SUNRISE826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHGuCsd3mcc
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“Honey?”826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDZqzR5RnBW
“Rachael, I don’t have the bloody time to – ” Adam drops his cutlery and throws up his hands.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6CLq6iwRK1
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Rachael returns back to her breakfast. With a grunt, Adam returns to his.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCOSsBSnHQw
The rest of the meal passes in silence.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJPA38WkZkN
The tall, unshaven man rises from his seat and almost trips on a bottle lying on the floor.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFOa1w4rsZS
“Idiot!” He yells. “Don’t you ever clean this rotten house up?” He kicks at it forcefully and it smashes against the wall, tiny green crystals cascading onto the ground.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6Z7jiS8ryw
Biting her lip: “I try.”826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgN4UGoTVS5
As if satisfied by his outbreak of force, Adam deflates. “Good.”826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY9cpAA28ac
There’s a pause. “…Honey?”826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjqoz2MnLZq
“For God’s sake, Rachael, what is it?” Adam turns to face his wife.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvmkVDuLqoj
Tentatively, she takes a small packet of white powder out from under the table. “…I found this in your pockets after you passed out last night. Adam, what is this?” Her eyes are wide, worried and pleading.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDBqyT2Il6Z
“What do you think it is?” His reply is throwaway; he barely gives the bag a glance.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUDIIbZVWiz
“Doesn’t it bother you?” She’s sweating: she knows that she might be crossing a line.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVdHXulEfgb
“Why would it?” His tone of voice already changes; suspicious of her intentions.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKlmD5PFI5Q
“I mean, for him.” She gestures vaguely to the bedroom at the back of the apartment where their son is still sleeping. “I don’t think all of this is good for him… He scratches himself.”826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7mT4fGXYwy
“…And?” Questioning. Provoking. Is this the man she married twenty years ago?826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡujGXsCtAQU
“I think you shouldn’t drink so much. Or take…” She throws the packet onto the floor. “It’s not good. For you. Or for him.” She gasps, then holds her breath, waiting for the explosion.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1UliRSk6lQ
For a moment, everything is frozen – but then it happens – the side of his hand coming into contact with her left cheek.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5Ht9XqMJM7
Her cry of pain isn’t registered in Adam’s mind. He’s staring at his hand as if it is somehow dirty, and with a growing feeling of shame he stumbles out of the apartment, but not before grabbing the abandoned bag on the floor.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGw7mqhbfzS
“S***, I’m sorry, Rachael.” But the words are said long after his leaving, leaving his mouth only when he is sitting on the curb of the path outside.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLNMhBzIDqC
Confused, angry, forlorn, ashamed, he curses under his breath. Since when was he like this?826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNQAfhrHOJ0
He tears the packet open and pours the contents onto his hand before inhaling them, hating yet relishing the sting up his nostrils.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtcJ6c2gOLL
He just wants to forget. In his younger and more vulnerable years his father beat him: and every day he asks himself what he did wrong.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPBxxl7F7VG
Dazed, he walks up the street.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuNUe9F1b9l
It hasn’t occurred to him yet that it wasn’t his fault.
826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIIoBmed1eo
He wakes on something soft. Green. Grass?826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2kAHuyxaX2
His stomach returns the breakfast it so willingly accepted earlier that day (yesterday, perhaps?), bile burning his throat as the liquid leaves his mouth.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi8mm6obyhS
Rachael. Beautiful Rachael. She was upset about something. She’s always upset.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgA9ZFfEKOn
He gets up onto his knees. “Rachael!” He yells. Where is she? He wants to say something to her. Something he hasn’t said to her for a long time.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsmbfi9rC0P
He laughs in relief when he sees her, standing all the way at the top of the hill.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9P9kYn9YFk
Gone are the creases of worry that lined her face, gone are the tears she often cried.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡh36aU7oImp
And, can he see – or is it just his imagination? – just like the first strands of sunlight dancing over the tops of distant mountains, the faintest of smiles lifting the corners of her lips?826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbHkPTAEr5n
“Rachael!” He runs up towards her with all of his dissipating strength, not stopping, not even when his legs protest in pain, he’s rushing towards her open arms, the clouds in the blue sky singing a symphony of joy – he falls into her embrace, feeling her warmth, her happiness, surround him entirely.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUSnUbQ77Zb
He whispers into her ear what he never had the courage to say; just a few words, but he can tell how much they mean to her, and finally – finally! – as the sun rises on Icarus Point, her growing smile lights up those final moments, with her laugh outplaying the birds spiraling into the heavens, he knows that she forgives him.826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAPtBuuy0Vu
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diende…
~Ad infinitum~826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUqnVVrK9pg
826Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ52UZ6EZK9o
