You Can't Ask Why

 

A short story I just wrote at midnight... It's a bit odd, but when the muse strikes, I have to obey.

~ Fiona

 

 

You Can’t Ask Why

~ a short story

 

She sat up in bed and looked outside.

The window was clean and the night sky thick

With darkness and rain

“What are you doing there?”

“I’ve come for you.”

She looked at him with a frown.

“Why?”

“You can’t ask why.”

“But”-

“You can’t ask why.”

He held out his hand.

“What is that?”

“Moondust.”

“Where did you get it from?”

“Where do you think, stupid?” He reached for her. “Come with me, I’ll take you there.”

“No!”

“Come on!’

“No!”

“Fine then. I’ll wait outside here until you come.”

Night waned and waxed

And time melted into eternities.

She inched closer and closer to the moondust.

And finally she did it.

He smiled at her hand laid upon his.

“Come with me.”

“Why?”

“You can’t ask why.”

She took his hand and he yanked her out of her bed.

Out of her window

Out of her world.

He took her to a tree

Where every leaf was a question

She never even asked.

He plucked them one by one

And grinned

As he chewed them between his

Shining teeth.

She lowered to the ground

And held her heart.

“What are you doing?”

“Answering you.”

“You’re eating away my questions.”

“They were never asked.”

She stared as he ate the last one.

“Why didn’t you ever ask, my love?”

“There was no one to answer.”

“I’m here.”

He took her hand again and led her to a cave

Dark and pregnant with nightmares.

He flicked a flame

From his fingertips

And ignited the place

With candelabras all over the walls,

Ceiling and heart.

They were tall giant candles

Melting wax globs

The size of tires.

“What are you doing?”

“Melting these fears. They’re of no use in the darkness.

This place needs light – not your nightmares.”

The candle wax melted to the floor

Like a river which they floated along

Till they came to a stairway

“What is this?”

“I’m not sure. But I think we should climb it.”

“It looks like gold.”

“No, it’s sunlight.”

“Oh.”

“Come with me.”

They climbed,

And they climbed

To the far and vast moon.

And as they climbed,

Their hands grew together,

Their hips melted as one,

Their lips met and-

“What is this?”

“It is a kiss.”

“Why are we doing this?”

“You can’t ask why.”

Night and day became twilight.

Water and dust

Became cement

And the lips pressed together

Moved like a dance

Of butterflies on the streams

Of the human soul.

She lost her breath

And her legs gave out,

The moon beneath her

Crumbled.

“What is happening?”

She clung to him as she looked down

To the black depths of ocean below.

“You’re falling.”

“Falling where?”

“In love.”

“In what?”

“Love.”

“But why?”

“You can’t ask why.”

“Can’t you fall with me?”

“No, my love. I already rose with you. And I am rising still.”

“Don’t! Come down! Come with me.”

“I can’t. You have to fall first to rise.”

“Did you ever fall?”

“I have fallen in love a thousand times. And all those times it was with you. You, my love, in thousands of forms, in thousands of women and lives and worlds.”

“I don’t want to fall.”

“You have to.”

“Will I ever rise to see you?”

“Maybe. Or maybe not.

It depends what you take down with you.”

Her hand slipped from his

Yet she clung to the moon.

Tears streamed into the growing

Ocean below.

“You can’t let me fall.”

“I have to let you fall.”

“But why?”

“You can’t ask why.”

The moondust crumbled in her grasp.

And she fell,

Down,

Down,

Down,

Into the dark bottomless ocean

Of tears

And why.

She sat up in bed.

Wide awake

From the dream she couldn’t remember.

But she felt in her hand the fine edges of dust

Moondust in the crevices of her palm.

She opened her hand to let the moonlight shine

All the answers,

All the fears,

And all the reasons

Why.

And she rose.

She rose again and again to soulless heights

Always higher each time

Only to fall in love again.