Alexandra Christo

I ache for the ice of the sea, so sharp with cold that it feels like glorious knives in the slits between my bones.

I lie down on the ocean bed and nudge the jellyfish beside me. Its tentacles graze my stomach and I feel a wonderful burst of pain. The kind that numbs and calms and clears my mind. It’s a release like no other, and when the pain subsides, I do it again.

“Lies aren’t answers.”

“But they sound so much better than the truth.”

Could it really be such a bad thing, to become a story whispered to children in the dead of night? A song they sing to one another while they play.

My mission, my kingdom. The world. They exist somewhere other than in this moment, and now there is only this. Me, my ship, and a girl with oceans in her eyes.

Two kingdoms that come with responsibilities we each have trouble bearing. Him, the shackles of being pinned to one land and one life. Me, trapped in the confines of my mother’s murderous legacy. And the ocean, calling out to us both. A song of freedom and longing.

I don’t know why, but Elian has evoked the same feral feeling that used to be reserved only for her. The desire to allow sparks of loyalty and humanity in me to take hold. We’re the same, he and I. Just as looking into my cousin’s eyes feels like looking into a memory of my own childhood, being around Elian feels like being around an alternate version of myself. Reflections of each other in a different kingdom and a different life. Broken pieces from the same mirror.

There are worlds between us, but that seems more like semantics than tangible evidence of how dissimilar we are.

Love and madness are two stars in the same sky.

It feels like the entire world is asleep. And us – just us – we are finally awake.