SUNRISE851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhxkHDf4PzL
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“Honey?”851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQAzbGTIjQ7
“Rachael, I don’t have the bloody time to – ” Adam drops his cutlery and throws up his hands.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZKb5NzRRDj
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Rachael returns back to her breakfast. With a grunt, Adam returns to his.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGr9JJM4vPC
The rest of the meal passes in silence.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡD5LS6ebLBP
The tall, unshaven man rises from his seat and almost trips on a bottle lying on the floor.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxBVcdASJVi
“Idiot!” He yells. “Don’t you ever clean this rotten house up?” He kicks at it forcefully and it smashes against the wall, tiny green crystals cascading onto the ground.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVtq82qqhR9
Biting her lip: “I try.”851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrGv1wc9IBl
As if satisfied by his outbreak of force, Adam deflates. “Good.”851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ84gcvBRaeA
There’s a pause. “…Honey?”851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡioes1zNst8
“For God’s sake, Rachael, what is it?” Adam turns to face his wife.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1Spl891OeO
Tentatively, she takes a small packet of white powder out from under the table. “…I found this in your pockets after you passed out last night. Adam, what is this?” Her eyes are wide, worried and pleading.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpybgEbK43m
“What do you think it is?” His reply is throwaway; he barely gives the bag a glance.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNnkWEf3fhF
“Doesn’t it bother you?” She’s sweating: she knows that she might be crossing a line.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoTkdZ2oU9I
“Why would it?” His tone of voice already changes; suspicious of her intentions.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJBHHt8ZzaO
“I mean, for him.” She gestures vaguely to the bedroom at the back of the apartment where their son is still sleeping. “I don’t think all of this is good for him… He scratches himself.”851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxCdjLOdI8B
“…And?” Questioning. Provoking. Is this the man she married twenty years ago?851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4svD9fr4td
“I think you shouldn’t drink so much. Or take…” She throws the packet onto the floor. “It’s not good. For you. Or for him.” She gasps, then holds her breath, waiting for the explosion.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDFN8c87nNT
For a moment, everything is frozen – but then it happens – the side of his hand coming into contact with her left cheek.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk8XEiAdata
Her cry of pain isn’t registered in Adam’s mind. He’s staring at his hand as if it is somehow dirty, and with a growing feeling of shame he stumbles out of the apartment, but not before grabbing the abandoned bag on the floor.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhMsUb8LHZI
“S***, I’m sorry, Rachael.” But the words are said long after his leaving, leaving his mouth only when he is sitting on the curb of the path outside.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBtZczMOv2N
Confused, angry, forlorn, ashamed, he curses under his breath. Since when was he like this?851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmP8BHQHqhM
He tears the packet open and pours the contents onto his hand before inhaling them, hating yet relishing the sting up his nostrils.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQNrSU3VkLh
He just wants to forget. In his younger and more vulnerable years his father beat him: and every day he asks himself what he did wrong.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡraPDRNxNfL
Dazed, he walks up the street.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsNebm0FrXJ
It hasn’t occurred to him yet that it wasn’t his fault.
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He wakes on something soft. Green. Grass?851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhfzW9mcnVV
His stomach returns the breakfast it so willingly accepted earlier that day (yesterday, perhaps?), bile burning his throat as the liquid leaves his mouth.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbTQ7FB0gOb
Rachael. Beautiful Rachael. She was upset about something. She’s always upset.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPSAAzhKW3X
He gets up onto his knees. “Rachael!” He yells. Where is she? He wants to say something to her. Something he hasn’t said to her for a long time.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡS1yfgv2gsO
He laughs in relief when he sees her, standing all the way at the top of the hill.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbn9D8cAiKl
Gone are the creases of worry that lined her face, gone are the tears she often cried.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHmB1pZvR0M
And, can he see – or is it just his imagination? – just like the first strands of sunlight dancing over the tops of distant mountains, the faintest of smiles lifting the corners of her lips?851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZxsTI1DakA
“Rachael!” He runs up towards her with all of his dissipating strength, not stopping, not even when his legs protest in pain, he’s rushing towards her open arms, the clouds in the blue sky singing a symphony of joy – he falls into her embrace, feeling her warmth, her happiness, surround him entirely.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvjeGazMWjs
He whispers into her ear what he never had the courage to say; just a few words, but he can tell how much they mean to her, and finally – finally! – as the sun rises on Icarus Point, her growing smile lights up those final moments, with her laugh outplaying the birds spiraling into the heavens, he knows that she forgives him.851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡazZSlTFttA
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diende…
~Ad infinitum~851Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEaKWwZbcNL
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