Forget Me Not Blue
His eyes were blue, cornflower blue. They were blue as the water in the sea, as the beautiful sky on a good summer day, as blue as eyes cloud be before they were clear. Some people say blue eyes make an honest and pure person. He was just that, a big kid. Alfred lowered his blue eyes to the shoe in his hand. It gleamed, freshly polished. He reached over to the gnarled foot clothed in cotton sock to dress it.
Alfred put the shoe on and moved to the other. A rush of wind brushed past the trees around the porch, whispering secrets like fitful school girls. And as their youth vanished so did the sound, leaving the air tranquil, silent, so soft you could touch it and cry from its beauty.
"What are you doing?"
"I'm putting on your shoes, dad." Alfred said, looking up at his aged father. He set the foot down gently and rose. His father, Arthur, reclined on a wooden chair. His wrinkled hands poised on the arms. The fingers moved slowly, as if they would croak if provoked.
"What's your name?"
"My name's Alfred." Alfred reminded him gently.
"Alfred?" The old man's eyes, green and clouded with cataracts, grew distant. He vaguely recalled a son, somewhere deep, deep in the ocean of thoughts constantly battling undertow and storm alike. "Yes, I had a son Alfred… What a wild kid. He would stay up late at night and stare out the windows. I think he hoped to see he wasn't alone in the world, the only one awake. Then I would tell him to get to sleep. Know what he did? He would yell and throw a fit!" He let out an old man's cackle, rattling with hoarse breaths.
For a while, Alfred could only stare at Arthur. He remembered that, didn't he? He remembered the strong, broad-shouldered young man. His hair was the color of wheat. Alfred wasn't young anymore, though, was he? He had found a white hair in the base of his scalp. He plucked at it and held it before him, a trophy of time. It glistened in the harsh bathroom lights, reminding him that time can only go one way.
Alfred sighed and took his father's hand. "Dad, I'm Alfred."
Arthur offered him a profusely confused look. Alfred helped him to his feet. "Are we taking a walk?"
"Yes, dad."
Alfred managed to get the man to his feet and into a slow shuffled off the retirement house porch. They walked into the street and by a small, dilapidated lake. Even ducks rarely swam by. Alfred saw an elderly couple sitting together on a bench, tossing bread crumbs in vain at the lone goose waddling through the marshes.
"I have this strange dream."
"What is it?" Alfred asked, holding his father's elbow. Arthur wore a green sweater. Inside out. They moved through to the dirt road. Arthur paused, tested the ground with his toe, and, satisfied, walked on. Arthur began to whistle an old tune, a few short notes, then a long note. "What is it, dad?" Alfred repeated.
Arthur stopped, his puckered lips relaxing. He looked at Alfred, his heavy, hairy eyebrows furrowed. "What is what?"
"The dream you were talking about." Alfred had learned never to be too interested in what his father told him. He was bound to forget moments later.
"Strange dream…? Ah, yes, that dream. I keep dreaming that I'm on a road. It keeps going and going and, suddenly, I see the end coming up quickly. I can't help but walk on at the same speed, which to me only grows faster, until finally I fall off the end of the road. Then I wake up. What a curious dream, isn't it?"
Alfred had no time to digest the oddity of the dream. He was engrossed in the fact that his father remembered something at all! Then again, it's possible that Arthur had the dream years and years ago and was now mistaken for its placement in his life. Alfred thought this was the most likely conclusion. He hoped for a cure, for a glimmer in the darkness, for a speck of rain in a drought, and yet the clouds roam on, ignoring his patch of dead land.
"Son?"
"Yes, dad?" Alfred started, waking up from his reverie. They stood before the lake. It spilled before them, murky and unpleasant. The goose had flown off, obviously bored to death by the dismal spell of water. The reeds around the lake were shriveled, bending forwards. A patch of concaving sand showed where there was once water. Time lapped it up like a dog. Flowers dotted the grasses.
Arthur walked around the lake to a patch of flowers. He bent down heavily. His white head bobbed, moving with each pained breath. Alfred rushed to help him, but Arthur was already sitting down. He lay down in the flowers, staring up at the sky.
"What are you doing?" Alfred asked, bewildered.
"I'm looking at the sky."
"Get up! You aren't a little kid in their backyard."
"No."
Arthur's frown stretched in his trademark stubbornness. Alfred stood over him, his hands deep in his pockets. Eventually he would forget and get up by himself, Alfred thought, just wait and count to a hundred.
However, Arthur did not rise. He remained rested. His hand rustled through the flowers, eventually landing on a minute dot of a flower with sharp petals and a blue hue. He plucked it and held it up. Above him Alfred was bent, as if encased in a halo of sunlight. Alfred frowned, watching him move. He wore a leather jacket, open at the front and exposing a white shirt.
"Take it." Arthur said, shoving the flower in his directions.
Alfred reluctantly took it. He held it in his calloused, wide palm. It was like a spot of paint, of blue, blue paint.
"They match your eyes." Arthur said, still looking up towards the heaven, as if waiting for an answer. He knew it wouldn't come. He knew even if it did it was probably too late. Maybe it was in the shape of a man or human or… or what was he thinking of? Alfred's heart thumped in his chest. Arthur had never given him anything. This was not a gift but a symbol.
"Thanks," Alfred said, placing the flower in his pocket.
"Do you know what flower they are?"
"No."
"They're called forget-me-nots."
Alfred nodded. He turned to look where Arthur's eyes were pinned. He saw an endless sprawl of sky with dancing colors and drifting clouds. The world kept moving, leaving some people behind.
I do not own Hetalia