Sky Asunder
She stood in what seemed to be a steam of tears flowing infinitely from her dark sullen eyes. There was no betrayal such as this. No loving heart could destroy hers so entirely. There was a darkness that slowly crept into the fiber of her very being now. Splitting her, it moved in rhythmic jagged waves. It tore through the happy harmony she had worked so hard to create within herself. As the tumult of emotion welled up within her, she remembered that she was still standing in front of the invader of her quiet. She was overcome with the feeling of utter desolation. It shattered her core that she could be subject to malice by the ‘clean’ hands of kin. She looked to this person with complete adoration and somehow in that moment she knew that had changed swiftly.
Sky, the name she had been given by her dear grandmother, could not fully come to grips with what had just happened to her. As she turned, pained by the partial recollection of her experience, she felt a desperate hand take her own. She was now weeping for both herself and the visibly distressed figure before her. It was the mere thought that her sweet aunt had debased her so violently. The mere understanding that such an apparently insignificant act, her aunt raising a single hand to her, would tear down the deep bond in the relationship forged between them. Forever. Such a sorry and sudden realization. The fact that absolutely everything connecting them had been undone in that moment. It was horrifying and Sky stared blankly at her aunt’s face. Slowly, her eyes fell to their hands as they touched gently and just then Sky began to move away. Her body left that space, almost unconsciously, and drifted towards the door that guarded her way out of the kitchen.
Every motion of her fragile frame seemed to be laboured but not in the sense of her flesh. She had never known agony like that. In that short while, she was experiencing something so far removed from her peaceful state. It pervaded her young body and mind. The agony threatened to burst inside her and lay waste to her fleeting existence. With eyes blinded by tears, she clumsily felt for the wooden door frame as she drew near to it. Her legs buckled beneath her and she stumbled forward. Leaning onto the door frame, she seemingly gave in to the weakness she felt inside her. In that second, Sky felt a distance expand between her struggling mind and body. It unsettled her as she felt her mind separate, completely apart, from her physical body. The mind is dynamic and without fail lively. She knew it that mournful day. That thoughts alone could carry her out of her misery. It was a blissful respite from her terrifying reality but it was brief – an apparent lifting of her profound sorrow. Thereafter, came a sinking feeling that she noticed without warning. Following that, was the initial agony and it weighed heavy on her once again.
On the floor now, bent down on hands and knees, she drank in the air as if she thirsted for it. Aware of how it filled her chest, her body seemed to get slight relief. However, Sky was now wracked by the full memory of what had just transpired as it became clear and resounded in her like a gong. The agony she knew now was without question fitting for what she gone through. It came as does lightning - in flashes and bolts. It quickened her heart and made her as fearful as when she endured the pain. The firm strike to her innocent face. The forceful elbow to her trembling back. The vicious manhandling of her body against the rock-hard wall. Each storming through her at the time and also creative a devastating force which recurred upon recall. Inching forward, she crawled slowly as if to rest her weak body. Right then, driven by something beyond her, she unsteadily pushed herself up from the icy floor. As she rose up, she saw her brother Greyson standing silently before her and she smiled softly; she smiled because she had never felt safer. It was a happy paradox. She welcomed it and reached out to his warm hands. He received her hands alike and carefully wrapped his arms around her – this was unfamiliar territory for them. Although they knew one another as siblings, they had never shared a friendly embrace.
Greyson seemed to bleed love for her as she clung to him. He knew no other way to console her as he had seen and felt, in spirit, the blows as they hit her delicate flesh and bone. He could not loose himself of that harrowing memory. He would be her rock – he vowed to it on his sense of right. As he felt Sky tremble in his arms, his eyes contemptuously inspected his aunt. There was no acceptable way to legitimize what she had just done to his, to her, own fresh and blood. His aunt had broken, had split, the substance of her own lineage. Sky was asunder. In kind and in time, he saw that their aunt would meet a pain far greater. A pain that, when entirely fathomed, would consume her being. It would be justice enough. Instantaneously his thoughts shifted. He was no longer bothered by ghost of the aunt he thought he knew. He took his sister from that place and creating physical distance from the center point of the brutal incident. That distance was a message and warning to heed. Their aunt was shaken and she fell to pieces, but that was of no concern for Sky or Greyson. They had each other.
As he guided Sky, Greyson grew in character. He later became the great protector of his elementary family, which was his life’s true purpose according to him. He discovered it that day. He recognized only his parents and Sky. As they left that house and had gone some stretch down the road home, their parents met them along the way. They all walked arm in arm down the winding road and appreciated the sheer beauty of life in the aftermath. The chilling ordeal would not have after-effects on them, they refused to become or accept being worrisome victims of the heart-breaking affair. It became brilliantly clear that this was something that would invariably strengthen the bond between them as a family.
It was no accident that the parents found Sky and Greyson, as they had been searching for them for a time that seemed like aeons. They were panicked as they were anguished after interrogated the children’s aunt. Mother and father alike, were shaken by even her account of what had happened. It was a frightening visit and the family would forever be altered. The truth of the matter was that the four could now only depend on each other. The two children loved their parents wholeheartedly and that was returned tenderly. They could not in good conscience wreck what little regard the parents had for their aunts. They would spear them the great heartache of knowing the nightmare they had gone through. It was a terror for them to deal with alone. Sky and Greyson would never reveal their explosive memories to anyone and their parents respected that.
As the years passed by, Sky was stitched back together by the relationship she developed with her steadfast brother. Sky was older than Greyson, but he was a constant and unwavering in being her refuge. Mature and mighty, he defended her in every instance. What emerged out of that was glorious, she forgot the insult eventually and only remembered love. Love in its purest form. How it can be protecting and unconditional. It was that thread that wove together the fiber of her being. Her beauty and grace would abound exponentially in later life. Her dark eyes would shine joyfully. As do the cerulean heavens above.
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