LIGHTNOVELONLINE Sunrise
I’m never really awake for sunrises. Classic night owl behaviour, one time my sister told me I’ve turned nocturnal over the years. And why wouldn’t I? Daytime is all noise and lights, being surrounded by people who seem oddly okay with it all. They’re not overwhelmed, no, somehow I’m the strange one for being overwhelmed by overwhelming things, I mean, god forbid you spin your protective cocoon covering in the middle of a noisy gathering with those horrible HORRIBLE fluorescent lights because suddenly you’re the freak for just wanting to chill a little and not get your eyes attacked by the godawful fluorescent lights, I mean, COME ON, it’s not like I walked out! Every time I come out as a butterfly from the cocoon! AND I clean up the leftover cocoon, what else do you want?!?!
Anyway, I believe I’ve proven my point. I love the night. The darkness is a source of joy, it’s like a hug in a world which is just 24/7 sensory screaming.
Tonight, though, I’ve decided I want to see the sunrise. Or is it next morning? Tonight? In the border between tonight and next morning, that’s when I want to see the sunrise.
Why, you might ask? The tectonic plates, that’s why. There’s a god sleeping beneath them. Sometimes it changes its position in bed and that’s when the tectonic plates move. We can predict the movements a little bit, down to the approximate hour. And when the shifts happen, they happen fast. It’s incredible. It’s terrifying. Thankfully we all figured out ways to get through the tremors, the earthquakes whenever the plates collide and separate. Light and the atmosphere and the ability to see things is very very odd, though. It works wrong. It works unrealistic. It works wonderful and I’m glad because that means I’ll get to see the birth of a brand new mountain.
You know, every single night I become a butterfly. Born again every night. This one’s different though. Sunrise. I’ll be born again, come out of my cocoon after metamorphosing again, and this hill will be born for the first time. Both of us born on the same day! Me, mutant butterfly freak human and Sunrise (that’s what I’ve named it, don’t tell anyone), a beautiful new mountain with such treacherous peaks and heights. A stunning yet freakish puny creature being born alongside a thing of pure wonder and awe…
Some may wonder why I care. Those are the same people who don’t bother trying to understand my nocturnalism so I don’t care about answering their musings. I care because I care. Because I love caring. Because there’s so much to care about and being born with a mountain is just as good a thing to love as any.
I don’t know if I can stay awake for it though. Yes, yes, sure, I’m nocturnal, but I’m also weary. In soul, in body. My hair goes grayer and grayer each day even though I haven’t really lived that long. Some people remind me that yes, I’m very young. I don’t know what happened though. Weariness? Illness? Is the weariness an illness? Is illness causing weariness and if so, what are the particulars of this illness?
Bone marrow in my arm hums along to the premonitions. Premonitions of what? The earthquake, for one. The one with the hill. My twin, in a way, since we’re both being born. There’s the rest of the future too. There’s the possible tragic early death of mine. Or the possibility of a life where I reach a ripe old age, where I look at others who seem an awful lot like I did myself, and I tell them, “If I made it, so can you.” I already say that to others, of course. I have to, I don’t know how long I have so I need to say it, over and over and over because it helps people. I need to help people. I don’t have time and I better make all this count. I have to, I have to, I…
The bone marrow hums some more. Melody felt through my bones and fat and muscle and skin. I wish you could hear it. I wish you could hear the same premonitions I do. Maybe then you'd understand why I worry so much. You'd even understand why I love the world so much too, even though I also hate it. You'd understand my need to look at the tiniest of goodness and celebrate it like it's… like it's… like it's what? Like it saved my life? Well, it did. It did, by being good and existing. It did, it did, it did, I wish you'd understand how the premonitions tell me that nothing is certain (not even the question of whether you're listening), but what is at least a little bit less uncertain than everything else is the fact that good things, good things exist and I must celebrate them (all by my lonesome if needed!) because otherwise, otherwise I'll die so soon. Sooner than I should. Sooner than the tragic ending, sooner than the ripe-old-age ending, sooner than now and sooner than my birth and sooner than the rising of Sunrise.
I'm weary. Soul and body. My bone marrow says: "It's alright, it's alright. I don't know if we've been through a lot or not, the mind is insistent that nothing truly bad has ever happened to us (a collective; we are bone, we are caterpillar hairs, we are buggy eyes and we are brain and human skeleton which the archaeologists will find the remains of in our urn; we are nature and part of the world as a whole), the mind insists it's fine but it's an idiot and completely incorrect. Why weary? Who's to say. Maybe it's our inherent nature. Maybe there's truly good reason to be weary. But there's just one constant."
I nod. "Yes. One constant: the fact that I– that we can keep holding on. If we just hold on to the good."
The bone marrow nods. "Yes. And rest is good too."
Rest is good too.
I have infinite potential, you know. So do you. Filled to the brim with it, with possible wonders and possible horrors. Infinite positives, infinite negatives, infinite infinities… but that's just flying over the point I'm trying to make: Weary. Ill. God, I'm so weary and illness. I don't know if the illness will ever go away, I don't know where the weariness comes from, I don't know why I age like every second is a year.
But I do know that my current weariness, the one the bone marrow keeps reminding me of, that has a very simple cure. One I often feel I haven't earned (help more people work more work more do better do better push the limit grind to the bone till you see your bone marrow work hard work hard work work work help be productive be productive), but what sense does it make to say that people have to earn sleep?
The sunrise and the birth of my fellow wonder of nature and my own birth alongside it. These come and go and I sleep through it all. I don't quite understand it. I don't know what happened or why. I know I'm simply existing and that I was born today, but what… this odd peace? This odd insight? This odd unity with the world and in particular with this mountain.
I sleep. I rest. My weary soul and the world's weary soul and the mountain's soon-to-be-formed treacherous features (may you never be as weary as me, though I hope you learn to manage whatever weariness does come your way), we all are stunningly patterned butterflies and we mean everything to me/us/you and we mean nothing, we mean absolute gibberish. And as of now, as of today, we get to rest.
Goodnight, everyone.