«On The Wings of Ravens»
«Recently, I had begun to wonder if one day I would just stop sleeping altogether. My nights, actually spent sleeping, were getting shorter all the time.
But that thought wasn’t for now, it would have to wait for later, if that particular later ever came.
***
The quiet unlit downtown street, of the small northern town I found myself in, on this particular night, helped me to think clearly and organize my thoughts. I think it had something to do with the fact that there were so few cars around, and even fewer people—especially at this hour of the night. There was nothing and no one to intrude upon my broken soul and disjointed thoughts.
There was a darkness in my soul, like an oil spill, which threatened to overtake my existence on a daily basis. Who was I? What was I? What was I supposed to be doing in this life? Was I waiting for something—someone?
What was I to do for an eternity alone?
The threat of that darkness over hung my every moment, and with each passing year it was getting darker, spreading further—deeper into my very being. Soon the years would blend into decades, and just the same, fade into a singular moment. It would be then, if I couldn’t find the strength to fight it back anymore, when the darkness would accomplish its task.
Ironically, this was also something I used to ground me to the present, to help me differentiate between the passages of time. A double-edged sword if I ever knew one.
***
I had that dream again last night. But it wasn’t like the others. My dreams never seemed to be the same, never seemed to reoccur. Nothing—except for this one detail—was ever the same.
Always there was a young woman. And always she stood at the edges of my dreams, at the place where consciousness meets the dreaming world. A place that is forever blurred in the mind’s eye. She is the silent observer of my dreams. And always she is watching me with her eyes of pale green from the edge of my subconscious.
I remembered I was still barely a man when I first began to notice her presence in my dreams.
‘God, but that was such a long time ago. Eons, really.’
As the decades merged together it’s become harder and harder to tell exactly how long it is that I’ve been dreaming of her. I wouldn’t have remembered that far back, those long forgotten times—like a child forgetting their first conscious moments—were it not for her presence in my dreams to mark the passage of time.
Her quiet, watchful stare pierces my very soul, drawing my eyes away from the events of my dreams to her location in them. It has always been the same since then. I’ve become keenly aware of the very moment her presence becomes clear in my dreams; and as of recently tried to steer my mind to her direction with no such luck.
In all my long and accursed immortal years she has forever reminded the only constant in my life. The only person time has not stolen from me. The only light with which to brighten my empty days. She is my blessing and my curse. My darkness because I know that the woman who haunts my dreaming hours can never be a reality. No matter how many centuries pass, no matter how hard I constantly look. She will not be found. How could she be?
***
Last night the dream was different. It wasn’t hard not to notice the change immediately.
In this dream I walked alone, through the fields of tall grass and far-reaching trees of some mysterious land. The ground was distorted in a thick mist that covered everything, and feeling as if it would seep into my very bones.
As I walked I felt her. Turning I came to see her behind me. This was the first time I had ever come so close to her—to see that she really existed, even if it was only one of my self-creations.
I took a step in her direction, only realizing I had done so when she smiled and extended her hand in acceptance of me.
I wanted to hold her so badly in my arms—more so than I have ever wanted to do anything in my entire existence.
Her hand was soft and warm as I held it in mine. And in that moment, I was for the first time, happier than I could ever remember myself being. It was then that the dream began to fade, ripping at the edges of my consciousness, and slowly I began to wake.
***
My walk, this evening, helped me to clear away some of the unbearable loneliness that only seems to follow dreams of her.
The silence of the night and my reverie was broken suddenly by the sound of genuine ringing laughter that seemed to echo off the very sky itself. Searching the street up and down I found the source to be a young woman. She and a small group of people stood huddled on the far side of the street at one of the only two major intersections the town had. They were not more than sixty feet from me. The figures of the group were almost completely hidden by the shadows cast by the few—and at best sporadic—street lamps.
I slowly snuck closer and watched them as they continued unaware. Wanting to know what had caused this woman’s joyful laughter. It had sparked something inside me and I wanted to hear it again.
No, I wasn’t a stalker. There was just something about her appearance that gave me the feeling of familiarity. Her hair was dark and hung low down her back. I was still too far away to make out any defining facial features but something tickled at the back of my mind.
Before I could get any closer to the group they had begun to separate—heading in their own directions for home and to sleep for the night—that was my guess anyway.
I made it across the road and continued down the street as casually as I had first done. No one saw me sneak back across the deserted road. The moment she stepped within my sight, she was less than twenty feet away from me and recognition clicked within me.
Her face, her hair—everything about her was exactly like the young woman who plagued my nights. As she passed the alley in which I hid, she turned to look directly at me and stopped—it would have been impossible for any human to have seen me, unless they knew where to look. Her eyes locked with my own, in the darkness, and she smiled. Not like that of a pleasant greeting between strangers, but like that of welcoming back a good friend or lover.
No matter what I did I couldn’t look away from her. She was even more beautiful than in my dreams.
The others she had been with had long since vanished down the various alleyways, while time for us seemed to freeze as we stood gazing at each other. Then, just as it had happened in my dream, she held her hand out to me and I took it, closing the last of the distance between us.
She was not much shorter than me, but still, she had to tilt her head up to clearly see my face in the dark. She smiled the smile that one saves for their lover, as if between them they shared an intimate secret. And here I was, that very smile directed at me.
“Hello, John.” Her voice was smooth, flowing into every pore to envelope me completely. With a rush the past—memories—came rushing back to me, slamming into me with the physical force of a brick wall.
“Claire.” I breathed.
“I was beginning to think you’d forgotten about me.”
“I can’t forget about you, Claire. You won’t let me.” It was her. The dreams were of her doing.
She giggled, and clutched harder onto my arm as we started to walk again. “I’ve missed you, and I’m ready to go home again. I’ll have to tell you all the things that have happened to me. You’ll laugh so hard, John. And you have to tell me everything you’ve done. Don’t forget, you promised.”
I nodded. “We can go home. I’ve missed you, too. I should’ve given you a reason to stay.” He knew they would part again; they always did, but never forever.
It wouldn’t be for a very long time to come, before they separated again. And they were glad for it. He kissed her again for the first time in over fifty years. Still, neither of them looked as if they had even reached thirty. And her lips still tasted of sweet honey to him.
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