Stone Bench

On the granite plane, there's a man, more like a boy, who sits on a stone bench on one end, facing into the grey-brown sky and staring through and beyond the horizon.  There is a storm far behind him, in the dark clouds illuminated by white-blue lightning.  He sits, chin in hands, elbows on knees, thinking, this man.  He thinks about a lot, doesn't say much, but no one really wants to talk to him.  They don't think it's the best thing to interrupt the ponderings of a man with the aura of someone who has come a long way and hasn't gotten much done.

But a few people do.  One is a girl, her age hard to determine.  She has the innocence of a ten-year-old, but she speaks with a knowledge of the darkness of the world she and the man are in that only someone years ahead of her should be aware of.  She knows that she can't do much to help him, but she does what she can.

The girl clambers on the stone bench behind the man, places her hands on his shoulders, and leans into him in a gentle hug.  He does not push her away, but does not turn and return the favor, either.  She keeps going for a while, until he gently shrugs her off.  She leaves.

The man keeps sitting on the bench, listening to the storm.  It neither moves towards him, nor away from him.  He continues to watch the sky, and continues to think.  He hears the words of the few who come near him, but does not respond.  His shoe scratches the granite plane beneath him, leaving scuffs in groups of three.  He knows he does not gain anything from this, but still, he wears at the ground.

Eventually, the girl returns, and grasps him again from behind.  Gently she murmurs, "I love you," and rubs the man's shoulder.  He turns to gaze at the strange girl, who, though tender, bashes with furious fists at the wall he builds.  He looks her in the eye, and they exchange a moment of speechless conversation.  His eyes speak of things the girl barely dares fathom.  After a time, the man breaks the connection.  The girl gives a final squeeze of his shoulders and leaves him again.

And it goes on, the silence, the girl, and everyone else who tries to reach to the man.  He sees no way out of the granite oblivion where he finds himself now, except to run to the darkness ahead.  But the darkness holds things worse than the storm behind him, and so the man sits on the stone bench, thinking of things that no one ought to have floating through their mind.  He regards the scuff marks he makes with curiosity, and gently grazes his shoe over them again.