//------------------------------//
// Home by the Sea 
// Story: Dreams and Dementations 
// by AShadowOfCygnus 
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The beach is empty but for them, and the quiet is complete.

The weary sun hangs low in the orange sky, a-shimmer in its own unearthly radiance—pierce-white hole burning itself into the celestial tapestry—casting the empty resort in tawny shades of autumn. The cliff around them stretches on for miles: below, the varnished-amber cove; around, untamed upland crags. The breeze, salt-heavy, carrying the taste of foreign shores, flits and dips above the roar of the tide, soft-warm, a lover’s kiss.

Fitting, then, that the lovers sit there upon their lone and lonely bench—O bleach-wood throne!—tucked together in solidarity against the waning sun. So quiet she could hear herself think; so calm he could finally let down his guard. Head finds the comfortable nook between shoulder and chin, rests against breast, against softly-beating heart. Muzzle brushes mane, tender and reflexive.

Is it the End of the World? The sea stretches on far enough that it surely must be. 

Is it the End of the World? The resort lies so still that it surely must be.

They’d say the words if it wouldn’t break the spell; these are familiar paths, known and trod, and it would take but a look to know, to smile, to laugh at that damnable twinnery. But perhaps the greater surety is knowing they need not need to be sure; that they can sit here and bask in the warmth of tired sun, float along the eddies of gentle breeze, and simply let it be. 

For there’s joy in a moment, even if it comes with the promise of things to follow; there’s comfort in silence, even if the noisome noise of life will find its way back in in time. This one problem could wait to be fixed; this one fraction of the world could indulge them the moment before needing to be saved.

They could wonder and worry at the empty beach below, which earlier in the day had rung with the shouts and laughs of dozens; they could worry about having to break in on the kitchen to feed themselves, or wander into town to raid the corner market for supplies. 

They could frolic like yearlings again, running and laughing and dancing together among the waves and sand and marble arches, indulging those bright-eyed childhood passions each of us silently agrees to forget for fear of judgment when we come of age.

They could fall into that familiar embrace of theirs, gaze meeting smouldering gaze, grin meeting oh-so-playful grin, as lights fade and all else is, for a blissful moment, forgotten—lost in the wheel of the stars and the wash of the tide. 

And yet, what greater joy could there be than that they had here, together, in this tender moment of silence they’d somehow bought themselves? What more could they ask than to feel the warmth of the other under the warmth of the sun, feel the tender nearness in the kiss of the breeze? He relaxed, and she heard; she breathed, and he felt; their hearts beat slow and together they savoured the surety.

And as the sun continued along its final arc, and the breeze began its faint and gradual turn to chill, they nestled together in the warmth they’d made for themselves and dreamed. Not the noblest dream, nor the finest, nor even the first of its kind. But it was theirs, and in that eternal sunset of immaculate sand and cleansing tide, it could, for once, be enough. 






Time enough for laughter yet; time enough for tears.
Time enough for all the things that you and I could fear.
For now the world is ours alone, and all the eye can see.
But all I really need, I think, is that you be here with me.