The Beach House.

Monday, September 14, 2015

~Short Story~

We had been coming here at Kay's beach house ever since we were in college. Every spring. Every year. All of us would be here. Significant others changed through the years but we remained. The five of us. After college, I would see all of them during the year except perhaps Sam. We saw less and less of each other with each passing year. And then just only at the beach house.  One year he showed up wearing a bow tie. Looked like a compete idiot. Not many men can pull off bow ties, some shouldn't even try. Another year he was supporting a full bushy beard. His brownish-blond beard. Very unruly and unkempt. I wanted to run my fingers through it. I stopped myself from doing that.

While so many things changed, some things remained constant. Every year on the third night, I'll come out of the beach house around 2 a.m. when everyone else is asleep. I;d walk up to the shore and find him sitting there among the rocks, smoking. We never talked about it, never planned to meet, but it always happened that way. He kept coming back to the beach in the middle of the night, so did I. Perhaps to just remind ourselves of the life we once inhaled among the rocks, when the roaring inside us, the thrashing life, could easily drown the roaring of the ocean. Now there was just silence, except the mockery of the waves.

I sat next to him. He looked at me like he always did, with longing for something you've once had and then lost. He touched my bare feet with his hands. I let him. His hands were warm. My feet were cold. I could see him through the dark. His eyes were always bright bringing me to life.  He touched my head. I closed my eyes. I didn't need to see him after that, I knew I wouldn't be able to feel him much longer.

For a moment, it felt exactly how it used to feel when we were in college - all reckless and thinking that life was full of possibilities. Now we were old. We had learned to live with the voids in our hearts. We weren't even sad anymore. Now we are mature enough, and scarred enough to know when to surrender our happiness.

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25 comments

  1. This is so beautiful, I love the way you write :)

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  2. Back in the college days a friend had me join a band called 'void residents'. I was way too hung up on the name for months. The first song i wrote for that band had the following lines... "we sail unanchored on troubled seas, our dreams not ashore//at peace with the waves and winds from the west, we are sailing pure.// Invaded by a war that we've won and lost, that captures our dreams and re-dreams them all"

    Once again...your words took me back to that exact state of mind that i longed for.

    You, Are, Magic.

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    Replies
    1. Aww, this is beautiful. And as always, you are too kind with your words :-).

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  4. "...scarred enough to know when to surrender our happiness." - that is so painfully beautiful.

    Raaji, ^like he said, you really are magic.

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  5. Living with voids... I have had to learn to do that in the last three years... it has been a hard go but I am finally learning to live with the empty part that cannot be filled... very wonderful writings xox

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    1. Luanna, this makes me so happy. I hope you keep at it. :-)

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  6. This post brought tears to my eyes. Just so brutally honest and relevant.
    Thanks for the story which can belong to anyone :)

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    1. Thank you! That's what I was hoping for - relate-ability.

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  7. This post brought tears to my eyes. Just so brutally honest and relevant.
    Thanks for the story which can belong to anyone :)

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  8. this is so poignant...beautifully penned :)

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  9. there is a poignancy, a quiet beauty in this narrative. i love the tangible mixed withthe intangible. "his hands were warm. my feet were cold." lovely and broken the same.

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  10. Ah! The silent slow sullen transition to zombie living :)

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    1. Haha... this is both sad and hilarious :-)

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  11. Oh wow! If it was me, I would never surrender.

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    1. Yes, my dear. I wouldn't either, but its easier said than done :-)

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  12. How can you write so beautifully !? I sure have a lot of emotions , some deep, some fleeting but I wouldn't know what to do with them. You create magic.

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    1. Aww, thanks. I haven't been writing must lately but I am glad I can still write :-)

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  13. but why surrender.. fight it out

    Bikram's

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  14. I hope you will share such type of impressive contents again with us so that we can utilize it and get more advantage. An Unstoppable Life

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