SUNRISE749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0THbnYdxcu
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“Honey?”749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwW2mPDtfHM
“Rachael, I don’t have the bloody time to – ” Adam drops his cutlery and throws up his hands.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx726ufS3cW
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Rachael returns back to her breakfast. With a grunt, Adam returns to his.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4Ea67oiQqu
The rest of the meal passes in silence.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiDQZiFCr2n
The tall, unshaven man rises from his seat and almost trips on a bottle lying on the floor.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGhBLS1Ga5H
“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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx1mWbdOG2S
Biting her lip: “I try.”749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡENpL8TDAV0
As if satisfied by his outbreak of force, Adam deflates. “Good.”749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡieJVABu7Yu
There’s a pause. “…Honey?”749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuBLJpXXdlb
“For God’s sake, Rachael, what is it?” Adam turns to face his wife.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡysqqseUFnk
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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡapRwsZDTLT
“What do you think it is?” His reply is throwaway; he barely gives the bag a glance.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnlC3uXETCq
“Doesn’t it bother you?” She’s sweating: she knows that she might be crossing a line.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGbu1UhkQcH
“Why would it?” His tone of voice already changes; suspicious of her intentions.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsWLm9IZSx9
“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.”749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcuZUdxRwzr
“…And?” Questioning. Provoking. Is this the man she married twenty years ago?749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsE7amIhdYj
“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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2AjMq7UAJT
For a moment, everything is frozen – but then it happens – the side of his hand coming into contact with her left cheek.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbKyLlwIfRP
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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjXeGnSozQ9
“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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqBtaOvyl4h
Confused, angry, forlorn, ashamed, he curses under his breath. Since when was he like this?749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdja328b6Zc
He tears the packet open and pours the contents onto his hand before inhaling them, hating yet relishing the sting up his nostrils.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq7kOCUgsQ5
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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnPGLuj3stN
Dazed, he walks up the street.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡp1hmrwZvLR
It hasn’t occurred to him yet that it wasn’t his fault.
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He wakes on something soft. Green. Grass?749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVthcpc3dA1
His stomach returns the breakfast it so willingly accepted earlier that day (yesterday, perhaps?), bile burning his throat as the liquid leaves his mouth.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPONGFQlPvB
Rachael. Beautiful Rachael. She was upset about something. She’s always upset.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡB7ZoJ8KKmy
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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi5WmSu3KDn
He laughs in relief when he sees her, standing all the way at the top of the hill.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJOfTdZKXM4
Gone are the creases of worry that lined her face, gone are the tears she often cried.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMKzN1Ps2Tz
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?749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdHRXlZUHpF
“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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSJWruOsba7
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.749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmotEXIIi6t
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diende…
~Ad infinitum~749Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtYcpiSK7VM
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