Catnip for the Divine and Destructive
May 22nd – "Firsts"
Hiyori dived out onto the tarmac road. Her heart hammered in her chest. Instinct took over and she didn't know why. Her mind was blank. Her body posed like a leaping beast. She had to protect that boy. His stupidly noble goal was to protect the cat. Its life was just as dear as his. People would cry for it just as they would cry for him. Therefore, it only made sense that Hiyori should try and protect him as well. He was willing to throw himself at danger and so was she.
She saw him briefly before she made the decision to jump. He was cold, like autumnal wind on an eerie night. His eyes were shifty and treacherous like the ocean under moonlight.
Hiyori couldn't think of a more perfect description for "arrogant". Her opinion changed as soon as he ran out for the cat. Seeing that side of him was admirable.
Their bodies collided and she pushed him out of the way. There was no sign of the cat. Hiyori could feel his sportswear clothing crumple at her touch and he seemed to admonish her with nonplus. Yet Hiyori couldn't feel a pulse or breath from him. 'It is very dangerous,' Hiyori panted, 'to run out like that.' He quirked an eyebrow at her then his confusion thickened.
He asked, tentative and surprised: 'You can see me?' His voice was unperturbed by adrenaline. It was cold. Cool. Completely unlike Hiyori who has perspiration dripping down from her forehead.
There was a lot happening in that sole moment but in the back of her mind, it clicked for the first time. Hiyori realised something for the first time ever.
Long ago, she had heard about liminal spaces and she hadn't believed in them but now, she had truly crossed the threshold she had always unknowingly witnessed. She always just assumed what she could see was real. She never saw anything unusual but, what if, what she saw did that have glimmer of the extraordinary?
How can you tell who is real and who is an illusion with a single glance?
Her friends screamed and cried and mourned loudly. Sirens wailed. Hiyori's heart hammered as she realised that there was no line between fiction and reality; life and death. She couldn't handle it. She couldn't handle the revelation.
'Are you okay?'
Hiyori's eyes opened. Her head rattled. Her eyelids were droopy. She felt like the dead and perhaps, she was. Her mind was foggy. Certainty meant nothing. Her friends and family clustered around her.
They didn't remember him. They didn't remember the boy with sleek, black hair and a face like the night. They didn't remember his daggy sportswear clothing and the neckerchief around his neck that made him look foolish. They didn't remember how coldly he acted. They definitely didn't remember had bravely he had acted.
Hiyori could feel gravel stuck to her arms and where bruises unfurled. She felt okay and her father confirmed it.
Should she dare ask if it was possible to perceive where realms crossed?