The Salt in the Sea

Chapter 1

I started writing this story with Dearly Beloved playing in my ear, but sorta just got lost in the music for a while, so if this ends up kinda flowery you now know why ^-^);
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Radiant Garden didn't really feel like home after so many years. The clouds seemed to have vanished, the sky a bright and empty blue that radiated a brilliant light; Lea had to yank his collar away from his neck in feverish frustration. The flowers were coloured different, long replaced with newer species and highlighted in the summer day with harsh yellows. The buildings too, had been rebuilt and repainted into landmarks he couldn't recognize, and the loud laughter of children had a strange hum to it. Even the air had a foreign smelling freshness.

Lea, with his lanky stature and vivid red hair, stuck out more than he ever did as a child. His bold choice of colours, although distracting, placed him neatly into Radiant Gardens natural hue of brightness. Now, in a black coat he couldn't quite will himself to take off, and with a small frown stuck to his face, he looked so incredibly out of balance with the rest of the world. As if he'd gone back in time to a place he no longer belongs.

Lea took a deep breath, one of brevity and self-assurance, and forced some confidence into his steps as he took powerful strides forward. He remembered the road to the castle being so much longer, its uphill climb seeming like an adventure in of itself. When he could only walk, he would stare up at it in wonder, his hand in his mothers as she nudged him past the trail. When he could run, he would race off with a grin, waving his arms frantically at his best friend trailing behind. His amused smile left an imprint in his mind, something he knew even then to be cherished. It was like looking up at a completely blank night sky, and finding a single star.

At least now it did– cherishing something while it was still in your grasp was very different, after all, to when it's gone.

As he was a decade later with longer legs and a much bigger sense of urgency, he made it onto the castle doorstep in less than ten minutes. He waved sluggishly at Dilan as he passed him, and the bright-eyed man gave him a simple nod and smile in reply.

"Sup, Dilan."

"It's good to see you, Lea." He breathed out in a deep accented voice. As he spoke, he walked ahead towards the grand door at the castles entrance, and granted Lea excess with a quick pull on its hinge. Lea grinned.

"Thanks," he laughed, "Sorry for turning up so suddenly."
"It's no trouble, now go on."

He stepped into the hallway quickly, his feet marching forward with a pace his head wasn't ready for. The door shut abruptly, and suddenly he was in a labyrinth with walls all the same immovable shape and bland beige in colour. For Lea, they wobbled in his peripheral, and he stumbled along with them with every turned corner. In the past, he could walk this path with his eyes closed, in fact you could spin him around until his eyes fell out, and he would still whistle a tune on his way without a care. Now every step felt wrong, like he was walking into a lion's den without a weapon, or a doctor's appointment expecting bad news. His palms were sweaty, his breath hitched at every twist of the walls even knowing he was nowhere near the lab.

The lab. The room was too bright, too easily tainted with memories that filled Lea's lungs with soot and left him to choke. Medically cleaned floors and stern, emotionless expressions– as a child nothing was worse. With Isa by his side it made everything a little better, his arm warm next to him and his smile kinder than anything else present. And he would give comfort back just the same, with a teasing remark or an outstretched hand. Lea wasn't sure it'd be much of a comfort anymore.

Isa didn't smile at him at all when they were nobodies. Lea didn't smile either, but he knew if Isa needed one he would've plastered one onto his face all the same. He never needed it though, not a smile or a teasing remark or an outstretched hand. Lea couldn't remember the day he thought he wasn't needed anymore, or the day his remarks turned more hurtful or stopped altogether. If Isa missed him so much, why didn't he even try to express it? If he was jealous, why did it take him dying in Lea's arms to finally say something? They seemed like lies, and after years of believing the opposite, he couldn't help but think they were.