Layers of Knowing
She knows things.
A lot of things.
Terrible things.
She knows that the future isn't bright and hopeful and new and shining. She knows that the future is less than what it should be. She knows that there is a grimy film of tainted smoke lingering in the air.
She knows that in the future everything is polluted and dull and a little bit repulsive. And there are times she is tempted to tell them that. There are times when she is tempted to tell him that.
Because she hates his awe. She hates and envies the way he can close his eyes and still see a future that's perfect and beautiful and right. Because she knows it isn't and sometimes she wants him to be just as jaded and disillusioned as her.
Because he knows he is dying and he is so alive. And she has a whole future, a whole life waiting for her and she is so dead inside.
She wonders if he knows how lucky he is to know nothing.
He envies her time but what he doesn't know, what she knows, is that in the future there are clocks that tick and chime and never stop. What she knows, and what he doesn't, is that in the future everybody is reminded that they are dying, except in the future there's more to lose than just days.
There are hours and minutes and seconds. He doesn't know that he has these things, these hours, these minutes, these seconds. He doesn't know that in the future entire lifetimes are lived in moments.
And she never tells him because she's come to love the way time slows down in the past, she's come to love the way days stretch. She's come to love the way time crawls.
And she knows that if she told him then he would know that in the future he could have a lifetime. And she knows he would hate her for wishing for less time.
But she thinks lifetimes should take lifetimes to live and that every second should not count. Because it's just too much time to try to live and he doesn't know that in the future the roses are just flowers, the mornings are ominous, and the nights are black time never used. He doesn't know what it's like to watch time go by and not care.
So she doesn't tell him because she hates the awe and wonder he shrouds himself in because she wants it back so badly.
She's forgotten what it's like to believe in things. He hasn't.
He believes in reincarnation and God and the smell of rain and touch and taste and the certainty of his own death. And she's left with knowing.
She knows science and reason and evolution and all the things that tell her God does not exist. She knows about the ocean and weather and cycles and why the rain falls. She knows about factories and chemicals and dyes and manufacturing that can create touches and tastes that were never meant to exist. She knows about hospitals and surgery and medicine and cars and airplanes and guns and crime and all those things that make death simultaneously escapable and inevitable.
She knows there is no magic no wonder no real miracles in the world. And she hates that in the past she is the only one that knows the world is nothing more than a perfectly crafted machine that will continue to function long after she ceases to exist.
She hates the knowing. And there are times when the hate is so strong and so angry that she tells him of the things she knows.
There was the time she told him that the Earth rotated around the Sun. She remembers later that night when they were alone and he was quiet she asked him what he was thinking about. She remembers him smiling and saying he was thinking about what part of the world the sun was shining on right now.
And she hated him for being able to wonder even after knowing.
There was the time she told him that man would walk on the moon. She remembers him asking what it feels like to walk on another world.
And she hated him for being curious even after knowing.
There was the time she told him about evolution and microorganisms and particles and atoms and cells. She remembers him saying how it was amazing that things could be created out of practically nothing.
And she hated him for being awed even after knowing.
Then there was the time she told him that shooting stars were not really stars at all but meteoroids, chunks of earth melting and exploding. And she remembers the next time they saw a shooting star, she remembers the way he looked at it as if it had betrayed him.
She knows now that he never looks up anymore, never watches the stars, idly dreaming about what they are, where they are, or what they mean. She knows he doesn't make wishes, she knows he doesn't smile when the night flashes white.
Because he knows.
And every night when she watches him sleep in the dark, when she watches him sleep away the time he used to spend dreaming she hates herself.
She hates herself and she hates him. Because she already knows what its like to watch time fade away, she already knows what its like to feel it slip through fingers trembling and desperate.
And she thinks it's only fair that he know what its like to lose hope. She thinks it's only fair that he know that miracles do not exist.
That they never did.