Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
03 the sea is a good place to think of the future
It's warm against her skin; almost endearing how the sand moves with the curl of her palm. Mercy has a headache. She can feel it, nipping quietly and without hesitance at her temples. It's consistent but soft underneath the skin. Subtle nails dragging against the chalkboard as she pulls the pieces of conversations and split sections of body language together. A bottle of aspirin sits on a white shelf inside. So close, but so far. Her fingers twitch. All Mercy has to do is stand, brush off her black, crinkled beach skirt and walk through the entrance into her house. She just has to make it through the threshold.
But she can't move.
Something keeps her still in the quiet. The air rests steady, and there's a bite to the beach's warmth that Mercy's never felt before. Even away from the beach, sand seems into the seams of her bikini top, clinging to the skin of her back. And in the distance, the waves march forward and retreat; stuck within an infinite loop of push and pull under the Moon's steady watch. The sound crashes, swarming against the buzzing within her skull. It knocks on the hollowness within her chest, filling it, before heaving away again. Mercy sucks in a breath. The Earth presses against her back, rocks jutting into her spine and the sporadic tendrils of grass hesitantly tickling the back of her neck. A subtle reminder that she's still here. Or is she? The ground may hold Mercy close, the open arms of Mother Nature's comfort, but she still feels as if she's tipped the scales of an already off-kilter balance.
It's the flame of a lingering of doubt. The slightest slice of insecurity.
Her mom has always said that Mercy wears her heart on her sleeve. A painting of red waves curling against temples and tight smiles bunching her freckled cheeks. She doesn't cry; very few times have salty tears splashed against her face, leaving cracks in her mask. But if you look closely enough, her eyes are almost transparent—flecked with the gleam of trouble or the cracked stone of pain as the hurt seeps through the jagged lines. The first time she saw Illusion, it's like a camera was grainy. Pixels softened at the edges against each other; Illusion's smile fuzzy but it never lost its sharpness. It has always been otherworldly. The corners upturn and Mercy feels her chest expand and fill in tandem. It's like feeling everything and nothing all all at once. Her eyes close.
