Submitted by: tmtl
Written by:
Title:

Synchronicity

If I sit at home one more day I think I'll go insane. She managed to scrawl into the kitchen table before standing up and getting her coat. Time for a change she scribbled into the door as she closed it and turned the key in the lock - stepping outside.
Walking down the street she watched the people she didn't know staring back as she walked along in the same fashion. She didn't know where she was going, but she liked the idea that she was going somewhere. Off I go! She imprinted this onto a tree that she passed as she walked through the park and into the river.
She traced the word wet with her finger through the water and watched as the water flowed through her fingers - encasing each hand in liquid gloves. The water had changed her light blue trousers, to dark blue - and they stuck to her legs as she waded out.
She lay in the paddock while the sun shone down drying her. She spelt out here I am with her left hand in silhouette on the patch of grass by her head. The sun smiling down made her realise that there was a bigger world than the one inside her head. She smiled back at the sun as if to please the star. But it smiled back the same, not recognising her new revelation.
After a while, she stood up and dusted off the afternoon. Mingling with the crowd of people making their way home, she moved through the town and her feet met with the pavement as she carried her shoes. Buy today! Read the advert. Bye to day, she engraved into the wooden frame of the poster as the sun set down - finally disappearing behind the horizon of the world she had met today.
Suddenly, all the streetlights came on and sent a shiver down her spine. Standing looking down the street she could see a track of beams erupt towards a small building at the end of the road. Walking through the stream of fiery spheres, she found herself at the door to the building that seemed to end her path.
She glanced through the green-tinted window. Here? She scrawled onto the door and pushed the big oak door open. Inside she was met with stairs. She stepped down and down until she came to another door. Here? She scrawled on that door in less able handwriting than before as it was dark and it wasn't so easy to see what she was writing.
Entering, she came across a roomful of people. Some saw her and some didn't. Those who saw her were welcoming but still hostile. She could feel their glances as if they were breathing hot breath onto the back of her neck - making the hairs stand on end.
She found herself a corner and sat down. The seat was warm and comfortable and soon she fell asleep. She dreamt of lots of eyes staring down at her, enquiring eyes, fearful eyes. What now? She painted on the back of her eyelids while she slept. Is this it? Is this my chance? Her eyes fluttered open and there he was.
"Can I help you?" She asked.
"No." He replied.
"What do you want?" She asked.
"What do you want?" He asked back.
"What I want is no concern to someone I've only just met." She replied courteously. "And why do you want to know?"
"Why do you want to know?"
The game was tiring her again. She could only hold his look for a short while before falling back asleep. It wasn't so much the game, she said to herself, it was the gaze...
"Wake up!" A voice chorused in her ear. "Wake up, we have to leave." He was looking down on her when she opened her eyes and holding out his hand. "They're closing." Warily, she took his hand.
Standing up, she blinked the reality in, allowing her eyes to once again become accustomed to the well-lit room. They stepped out and closed the door behind them. Yes, here. He scrawled on the door beneath her half-formed, four-lettered question. They walked up the stairs together hand in hand.
She stepped out into the indigo night and became blind again. He turned around in the dark and faced the closed door. The dim green light from the window illuminated his face as he ran his fingers along the grain in the door. Yes, here, he wrote thickly - straight underneath her previous query.
They walked up the middle of the road, following the painted white line. The street was completely deserted. She remembered the feel of the crowds beating in on her and began to watch her footsteps pacing along beside his. Stretching out in front of her was a faceless nothing. Beside her was everything. They snaked between the two rows of glowing beams until they came to the advert. Hello to tomorrow, he marked into the frame by her farewell.
The paddock seemed eerie in the night, but they made their way slowly across the grass and met the river again. The surface glowed silver from the moon and she watched it in the reflection and he watched her. They looked up at the sky and he said, "The moon is smiling, can you see?" And she saw.
He motioned for her to put her arms around his neck and then he lifted her off the ground and carried her across the water. It rushed around him and slowed his pace across the current.
On reaching the other side, he motioned for her to lie in the grass next to him while his trousers dried in the cool wind of the night. They looked up at the stars before he turned to her and traced here we are on her stomach.
He looked up and found the tree as it had stood that morning. He looked at the exclamation she had engraved in its soft bark. He pulled the rotting bark off and etched, Let's go home, into the fresh wood underneath.
She stood up and, joining him at the tree, nodded her head in agreement. They set off for the final stretch of their journey back to the house, which she had left that morning. It was deathly silent as they entered. He scrawled, Forever more into the door as he locked it behind them.
He helped her take off her jacket before noticing the first message marked on the table. He looked at it for a second time as if he hadn't expected to find it before idly crossing it out.
They looked at each other. He's following every move I make, she thought ...Or am I following his every move? They mirrored each other for a long time intrigued by each new reflection.
"Synchronicity." They both let the words escape at the same time. "Forever more."