I have probably crossed the sea as many times as I have swum in it. My mother taught me to swim when I was a small boy; I scoured the shallows for bright things to bring her, shells and bits of broken jewelry, like a crow. She made much of them at the time. Now I realize that the treasures of the earth, all the sunlight, all the wind through the cypress trees; could not bring her the joy she felt at the depths of the oceans, where the world becomes blue and silent. It could not bring her home. She stayed because of me, because I made the valleys of Greece my playground, and she could not bear to be parted from her only child. The rocks cut her feet, and the sun burned her skin, and the cries of the birds were harsh on her ears; but I was her world.
I could not understand her. She remained on the coast, spending her life loving people who would die, and forget. I crossed the seas in the fastest ships, rode over the hills on the swiftest horses, never walked when I could run. I chased my destiny as the hound chases the hare. My name would live eternal, though my body would be left on the sand, eventually, useless to me. I gave it little thought.
When war called, I answered. Again and again. With every new glory, every unimportant pile of bloody gold laid at my feet, I ran faster. I put no roots down. And at last my fate appeared, as she had always told me. I would go to Troy. I would make my name ring out forever; it would be a bell that sang through time, unchanging.
I took the beach. Simple. I took the temple, too; allowed Hector his furious ride back to the city walls. Let him stew another day. I thought to myself, how easy this will be, this immortality. I cut men down like a thresher; I held out my arm, and the legions of Greece screamed my name from every ship on the beach. I walked in the sand without touching it.
I was given a woman. Gifts, we cannot earn, and often we do not deserve. I had no right to her, but better I keep the girl than Agamemnon. Honestly, though, I kept and defended her more out of curiosity than nobility.
Women are a thing I have never cared for, save for an obvious reason. The ones that desired a night with me, for their own reputations, never desired anything more. The ones that sought to tame me, bring the beast to heel on a golden bed, I ran from. The only women with whom I have spent long hours speaking are my mother, and my aunts. There is nothing in my life that has ever suggested I would wish otherwise; and I suppose I've never considered it. I have never been struck by a woman, found repulsive, been insulted. Been debated. It was refreshing.
And now she shares my bed willingly. Though they speak of the mysteries of woman, those were mysteries that existed outside my experience. Now I know, this woman, I could unfold like a blossom, for hours, for days. A lifetime. I could love her, and no one else, and be satisfied.
Is it possible ?
Never before this moment, but yes, it's possible. I think about entering the afterlife alone, with only the glory of my name to keep me company. My life's ambition. In the daylight, with the glitter of sun on shields heating the blood in my veins, and the trumpets calling out the attack, it seems like a fine eternity. But in the dark, I know better.
Her eyelids flutter in her sleep, and her small feet warm mine. Tomorrow we will sail from this place, and I will marry her, and have children; I will take her to meet my mother. They would understand one another. And when I cross the river, to meet the men that I leave behind here, I will clasp their arms in friendship; and tell them that they are fools.