fiction / the lighthouse

"I remember being barefoot, my nails were caked with sand, and my hair was messy with sea salt. I was running away from somebody, my chest heaving, and my breath forming whips of transparent smoke in the air. I was holding some sort of battered suitcase, leather it seemed. 

I could only concentrate on the foamy sea, lashing out, and pouring over my toes, my thoughts a windmill, while the sky above me was going in and out of focus. The wind carried my complicated, never-ending thoughts, gathering them, imprinting them into the sand, and then sending them away into the water or planting them into the soil. I tried to stop, or slow down at least, I wanted to kneel down, put my hands on my ears to block out the sound of the seas' screeching and open the suitcase I was holding. You see, I desperately needed to know what was inside of it.

The head-ache I felt when running, was stronger than anything I had ever felt, ramming into my skull, but I didn't mind, there was something soothing about the pain." 

The boy shook his head, and paused before continuing:

"They say that dreams are only a figment of one's imagination, but I'm here to say no, of course they aren't. They are more real, more vivid, more raw than any human-experienced reality. But when a one does not know or cannot fathom the truth, he denies.

It loomed up in front of me, pale and white; a sort of intricate lighthouse. My feet brought me closer and closer to the building, thumping to the rhythm of my breath, or was it the breath of the sea? to and fro, to an fro.

As I entered the lighthouse I was well-aware of the darkness behind me trying to swallow me whole, trying to drag my spirit away. I kicked at the black dust that was grabbing, reaching for my legs, my hips, trying to fold itself into my mind.

After, there were the flight of stairs. My feet hitting on the sand-stone, a smooth and creamy white, arms flailing about, I had to reach the top of the tower. I knew that up there there would be warm yellow light that would pour all over the walls." 

He laughed quietly, a laugh without happiness.

"You don't know how much I wanted, how I thirsted for the comfort of that light. When I finally reached the room, I knelt down in the middle of it and looked at the case."