Moonlit Duo

I remember when we lived, when we truly lived. We would shine in the night, like fireflies mistaken for stars, and each grain of sand would be peeking at us and each seashell listening. Each wave of dark oblivion would be slowing their momentum down, in fear of interrupting our gathering of spirits.

The Fire-man never was like you would expect someone like him to be...


The shabbiness of his appearence and absurd rhythm of life he had only seemed to overcompensate for the deep, unconscious understanding he had of human life. And thus he truly shined, of a light unknown to the masses.

… I, on my side, wasnˊt what youˊd call an alive creature; not then. The complex mechanism that had kept me going for so long had shattered inside, and I would struggle not to feel anything at all.

It was only when Gaia and Atlas slept, that I could breathe … and let out a long sigh, which would prickle in my throat and reverberate in the seabreeze. I would finally just be.

And I would sing, sing at my heartˊs content, of the anguish imprisoning my older self that had cauterized my heart and infected my beat. And I never could fault anyone apart from myself, for how I couldnˊt heal it, but simply celebrate it.
Maybe that is why my notesˊ echo was such a hopeless one.


Then one night I met him.
I was passing by the seaside walk, with a buzz in my ears, singing endlessly, when I noticed someone dancing ... a shadow etched against the only light I found bearable.
It wasnˊt a dance of the kind weˊd see nowadays...

I couldnˊt help but being hypnotized by how the sand, directed by his bare feet, would shape a zen garden around him. His eyes were closed, his hands directing seawaves like a conductor would.

And I stared, and stared, and never grew tired of staring; and my heart had unintentionally stopped throbbing, if only thanks to a sorcererˊs black magic, for I had just seen my anguish come to life before me.

It was his feet, what most felt perfect; that a man with such huge shoulders and strong hands could be so delicate as to make sand seem the surface of a sea onto which he was suspended, truly amazed and awed me.

He held a metal staff, I noticed while dreamily getting nearer, which rotated and occasionally threw up blades of sand in the air, describing invisible circles of magic... which only added to the aura of mistic wisdom he had.


At last, the spell died away; I shivered in the cold wind of midnight, and he heard it.

"You …" he simply said, only then noticing me. His eyesˊ blue was so saturated with that flickering spell, that it was scary.
I lowered my eyes, knowing I would stutter if I spoke.
"Oh, I apologise."
I looked at him, frowning. Lolwhat? But didnˊt find anything coherent to say, so I waited.
"For making you stop... Iˊm sorry about that." he whispered, scratching his neck. I noticed how his shirt had little holes here and there, like tiny cigarette burns. "I … hear you sing when you pass by."
I didnˊt know what to say, again. No one was supposed to hear the words I sung at night. I focused my attention on avoiding any blushing.
"Who are you?" I asked, and immediately corrected myself after shaking my head. Pitiful."I mean... whatˊs your name?"
"Iˊm Jack..." he said, turning and going to lift a water bottle from a bench, drenching the two ends of his staff with it; maybe it wasnˊt water? When he took a lighter from his pocket, I noticed how his hands were blackened.
He ignited the ends of the staff and threw it in the air with sudden, inexplicably elegant force.

Rising up higher than the moon, its circles describing the halo of perfection, fiery trace of a gate to who-knows-which world, I could hear the sound of flames breaking the breeze.
Catching it in midair right before my eyes, he slowed his dance to an inviting hint of rhythm.

The Fire-man never was like you would expect someone like him to be.

"... but they call me the Fire-man. And you, who are you?"

And it was at night, that we truly lived. It was then that I realised how I seemed to regain my self, the self that you loved, when I was hit by the only bearable light.

I opened my mouth.
And then closed it, blinking because of the flamesˊ light. Was this any real? I was too mesmerized to speak.

He laughed and his laugh was free and tangled with anything but worries.
"Will you, perhaps … sing for me?"

The Fire-man never was like you would expect someone like him to be...


My voice would each night entwine to his flames, after that night and it would be as if I was dancing, too.
His flames would lick my notes and it would be as if I was burning, too.
We would smile without love, but with a passionate glint in our eyes for that was a hymn to what I was longing for.

I would be truly free to sing my homage, then, when we sank too deep to resurface and take a breath to save our sanity.

… Maybe I wasnˊt like I would have expected someone like me to be.