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 Posted: Sat Apr 22, 2017 9:13 am
The pier groaned gently with each lilting wave, its ages-old sturdiness holding well against the sea's play. Gulls vioced their sassy opinions just offshore, where they perched on Chapel Rock and pecked at the remains of another unfortunate crab. Children played in the fair distance, preferential to the warm, clean sands, and left the pier to those who worked tirelessly on their boats. As the sea breeze rolled in, it wicked away heat from the shoulders of those prone to sunburn, though the sun still bore down with all its familiar intensity.
Elex sat on one of the last mooring pillars, where his view of the ocean remained mostly unobstructed by the ancient, fraying wood. He wore a loose, white dress shirt open for the whorling breeze, where it guarded his neck and shoulders from the prying sun. Beige board shorts and sandals provided a comfortable fit, with the requisite brand names to sate his mother's ever-vigilant sense of status. In his hands laid an old conch shell picked up from the last hour of walking among the beach sands, his brother in tow, before the older of the Yorkes departed for more pressing obligations. Now Elex sat alone, with little more to offer company but the occasional desensitized gull.
After withdrawing a thin, pointed hand tool from one of his shorts pockets, Elex paused to watch his father work on his latest guilty homage to his grandfather's lineage - an old fishing boat, the Anna-Marie, that remained in the family for decades past. Much rumor surrounded the boat, he knew, from the conception of his father in its annals to a pecualiar, ever-present list from the previous owner's haunting of its lower deck. For the better part of the morning now, his father worked and micromanaged endlessly with a couple hired hands he solicited from the nearby bait shop. They each tried thrice now to goad Elex or Erol into the repairs, but the brothers proved too wary of their father's endless tinkering quests to take the fall. Instead, Elex remained at a safe distance from the slowly-sinking vessel, where he needn't hear his father's overly-loud shouts when the endless cans of beer finally claimed him.
After shifting more fully toward the vessel, Elex framed the conch shell properly in one hand and began the etching process. Light strokes chipped away at the thick outer layer, forming the vague guesswork of a design. Frequently he looked out toward his father's doomed project, oft imagining the tales and fancies that occured long ago in its prime. The fancies fueled the careful work well, and he established a simple outline of the project at hand.infinities hope this works! if not, i can edit!
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Posted: Sat Apr 22, 2017 7:57 pm
Giulia had come to the area with Jada, Aidan, and Amélie, the six year old delighted by the onset of warm heat and the fact she would be able to perhaps get a tan to offset her blonde curls, and look more like the pictures of the pretty ladies in the magazines, and look more like a proper princess as the light bleached the color from her hair. It was a very pretty day, and though they didn't own a yacht, that didn't mean they couldn't come to the pier and enjoy the water. There was always the option of renting one if it came necessary. They had spent the first few minutes finding the proper location, the two older women using Aidan and her to set um the umbrella for the sun (Nanny was very fair) and lay out blankets and comfortable chairs. Re-slathering sunscreen on Giulia and Aidan, before they settled down to read and do adult things, letting the twins run off and play. Which was something Giulia sis with abandon, giggling and enjoying the warmth of the spring, probably a lot more than she actually should. But like all children, she eventually needed to go elsewhere- stretch her boundaries, her legs, her guardian's patience. Explore, expand, other things that started with Ex. (Ex-a**-pir-ate?) her exploration had led her towards the bathroom, though, and it was on her way back that her attention had been caught by a younger older person doing something. He was all alone, it looked like, or was sitting that way; Giulia didn't approve of alone. Alone could mean lonely, and lonely was the worst. Without hesitation, the young girl scampered forward, considering what he was doing. It looke like... ctting something? But she couldn't tell. What was he cutting and with what? "hi!" she chirped at last, approaching the young man; "I'm Giulia. What 'cha doin'?"
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Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2017 10:33 am
Elex knew how to lose himself in thought to an impressive degree. He often did so when busied in solitary situations, such as the carving of yet another boat on an old artifact of the sea. And while he didn't terribly mind this trait about himself, it irritated him when he failed to realize that someone was approaching him.
Like now. A child suddenly apparated to his right side, all bright eyes and tousled blonde hair, all wild happiness under the great, empty expanse of the sky. He looked from his project to her, and offered her a view of the vague sketch on the conch. "Hello Giulia," he responded in kind, "I'm Elex. And this will be a boat." Though, he supposed it looked more like a vague conglomeration of lines to a child. Or an adult, really.
He pointed outward across the stretch of sea between the piers with the sharpened tip of his scrimming tool. "It'll be that one, there. It's my father's boat, but he hasn't taken it to sea in months. He keeps thinking it could still sail if he puts a little more work into it. The rest of my family thinks it's driftwood. But he keeps trying to fix it. It's interesting to see him use that doubt as a reason to keep going. That's why I'm carving it." He paused then, looking out toward the ramshackle craft with studious eyes. He looked not to the boat itself, but to the distant figure of his father, ever stooped over his own work. "It makes a good symbol of perseverence." She might not know that word.
Breaking from the thought, he looked to Giulia, then out toward the surrounding beach. Of those present, none stood out as an obvious parentage to the child. No one looked terribly worried over a missing child, either. Were people still so trusting as to let their child roam free under the threat of rival teenage gangs and ravenous monsters? Perhaps; on a day like this, such dangers sounded like a distant dream from another age.
"What about you? Are you enjoying the ocean?"
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Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2017 12:43 pm
Big blue eyes blinked at the not as he looked up at her, and the child smiled broadly, flashing white baby teeth at the older kid, trying not to let the loose one wiggle. "Hi Elex. Nice to meet you." A princess might give the other boy a little dip, like in the movies when the princess met a little princess and she curtsied and he bowed. But Elex was sitting, and his hand was busy. So that would just be silly. She leaned in to take a closer look at what he was doing, pursing her teeny mouth and considering the lines carefully. It did not look much like a boat yet, but she could see how it might be one someday. Maybe. He featured past her and she pulled back, examining the target he had pointed to in a moment of silence. Turned back to the art. Back to the boat. Repeating the gesture a few more times, she tilted her head in consideration. "I think it looks good," she announced firmly. "It will be a good Pursey Veer Ince. Is that the name of the boat?" Giulia had lots of questions, but people always kept telling her not to ask all of them at once. She thought it was silly, not letting people know you had a lot of questions up front. Then people just got mad when you kept asking more questions but you tried to tell them.... "If your daddy gets the boat floaty will he take it out a lot? Does your daddy do lots of fun things with you, Elex? Are daddies fun? Does your Mommy not want the boat to float? What is drift wood?" She took a deep breath. "The ocean has been really fun! It is really salty! And it stings when it got in my eyes. I want to make a sandcastle. Have you ever made a sandcastle? I made one out of snow this winter but it melted and it didn't get very in tir kate. That means fancy. I am gonna make a real fancy sand castle." Her nod was grave.
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Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2017 10:31 am
"No. Perseverence is when someone keeps trying to do something, no matter how hard it is. Fixing a boat happens to be very hard." Elex smirked lightly at the internal recollection of his father's every failing, and each drunken expletive thrown at the old boat whenever he discovered another leak. He hated the boat for as much as he loved it. Perhaps that's why he needed it.
Elex returned to his carving after Giulia passed her judgment, preferring to keep his hands busy while she spoke. His mother often condemned the habit for looking as though he wasn't listening, but he preferred it over ceaseless fidgeting. Lines etched into the conch with more confidence as he formed a better picture of the boat, and as Giulia herself wound through more topics of conversation. From one curiosity to the next, ever bouncing between topics with an attention span not long enough to hold any of them. Maybe people found kids endearing for that. He preferred them for how seldom they lied.
"My dad doesn't spend a lot of time with me, no. To him, a family is like having a nice shirt. You wear it to look nice, but it's more for appearances than for his own interest. I think he still wants to be a kid, and I'm too young for the type of kid he wants to be. Mostly he spends time with my brother." Quickly his eyes darted between target and sketch, checking his work against the original. Frowning, he found it wanting. Once more he delved into his work. "Dads can be fun when they want to be." She must not have one. Single mother? Divorce before the birth? It's hard to tell, but she seems unfazed by it. Maybe not a loss in her memory.
"My mom wants it to float. But she also doesn't want it to float. She likes him better when he's drunk, and he's always drunk when he's working on that boat." What a child-friendly story to tell.
Elex shifted, dismissing the line of questioning about his parents entirely. Sandcastles seemed a much more proper subject for kids, for as much as society demanded preservation of their innocence. "What's your fancy sandcastle going to look like? Show me." Elex could use the break from his conch, and Giulia seemed interested enough in sharing her intricate blueprints for the next Kremlin.infinities having trouble with ice tags currently
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Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2017 6:01 pm
Pursey Veer Ince sounded like something that Giulia could get behind. "Like in Galaxy Quest!" she exclaimed to the older boy, thinking back to the movie and its catch phrase. "Never give up! Never surrender! Galaxy Quest is a really old movie, but I had to watch it on family night once. It was sooooo cheesy." her eye roll was dramatic. "Everyone knows aliens aren't real, right? Don't you think?" The boy was smiling, and working on his carving, and Giulia found herself enthralled with watching his hands move as she spoke. "Well that sounds really yucky," she told him, and her tiny mouth pursed. "Families aren't like shirts. You can put shirts away, but families are always, until they die.Or they are supposed to be. Like.... Like in movies?" the last part came out hesitating, cautious. The winged prince had told her love wasn't likemovies.... but what about families. Were families like in movies? Sure, she knew hers wasn't perfect, but... if her mother hadn't died, and her daddy wasn't naughty, maybe.... she would have a family too? Lucia had a happy family... Her brow furrowed tight, and she stared intently at the conch in his hands as he worked. It was starting to look a lot more like the boat out in the other direction, and she moved closer to him, trying to find herself a perch close to Elex so she could look like a big girl having a conversation with a big boy. Because right now, their conversation was very grown up. In the distance, she could see Amelie moving along the beach, and she waved to the older woman, who waved back. "I want a daddy," she told him, "But I'm not a shirt. You aren't either. What is drunk? Maybe if the boat floats, he'll drunk more, and you can all play on the boat together?" But he wanted to know about her sandcastle, and that was much more fun to talk about than child-shirts and bad daddies and boats. "It's gonna be so big," she told him, eyes lighting with excitement. "It is gonna have towers and windows and I wanna give it a little moat. And I want the towers to be as tall as me, so I am gonna have to start with a very solid fown day shun, like when people do makeup? And I'll make Aidan do a little teeny village, and there will be a bridge and then knights will cross my bridge. It can't raise and go down because it is only sand, but I can pretend."
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Posted: Mon May 01, 2017 7:02 pm
"Like in Galaxy Quest." Elex never saw th movie himself, but Giulia's regurgitation of its main phrasals sounded accurate enough.
Her conviction about aliens roused a smile. So bitter and so young. Where's your imagination? Seems like disillusionment keeps turning time back earlier and earlier. "Aliens are real." His attention flickered back to the shell in his hands, where he started once mre on rendering the ship. "All fiction starts from reality. Maybe they aren't little green men, but they exist. They might be the people cutting your mom's lawn, or washing her car. There might be a few on the beach. Maybe your mom's one." Elex knew with some certainty that his father's preferred help emigrated under the radar. But Giulia spoke of the men from outer space, much like the pretty-suited soldiers that milled about at night. Those tales were better left untold for now.
Movies and families. Movies and families and aliens. "It depends on the movie. I'm sure there's a movie with a family like mine. Maybe there's one with a family like yours, too." He stood from his post and stretched, joints popping lightly from disuse. He settled back when Giulia found her own seat. "Maybe your mom will find you a dad someday. You might just find one on your own." Elex snorted, then shook is head. "Not all dads treat their families like shirts. Mine used to value smiles on his kids' faces, but something's got him all twisted up inside. He'll figure it out or he won't." And then he'll move from getting drunk to being a drunk. And who knows where that path leads.
"Drunk is what you'll be in ten years or so."
It is gonna have towers and windows and I wanna give it a little moat.
"That's a big castle. Who's going to live in it?" Is it going to be you? Your family? Are the knights crossing your bridges coming to be your dad? What does Giulia find in these medieval romances? And how long will they last?
How long until you're saying 'everyone knows princesses aren't real'? It's a wonder you aren't saying it now.
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Posted: Mon May 01, 2017 10:07 pm
Giulia was very pleased to have understood what pursey veer ince was, and she was going to save it for later. She could pull out a very big word she had learned, and everyone would be so impressed! Leaning sideways, Giulia said, "People said the Egyptians were aliens. That's why they knew so much." she tilted her head, thinking about the foreign planet she had visited with Ara. Technically, maybe that meant Lucia was an alien? Since Lucia had a whole planet just for her? But Lucia didn't look like a little green man or Stitch or anything. Giulia considered the beach, and thought of all the sen-shi and the knights she had met, and wondered how mnay of these people were magical and just in disguide, like Ara. The people washing mama's car. Maybe Jada was an alien. It was an interesting theory. She had only met a small number of people, but if any one of them could be a sen-shi... "Maybe you're an alien," Giulia teased Elex happily. The idea of her family being in a movie pleased her; a special family, with kids and the mama had to leave, but the littlest kids were kept safe. "I'll be very picky. I won't just accept any daddy. It has to be a special daddy, who will adore me and call me his little princess and think I am the cutest. I will have to be very picky with daddies- they are the very biggest decision. I am hoping that I can get a real prince for a daddy, and then I can be a real princess.with a castle." she leaned over, patting the older boy on the shoulder. "I don't think the twisting sounds fun. I am very sorry, Elex. I hope that your daddy realizes he is being naughty very soon and that he doesn't stay all yucky inside." It made her wonder if maybe the fact that her mommy was in Heaven and her daddy was a naughty person who didn't get to meet her yet was actually a good thing. If Daddies drunk a lot and wore their little kids like shirts, then she would take her messy little family and she would just have to love it extra good, because Giulia was many things, and she especially knew she was loved. That made her feel kind of lucky. What did being drunk have to do with how old she would be? "I'll be sixteen in ten years," Giulia said helpfully. "Hopefully I won't be drunk- I'll just stay away from boats." Elex's interest in her castle kept Giulia animated cheerfully. "I'll live in the castle, and all the peasants, and a king and queen and their daughters and sons. And we'll have ponies, and I can probably even invite in some other stuff like cows and maybe a giraffe. And there will be a big room, and it will be my throne room, where I am the gentlest princess."
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Posted: Wed May 03, 2017 10:15 am
"Maybe I'm an alien," Elex conceded knowingly. My mother would agree.
"If you build your castle, dads from all over the world might come lining up to be your father." If that's what she wants. People all over the world grow up with deadbeat dads, absent dads, bad mothers, drug addicts, distant relatives, strangers… She wants an ideal. An ideal that can never happen. If she only faces disappointment, letdowns, wanting… Is it better to just pull her starseed? Some would see it that way.
Elex worked some of the knotty wooden plans onto the side of the conch-ship, rendered gently until he achieved a proper texture of it. As he continued, he considered the kid who so quickly divulged her wants to him. She wanted to be a princess - that wasn't too surprising. She lacked a father - perhaps not that, either. She knew her current age, and how to add ten years to her current age, which was something he doubted most kids learned until the first or second grade. Impressive to know it so young, precocious perhaps, but still not very interesting.
Maybe in a few years, Giulia will know a very full life - but Elex had no eyes for the future, and their time was now.
"But you're not related to the king and queen or their kids. Did something happen to their kingdom that they had to move in with you?" She wanted to keep a zoo, too. She wanted to keep the whole world, doubtless, for as long as her heart remained open. In a few years, that castle would stand empty but for her, and she herself would recoil at the thought of staying inside it. Then, eventually, more permanent denizens would make their beds in such a place, but even Elex himself hadn't yet reached that point. Growing up was a thought he seldom wanted to have.
On a whim, Elex altered his scrim. He carved in great masts where none stood on his father's boat, and a few sweeping strokes of the blade rendered the barest hints of sails. He added their billowing grace, and the sea washing against the side of the boat. "And what about the animals? Do they talk to you? Serve you?"
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Posted: Thu May 04, 2017 6:43 am
Giulia beamed at the older boy who spoke to her, her eyes full of childish youth and innocence. A pile of it. She had been attacked by youma, protected by magical princes and princesses and powerful magic knights, spoken with kitties and travelled to worlds far from Earth with her best friend. Life was full of scary things, but she looked around with wide-eyed hope. But she couldn't say she believed in aliens, because then they might ask why, and that would put her kitties and her magical friends in big danger. Not to mention her family! That could be terrible. Giggling again, Giulia shook her head. "I don't think you're actually an alien. On TV the aliens are green." Would building a castle actually net her a daddy? "Just a sand castle will bring me some potential daddies to love me?" Her lips pursed in consideration. "I guess that is good to build a sand castle first then. It will bring the fun daddies and then when I reveal my real castle I know that they are there because they want to be my daddy not because I live in a castle." Her eyes flickered down to his hands again, taking in the shape. "I'm not related to them, I am helping keep them safe. Their old land was eaten up by evil dragons, and so they said 'Please princess Giulia, can we come and live with you? Our people are in danger and starving and the land is very not safe.' Well, Jada and Amelie say that a princess is supposed to share. So 'Of course' I told them. If I am lucky enough to have more than I need, shouldn't I do good for people?" She leaned over him with interest, considering the lovely boat he was making. It was so pretty, and the little clothy- um- sails? They were pretty and the water made it look like it was all moving and real good. Giulia made a noise of appreciation. "Do you know a lot about boats, Elex? And the animals may not talk like normal people, but they aren't my servants! They are my friends!"
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Posted: Mon May 08, 2017 5:28 pm
"No, not just a sand castle, but a sand castle is a start." Moving forward meant something. Dreaming meant something. Living in the wake of all the disasters that befell this place meant something. They each had to - otherwise, why would anyone choose to wake up in a place like this? Living despite their stark reality bred something of passion in their hearts.
So if Giulia wanted to build a sand castle, if she wanted to play make-believe despite the youma attack on the morning news, then her choice to play meant something. It inspired something in someone.
It had to.
She incorporated enough of her make-believe into her own home, deeming it a castle, which earned her a softer look. You'll wish you lived in a castle. You'll wish for a motte-and-bailey. You'll wish for all the archer towers and crenellations and gates you could imagine for how not just the Negaverse, but life, will siege everything.
He wanted such stories himself. But for the more that the Negaverse blended fiction with reality, he found such high fantasy realms less and less a comfort. "That's a brave way of looking at it. Most people don't want to share." There wasn't much power latent in an imaginary realm in which to corrupt her, he was certain. She could live with such fantasies as he surely did when he was her age. And while he never much dreamt of princesses, he spent fair time dreaming up other realms that provided far more fantastical havens than life often did. Maybe such thoughts would tide her over until she found the daddy she sought.
If she did.
He smirked slightly at her wide-eyed question. "I know a lot about some boats. Mostly old boats. Nothing like the one my dad has now." A quick glance confirmed that his father yet made no progress in recovering his latest project. "These boats were from a long time ago - from when they had cannons in the sides. Like this," he continued, as he carefully bore cannons into the side of the slowly-rendered ship.
"Here. Keep it in your sand castle's harbor." He held the conch out to her.
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Posted: Tue May 09, 2017 10:39 am
Elex seemed to be very smart, Giulia mused, considering the older boy through the eyes of a child. He had to know lots of things he could teach her, including that a sand castle was a start to finding a good daddy to love her and hug her. She nodded as though she understood, and somewhat she might- it would take more than one sandcastle, and maybe more than sandcastles at all, so she had more work ahead to be a real princess. The beach was noisy with laughter and water, and in the distance Giulia could see Amelie and Jada walking the shore now, one of them seemingly calling into the breeze, though Giulia couldn't really hear. They were probably looking for her, so she would wait until they got closer before she waved for their attention. "Is it brave? Why?" Giulia tilted her head to him curiously. "I thought being kind to others was part of what we were supposed to do. Cinderella was told to have courage and be kind and everything turned out okay, but I didn't know that it was brave to be kind." she had always thought it was expected. Jada and Zora and Lucas told her and Aidan that they were privileged to be wealthy and healthy because not everyone was. Some people didn't have money for toys, so Giulia had to share. Some people were sick and so they donated to lots of hospitals to help make them healthy. As Elex told her about old boats with cannons on the side, Giulia leaned back in, staring intently at the little holes. "Like the old boats in the movies? The cannons are the big boomy guns like in a circus?" it was more proof that her new friend was extra smart. He knew a lot about old stuff. Her world was still black and white, and small, and she knew little about it. Giulia has always been protected and safe, from love and fear, and so she reveled in the little slip to the outside, where maybe there was unhappiness, and naughty fathers like her own, but who stayed with their children. As the conch was held out to her, Giulia's blue eyes widened and brightened with excitement. "Oh, Elex," she gasped dramatically, "do you mean it? It is so pretty! Are you sure? I will take real good care of it." tiny fingers with tiny rainbow-painted nails reached toward it eagerly, then hesitated, wiggling. She would keep it in her harbor, and then maybe put it on the shelf next to her stuffed seal when she got home, so she could see it when she woke up. A memory of a kind boy at the water, whose father unkindly compared him to a shirt.
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Posted: Tue May 09, 2017 9:07 pm
"If you have something they want, people will expect you to be nice and share. It's easy to see that. My father doesn't like to share so much anymore because people expect him to share, and get mad at him when he doesn't. To share anyway is brave because you trust that people won't be mean about it. That they won't just take advantage of it. But you'd still share." He looked out to his father then, considering. Or maybe that's not bravery. Maybe my father's just turning into a coward.
Elex stiffened, then rolled his shoulders for a few telltale pops from his sedentary stature. He wanted to move again, to go for a swim, to spy another world to which they weren't privy long-term. "You're right about the boats. Those are the ones." That she could liken canons to circuses was impressive - did they still hold circuses anymore? Elex only knew of them from books, never from firsthand experience. Perhaps Destiny City held more in its purview than Elex expected - not that he could complain about it.
She seemed uncertain concerning the conch, a gesture of which he thought his mother would approve. Anna always preferred that girls showcase a certain bashfulness. She considered it alluring and anchoring, and that many a man would turn to a woman who could flatter them so. Maybe it was true. Maybe Giulia's parents saw that for themselves.
Or the girl was simply unsure.
"Go ahead. It's yours." She needn't know that he couldn't keep it; the kid had a whole childhood ahead of her to remain as unspoiled as possible by bitterness and the petty acts of men. Reaching his teen years, Elex found it all too easy to regard mankind as pigheaded and untrustworthy, and such a view only cultivated more of the same. But was hiding the truth a better option? Elex didn't know. It wasn't even his responsibility. He didn't know this kid from the next one on the street, even for how extroverted she was to strike up a conversation with a stranger.
"I'm going to go swimming soon. Are you okay to find your mother?"
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Posted: Wed May 10, 2017 6:51 pm
Giulia furrowed her brow, trying to understand what Elex meant, but she thought maybe it was still a little beyond her right now. To share anyway is brave because you trust that people won't be mean about it. That they won't just take advantage of it. she chewed on her lip a little, thinking the words over before nodding a little- but he wasn't looking at her, he was looking somewhere else. The crack of his bones made her jump a little, and then she brightened. She had been right! That was good. She liked being told she had gotten something right- at least, if she actually had. "The pops sounded painful," she told him as she reached out and brought the conch carefully in close to her chest, beaming happily down at it. "The exercise will really help." she tucked the gift in carefully close, holding it as something precious, excited. She couldn't wait to show it off. Aidan would be so jealous she had gotten a gift. And it was so pretty too! She had gotten the best gift; it was known. "I can find her," Giulia assured Elex brightly, and gave him a clumsy little bow. "Thank you so much for the boat shell. It is really good." her fingers twitched over where it lay clutched to her narrow chest. "Is there anything I can do for you as a thank you?"
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Posted: Thu May 11, 2017 1:00 am
Elex paused not long on the question. "If you did something for me, then it wouldn't be a gift - it'd be an exchange. I don't need anything." Really, entrusting the shell to someone who might find interest in it offered him plenty in return. Too often the pieces were recycled or subjected to the trash can. Here, he wouldn't have to throw the conch back out to sea where the rest of the marine life would forsake it for its chipped surface.
Though by entrusting it to her, he took the conch out of the ecosystem. But such thoughts were inner tidings he could face after diving into the sea and feeling the living ocean floor between his toes. Those were thoughts better addressed when the sounds of men could not be heard any longer.
Giulia was an extroverted little girl who hadn't yet developed a crippling fear of the world. Perhaps she saw very little of it yet, or enough to realize that fear itself proved a little too extraneous when her whole life lay in the perilous claws of Destiny City. Or was that expecting too much from her? It mattered little; she had heart where most did not, and he respected her for that. She gave where others wouldn't, or couldn't, and she never once dwelled on what others might have that she did not. While curious of fathers, she never wanted his - whether by virtue of being his or by Elex's lukewarm appraisal of Elon's weaknesses. Either way, she expressed no great jealousy.
And children proved too truthful to withhold such heavy thoughts.
"But if you had to do something, then go tell your mother I said hi." Never one for parting words, Elex zipped the scrimming tool into the pocket of his swimwear and cast himself off toward the rolling waves. In a splash, the world faded to dissonance - to a wordless, blissful cacophony.
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