The water dances silently under the moonlight, streetlights reflecting onto the river in hues of gold and cerulean, fish fluttering to the surface in arhythmic, unpredictable time sequences.
I sit near the metallic railing that guards the liquid edges; I inhale slowly as my eyes absorb all the hidden color in the darkness of the blackened summer night.
The bushes arch toward me, extending their leafy green fingers in a hushed reassurance. The mulch under my lower body is slightly poky but weirdly soothing, and I seem to melt into the ground as I lounge in a silent Indian style.
The back of my head occasionally grazes against the tree behind me as the sprinklers just miss my relaxed frame.
In long waves and splashes of confusion, self-doubt, and loneliness, I manage to retreat to some, if only temporarily, state of serenity as I perch on the shoreline. It's as if I lose myself below the water, all the heaviness drowning & sinking to the bottom, and my much lighter outer shell waits, wading on the nearby soil.
Sometimes I have this fear that I'll always be
alone,
one of those people who just "isn't destined to be in a (loving) relationship," and in the meantime all I get are half-genuine, wholly-awkward "it's just not your time" 's.
Will there ever be a time that is mine, where I can let my inner hurricane fizzle out, waves of infinite heart to extend to another, crashing down onto a sandy white beach?
My spine suddenly tingles, existential crisis swimming up and down my icy veins, clogging my arteries; shortly before fainting from the crushing weight of it all, the sound of an airplane flying overhead snaps me out of my analytical coma, and the ripples put me back to tranquility.