Chris began to question the wisdom of this trip; he felt the sort of lonesome that seems to dangle onto one’s sleeve, unable to be shaken off. He really did. In all honesty, he was sick and tired of the cliché weekend vacations he was dragged along to by his frivolous parents, forever devoted to reliving their golden years by spending exorbitant amounts of money to surround themselves in a paradise luxe, in an effort to sweep away what it is that is truly missing from their lives. They tried to cover those obstinate holes with more and more money that just seems to pile up into nothing and slip through little gaps until it is diminished and yet, the holes remain. Chris noticed this, and not too long ago, either. He saw the way his parents fervently spent money like it was poison and attend parties of people they spoke scandalously of and, for the life of him, he could not realize why, until he thought about their shackles to riches and their inability to see past the prolific haze that made them believe that this was the only way to live. Chris was very smart, he had to be; he realized his parents had been swimming in the wrong direction all this time, but he wouldn’t dare tell them that, they were far too wrought up and tangled in an infinitely wide web that Chris wouldn’t dare touch or come near. Which, was why, Chris spent these luxurious weekends away from the paradisiacal state. When his parents had decided to have a child, it was out of guilt, out of guilt that they weren’t pure and good, as they put it. Chris made them pure and good, so that after a late night party of drinking cocktails and smoking and dancing, they would return home and see that they were actually pure and good; it was perfect.

Sweeping the glossy black floor, his mother’s shimmering dress and his father’s dancing shoes, slipped out the door, waving a well versed arm and allowing the sensuous velvet number to spread up the stairs like honey: thick and warm. A familiar sensation of abandonment and infidelity struck Chris, and being so familiar, he had taught his mind to take it as pleasurable, so that pain could not surface as easily. As soon as the clatter on the marble stairs had faded, he crept out into the grandness of the darkened hall, festooned with silken draperies. There is something of darkness that is strung to elegance; they share a bond, making elegance sly and mysterious, so the glint off gold gives only a subtle hint of its intrinsic value. There is vividness and a lush prance of air that swirls and intoxicates. A sensual and unpredictable ambiance penetrates the air that seems to dilute clarity and cast a shimmering haze over everything, and everyone knows, that darkness seals in intimate secrets of the night.

Slipping into the grand foyer, he was then surrounded by a gorgeous dimness, with the faint glimmer off of a richly spun robe or the shine of two haughty eyes, preserved in a fickle state, forever wondering with an intense throb what to do next to compliment their status. It disgusted him and he pushed through the lavishness, viciously tossing away the clutter of riches that surrounded him, and tumbled outside through the back. Standing by the garbage cans was almost like a tug of reality to him. He had always felt the dreamlike trance of the sumptuousness built around him, flashing and smooth and soft and lavish. It made his head spin and his eyes blur as the rich smell made him feel as if he were looking through frosted glass and feeling through thick sheets. Cold air and stench brought him back on two feet.

So he began to run, working a heat in his jelly legs, pumping, feeling the rush and the true pain and burn. A real feeling, not the burn of whimsical fairy lights on a boat deck or the rush of silk slithering through your fingers or the excitement of the night being a blur, but a true, real feeling. The power that you can radiate banishes those other insignificant feelings. So he kept going and going, flipping up sand and shells as he splashed through the beach. The salt in the air stung the rich off his skin, bleeding it dry until it washed upon the shore, feeling foreign and exposed. It was an ugly black color, like soot; it looked like soot. It had a distinct reflective quality, so that maybe, if you looked at it just right, you saw turquoise and gold and scarlet and obliterating glitter that could wipe the shore away. But Chris didn’t see that, he saw the darkness washing off his body, shriveling upon the sand, like a grotesque creature. It was out of place; it didn’t belong with this purity of waves that balm the soul and sand that holds you close, with the birds that flock above, watching over, and seashells with a thousand stories, or the gentle glow of the moon always with a sweet smile. Shivering and crumpling in his wake, the glitter hid and the scarlet seeped out. Chris kept running, watching his skin drain as a lucid path formed behind him, twisting and writhing, for they were not meant to live anywhere but infested in the heart, intertwined with the veins, sucking out what it needed and ceasing to give in return.

The glimmering water shone a hundred times brighter than any fleck of glitter. The water spun and swirled, the light dancing and the water cascading over itself again and again, but softly, like a lullaby. Maybe they were scared, maybe they couldn’t face this lack noise, the sweetness of the rain or the feeling of bathing in the sunlight instead of the passion that seems to entrance them, that holds them bonded forever to a lack of the natural, and an infinite taste for the hypnotic haze that grasps them tightly, sweeping a sleeping spell. Chris could only hope that one day, they might wake up.