blood feels like thin oil, muscles haven't stopped tingling since they stopped hurting. You don't even get out, how are you this fine?”

“I feel pain and exhaustion, I just don't show it very well.” Toying with the blood suckers who shied away screaming like a herd of prepubescent kids in love. Darting away from her touch, and even her sight. “It's an opportunity to find out how much my body can withstand, so I endure it. This ghost seems to have given you a lot to go for. Most people would have slowed down at this point.”

“Great, now I’m like Zackery... I tell you, she’s about all the motivation I got to go off of now.” Scooting his rear back against the rocks, having not actually slid any. Still feeling himself casually loose traction. “Everything else... Is... Burned out. Just the thought of her...” Aaron lost himself in thought. A sweeping wind came through, amplified as it piled against the wall. He could hear the breeze loudly but his mind faded into somewhere else. All thought sweeping him off to see her glowing mythical face in his mind. Even the north winds were a numb reception to his strong recalling memories. Boy was freaking tired.

He could see himself standing beside her, while ten miles away. He could make out every detail, slowly coming into frame. Her spirit, the past she felt without a single story. She noticed him, as he stood upon the mound and their eyes met. Aaron could recall the night before in much greater detail than he felt previous. Her face, saddening, not nearly as beautiful as he desired, not for as much as how he felt about her anyway. She became to him as a friend, and maybe deeper but no love could be felt. The cold sweat from his body soaked his clothes.

Waking from this restless dream, mosquitoes numb against his face, Aaron returned to his conciousness. He could hear them vividly, but care not. Oddly he couldn’t bring himself to be bothered. If anything, he was too distracted with being able to feel every grain of sand beneath him to care about the blood sucking invasion.

Looking above him, he felt the stone, cold, radiant. The gradient of temperature that he could feel beneath the surface of the rock itself, transpired out like an energy. He felt the rock beneath the surface, like a slow wafting current of water, impeded by the density and compositions which frayed the energy and it poured out of the rock as air through his fingers. His mind wondered if this too was the odd occurrences that he was told of. The imp, claiming something very real existed, something only he could feel. At the end of the river that flowed from the rock and solids, he sat, grasping onto what frail focus he had to obtain this feeling.

The emotion fell out from him, being forced to normality. He cursed himself, again, for loosing the precious awareness of the world's mysteries, as the stone lost it's lustre of grace. The river ceased to flow, or merely, he had lost the sense to feel it any longer. “I wish I could just figure this shit out. Why I feel these things, why they become more real than anything I've ever felt in my life... Slowly... Fading away entirely.” His eyes wept a reminiscent tear as his mind recalled this feeling once before. “I felt this way as a child. This splendour, this visceral embodiment. Just the slightest grace of it, understanding it's entire existence within an instant, and everything that came before it. I know it, I understand it, and now... I’ve grown away from it.” His ears ringed, the inescapable tone that numbed out the infinitely acute sense of hearing, like the tone at the end of a broadcast. Chill. Wet from the lace of his shoes to his ears in sweat, miserably, Aaron rinsed his voice. “Sophie?” Somewhat already aware of his solitude. “You're not even here are you?” Still pressed against the wall. No telling how long he had actually been asleep for. She probably left to take a leak or something, if he was lucky; he’d hate to be late to the party.

His weak arms stopped tingling, lifting him to his wobbly feet. Their mass felt like styrofoam. Stumbling down, Aaron fell onto his rear, reacquiring his stability and balance. Climbing back, his grip clung to the rock wall. Aaron didn't realize how steep the basin was. “Sophie?! Damned girl, SOPHIE!” The silence whistled along the rock. Aaron fed up with the absence, took his own legs to the hillside, circling the ledge to hopefully find her. “She better not have gave up and left me alone out here, to go look like an idiot for trying to find her.” His footing slid out from under him, as he traversed the large edge.

“Aaron, what are you yammering on about?” Sophie returned above the cliffside “I found a way up and because you were still asleep I checked the other way and it's faster...” Standing there awkwardly in the silent response she shrugged. “Well, guess I'll see him soon enough.” Looking below the cliffs edge; frowning as she did. One tic hung on by a hair, “Why do they bite me if they know they'll die?” Blowing the already lifeless corpse from her leg. “Suppose it want's a proper funeral while I'm at it, doesn't he?... Smug little bastard.”