Cosmic Hero

A mildly romantic story about falling in love to the point where it tears you apart.

The night was quiet velvet, the kind of dark that would be suffocating if it weren’t for the vague glow of the dorm houses about two hundred yards away that attempted to infiltrate the dark woods like the weak flash from a polaroid camera. The pine tree boughs hung low over the collection of boulders we liked to call our asylum. We had nowhere else to go, no one else to see, and nothing else to do.

So she sat there, one hand holding a pencil, the other, a forgotten cigarette, balancing a sketchbook on her knee. The cigarette washed her drawing in red light, casting cold warm tones and deep shadows onto her inexplicably artistic face. Burning too close to her fingers. She lived and breathed the shaky pattern of someone who intentionally pushed themselves to the edge. Even as she did nothing dangerous, the strangely fluid cycle was evident: Her hair fell in her face. She pushed it back. Steadied her hand upon the paper, told the pencil to draw the lines from her mind to the page. All the while, smoke rose from her cigarette, serving no purpose other than to turn the blue night grey. She was barely holding on, and who knew for how long she would be able to, but that just was her. Always letting things burn too close to her fingers.

And I? I sat on a boulder some feet away, inhaling from my cigarette as though the air was poison and the smoke was the only thing keeping me going. My face wasn’t artistic, my hair wasn’t falling in my eyes, and I didn’t have glasses to reflected the burning cherry of the bummed Camel Light in my hand back at the world. I was drunk on love and nostalgia and cheap alcohol and a combination of false hope that I couldn’t push down and my own pessimistic view of life. So I sat under the trees in the dark woods that we’d walked to a timeless number of hours ago and I watched. I watched the love of my life fall apart and put herself back together over and over and over again and each time I hated myself and my lack of confidence for not being able to just tell her, even though she already knew. Because I was afraid. I was afraid of not being enough, and that was something I would never get over. So I filled my lungs with grey smoke and blue air and prayed the night would never end because in that moment, I had never felt so in love.

Author's Note

Titled after Car Seat Headrest's song Cosmic Hero.

Reviews

[keegan]

Truly a intriguing Tale, especially the way you describe both characters I would like to know more :)

[Contessa]

Thank you! I really appreciate your feedback and i'm glad you enjoyed it :)

[aimee]

It is nice to read other writers stories and this I liked due to use of words and it made me feel intrigued to know more about the two characters portrayed in it.

[Contessa]

Thanks I'm glad you enjoyed it and want to know more!