Tears of the shadow
Marie Hlaváčková
Twenty five years ago a seventeen-year old girl, Maria Bluetear, the daughter of William Bluetear, got lost. She was missing for two weeks then she was declared as dead - her body has never been found. But there was something that was found. Unusual silvery shadows on places where the girl was seen last time. Everyone said that the last day she had behaved very strangely. She looked exhausted and she was going from school on frozen puddles although it was only October. Nobody knows what happened to her, nobody saw her then. We know only about this mysterious disappearance but it is a real mystery...
Something is happening to me. It’s after the dream. That dream. When I saw someone I really wouldn’t like see again. Or I would? Difficult to say. She was incredibly beautiful. Silver, golden and black. From light and shadow with shining eyes. Frightful, powerful and incredible. Perfect. That dream seemed like a reality. I don’t know what has happened to me. Something great. Something that I will never retrace.
When I walk I feel so airy. And there are no footprints behind me. I can walk on a very thin layer of ice or mud and I don’t fall through. There rests just a light footprint. Almost insensible. How come? When I want to pick up something it picks up almost itself and I almost don’t have to do anything. But when I touch something, there rests a shiny shadows which I almost can’t see. Only in the light. How is it possible? What’s that?
I’m going home and I almost fly. I live just outside the town so I walk. What if I did something wrong again? My wishes are mysteriously fulfilled. Somebody upsets me and I want him to fall down. And he really trips over and falls down! I really feel as a derelict and outsider. Oh… I can see a stream which runs near the town. Will I be able to come across it?
My breath has been getting faster and faster and when I looked at my fingers I saw a silvery rime. In my hair I’ve discovered a gray hair. But a very strange gray hair. Shiny and bright. What on the earth is happening…? I come closer the stream and I feel that it’s getting cold. Is it my fault too? I don’t know and I prefer not thinking it over. Is it my fault that he has broken his leg? He shouldn’t have laughed at me. I’m already next to the stream and I can see the surface is freezing near me. I turn around and in the panic I run to the bridge, I come across and very quickly flee to the fields. Just I don’t want to see the level thawing behind me…
I was running like flying and I wasn’t tired. But I wanted to get asleep and never wake up again. It was that dream! Why did I have such a dream? I remembered the very sad face and the sadness overwhelmed me. What could happen to her? Why was she so sad? From white shining eyes shadow tears rolled down looping like pearls. I feel like crying too. But because of fellow feeling. Because of the fellow feeling with the shadow who appeared in my dream. I stop - I don’t feel like running any more. Then I suddenly get an idea. And I run to the pond which spreads ever there. I must try it.
I run down to the pond and I stop. I feel as though my body will fly to the sky but my soul will sag down to the grounds of the Earth. I don’t feel well. I look at the surface of the pond and it is slowly freezing before my look. “No!” I shout. The I put my bag away and with deep cast I step into the water. The ice doesn’t brake through but there is hardly any. Then I make the next step.
My last memory is the pond surface freezing and closing behind me. The frazils surrounding me and golden brilliance around me.
I remembered. That dream. That strange dream. I hadn’t ever had a dream like that. A seventeen-year old boy made of light and shadow. Silver, golden and black. He was so sad. He went on the frozen surface of the pond and then he broke through; he didn’t shout. He neither defended. He just sank into the water within a flash of silver and golden light around. The ice broke into the frazils and then disappeared. So strange…
But since that dream I've been feeling that something strange is happening. The silver and golden figure is chasing me about and I feel the water is freezing when I touch it. And I can walk so lightly…
And that strange silvery shadow which rests on everything that I touch. I can’t forget the sad eyes from which the tears had been rolling down like pearls…
What’s wrong with me?