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He stirs. A blessing, born from the ardor of the Heavens, but a heart colder than remnants of glacial ice, as if forged from numbing tides within trenches deep; bitter, inert.
But only a misfortune upon himself.
☥
Jonah Marshall never liked the color blue, or the sorrow that accompanies it, but he sees it everywhere. He remembers it in the sky, the deep overcast when it rains. He associates it with the sea, uncertainty of what’s lurking in the devouring deep. He recognises it in the tears shed, a struggle to grasp the fact that he would never get the chance to grow up and achieve those holy grails that he was predestined for; another soul, helpless in the hands of time.
He’d always hated the color blue, but not anymore when he meets Adam Murray, who notices the former perched up against a wall, Jonah’s own arms wrapped around scraped knees and head buried in between, who reaches out a hand for him to hold onto. Tousled blonde that shone like the promise of tomorrow, complemented by a gaze as raw as the seas that Jonah was afraid of drowning in, eyes that he hoped would warm up with time. But for now, he doesn’t mind drifting, drowning, in this endless hue.
Two teens, written in the stars; fabled fates. One cursed to feel oceans, yet only allows himself to express a drop, and another with sentiments bigger than his entire being.
But at the end of the day, they were just two wandering souls, who can’t change the trajectory of the future, fighting for a chance to see another day in this sin-tainted world.
☥
And as the moon sees new phases, they’ve only started relying on each other even more. Jonah teaches Adam what it’s like to be human, and Adam’s just there as his best company.
Adam, who knows the name of all of Jonah’s stuffed toys, who knows all about Jonah’s favorite constellations, the formation of shapes when it’s bleak and dark outside, who knows Jonah like the stars know the sky. Yet, he only speaks to Jonah with words, whilst Jonah looks at him with feelings.
Even as Adam shuts himself out or pushes Jonah away, the latter would always come back to him, the same way the tides find a way back to their shores.
He holds out hope that Adam would find it in himself to trust Jonah, that he wasn’t a foe. He knows that emotions are a weakness, moments of vulnerability, especially for an egocentric teenager who has only ever cared about upholding an authoritative front. Jonah, in his usual joking fashion, refers to it as his “swag”.
But blanketed underneath the countless nods and audible little hums of agreement lies a boy, life of broken youth and drugs, too afraid to act on his emotions and a fear of losing the things, the people he loves the most.
☥
“I love you.”
..!
That’s new. Adam hasn’t heard those words before. It's reminiscent of a broken melody when it’s on Jonah’s tongue. Foreign, but there’s an unmistakable hint of longing.
But Adam recognises the familiarity in his tone, because he knows that he’s loved him the same. But why can’t he bring himself to return his love? He can’t just let anyone else in the walls he’s built.
And Adam hesitates for a moment, his heart and mind are working as two separate entities, two conflicting ideas. Fight or flight?
Until he opens his mouth.
“And I, you.”
Adam isn’t able to catch a glimpse of Jonah’s face underneath tonight’s starless skies, but he could hear him crack a smile before he feels himself enveloped in a warmth that leaves just as fast as it had found him.
☥
Perhaps they didn’t need words to show their love. They say it with their silence, nothing but the company of each other. They say it with their actions, when their touches linger for a little longer. They say it during nights, hopping from one shitty motel room to another. Moldy walls, creaky beds, breathy moans, and intoxicating skin-upon-skin; the moon, the only one to bear witness to their sinful consensus.
Adam, Jonah figures, deserves everything that the world has to offer; that he has learnt to speak, in spite of the inability to find his own voice of reasoning, and love, undeterred by a broken heart.
And Jonah knew that Adam would gradually warm up.
Because he was the sun that melted the ice.
☥
But even the sun shies away during the night.
With time, Jonah gradually grows pale and listless. The once little blemishes that adorned and accentuated his features like constellations in the night sky, now plaguing his entire body, a spring in bloom.
When Adam starts accepting his emotions and opening up, Jonah starts forgetting who he is.
But what is there to lose if he doesn’t know what he’s losing?
Regardless, Adam still loves Jonah. Even if they next meet in a week or in 5 years’ time, Adam will continue to love until the last star dies.
☥
Jonah knows that he doesn’t have long left when he starts to spend hours in his room, alone, staring at the unfamiliar figure in the mirror and wondering where it all went wrong. He doesn’t recognise himself anymore, a once-agile man, now nothing but bare bones and sagging skin. There's a permanent look of exhaustion etched on his face, any semblance of a reckless, larger-than-life boy, now just another distant memory lost to time.
He’s ashamed of his unfulfilling life. Nineteen years, but zero things done. But he doesn’t realize that he’s already achieved more than what he’s wanted. That his entire life was a trophy to be held high, a brave soldier who’s fought in the fierce battle of life.
And Adam.
☥
“We’ll be together in every universe.”
So why not this one?
☥
A deathly pale hand, once as dark as the fertile soil that bore life, trembles as it reaches out, encapsulating a silver pendant that glints alongside the existence of a deluded tomorrow. Jonah musters a debilitated, but genuine, smile, the best he could offer. He’s sorry he couldn’t be stronger, but his life is a regret for a choice he didn’t make.
And Jonah appeared the most content than he’d ever been as compared to the past few years, the prettiest under this dying light. As his breathing shallows, he goes limp as he closes his eyes for the last time and allows himself to give in to a final slumber; his last assault of senses the taste of tears just as salty as the roaring tides which were reminiscent of Adam’s eyes. Vast, uncertain, yet filled with emotions all the same. It has always been Adam; and in death, he feels the most alive.
Eleven years ago, alone in his room, heard by no one but the comforting sigh of cold January air and dark skies. The innocent, selfish desire of never having to grow old was finally sealed; when Adam sent his prayers to the Heavens, he should’ve known better than to call upon their names.
If God really existed, he was cruel.
But he’s pulled through this long fight, the ultimatum, and he doesn’t have to go through another again. He’s managed to prove his strength and he’s finally free from the clawing grasps of reality that was only anchoring him down. They’ve met under the lucky stars of fate, everlasting fervor, and it would only be right if they’d parted the same way; back when Adam couldn’t care any less about him, he loses him when he’s loved him the most.
A part of Adam is stubborn, a refusal to bid him goodnight. A bird and a cage; the remains of a broken promise of freedom and forever. He kneels over Jonah and gently cradles his head like taut strings handling a piece of China and the fear of cracking underneath the pressure, an attempt to lull him to sleep, even though he’s already gone. The show has ended, and everyone has already gone home; he can stop acting now, it’s enough.
Thus, when he calls out Jonah’s name for the last time, it was a soliloquy, sacred hymn; solace sought from an answer that the both of them knew wouldn’t come. Adam hopes that death came easy to him, holding him as if he was a child once more, when he didn’t know of the harsh realities of the world, where he could hear the laughter of his greatest loves again for the first time.
Two teens, star-crossed lovers. One who had a promising future, now no longer limited by the confines of reality, and another who’ll spend the rest of his days, detached from the world, without his reason to live. He knows that Jonah would’ve given anything to see another day, but Adam would’ve given everything if it meant one last yesterday with Jonah.
Now, he’s left to rebuild the mess that Jonah had left in his wake. It’s a mess. But it’s a beautiful disaster.
The stars were never aligned for them, but they rearranged the constellations and spelt their own names in the sky.
☥
When the moonless nights that enshroud the barren fields of yesteryear are dimly illuminated by nothing but an agglomeration of stars and the tip of a dying blunt, a mourn for the absence of solace that’s meant to come with tonight’s frigid snow and biting cold, complemented by stars that inevitably burn out and meet their end; only a stark reminder of the years Adam has spent making memories with Jonah would eventually, inevitably, catch up with the years spent without him.
Soon, Adam will be celebrating his twenty-fourth birthday, yet it’s unfair that Jonah was never given the chance to see twenty; but he’ll be the one to honor his existence. Adam lights a candle for him each year, hoping that the stars align and Jonah, against all odds, is able to find his way back to him.
But Jonah was just a liar, another fleeting memory. Ones that died alongside his entire being in the Winter of 2009.
With quivering hands that desperately clutch onto the eroded exterior of a locket once familiar, he grieves for longer than he’s ever learnt to love.
The world around Adam burns as he prepares for his final act, the time for him to let go.