"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
Aprielle Castellano was determined to commit suicide by jumping off the bridge, letting herself drown, and die with her lungs filled with water━well, not until this blue-haired gu...
↬ a feeling of closeness and understanding that someone has for another person because of their similar qualities, ideas, or interests. ↬ a quality that makes people or things suited to each other.
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00 | prologue
WHAT IS life?
Is life the weight of responsibility for existing without our own permission? Is life a task of finding our roles and purposes in order to consider ourselves alive? Or is life a socratic irony of death — perhaps, a euphemism of dying in this cruel reality?
We, the humankind, can never tell albeit we are the ones who enjoys (or suffers) the luxury of life, of breathing and of making innovative ideas come to life for the future’s betterment. However, after coexisting with different lives and even non-living ones, we’ll all go back to the same question: what is life?
Well, maybe we don't need the answer, for the answer is already among the question thereof.
Perhaps, life . . . is life itself.
No further scientific explanations, no theoretical researches, no ironical and metaphorical symbolisms. Life is just . . . life.
“Have you ever wondered . . . what happens in those parts of the universe the human eye cannot perceive?” I asked, eyes never breaking contact with the starry midnight sky.
Seconds passed before I heard him breathe out lightly. “Of course, I did.” He sighed once more. “How can I not? Whenever I look above, even after following through different roads, I still can’t see its end. It’s unfathomable,” he mumbled.
I nodded my head slightly in conformity of his thought before asking another question. “What is?”
“The universe and every thing it upholds. It’s unfathomable.” I felt him move a little, probably adjusting himself to his own comfort. “That’s why it still leaves me thinking at random times. When? When will we arrive to our destination? How far should we go to actually find what we’re looking for?”
Finally, my eyes broke out from the trance the night sky was giving off. My head turned to him. Now I realized, this vast bermuda meadows we’re currently laying at was just a tiny dot — or even way smaller — in this obscured universe.
A smile escaped my lips. “I trust the universe’s calling. We’ll arrive there soon. And if not? Then it’s fine. We already learned a lot along the way,” I muttered. Marahan siyang napatingin sa akin. Hindi dahilan ang distansya upang hindi makita ang maliliit na kinang sa mga mata niya.
It’s like his eyes is a crescent moon. A crescent moon . . . that holds a whole universe with flickering stars inside. Those raven black orbs that seemed to be a black hole, pulling anyone who would dare to go near. A black whole of infinite journey, too deep to dive.
“Could these five little specks of molecular entities actually find something in all nothings?” he questioned, combing his vibrant blue hair that stood out in this stygian evening.
Marahan kong pinakiramdaman ang bulong ng kalikasan. Exactly the tranquility I need.
I felt the cold wind grazing through my skin. “Sa kalawakang puno ng kawalan, alam kong may mahahanap at mahahanap tayo. It just takes a lot of courage to voyage across the obscured cosmos of our own frail minds. I know there’ll be something inside those nothings. We just have to search deeper and further.” Tumayo na ako at pinagpagan ang suot. Tumikhim ako bago tumingin sa kaniya.
“Hindi ka pa tatayo riyan?” Marahang umangat ang kaliwang kilay ko. Wearing a small smile, he removed his hands — which served as his pillow — from his nape before sitting up. He then pushed himself to stand and started walking leisurely, leaving me alone in the murks.
Nahagip ng mga mata ko ang pagkaway niya sa tatlo pa naming kasamang naghihintay sa may van. I observed them as they reply a ridiculous amount of waves. Napailing na lamang ako.
“Hoy! Bilisan niyo na nga!” sigaw ng isa sa kanila.
I started trailing his footsteps as my smile faltered.
When? How?
Time and distance . . . does not measure the strange affinity I have with them. Am I really involving physics here? Oh well, that’s just . . . how it goes.
Muling napaangat ang tingin ko sa langit.
Time and distance.
When time is ticking faster and when distance is still too far from our grasps, how could we actually reach the stars?
However, clad with determination and a little bit of story to tell, I hope we would. And I know we could.
The universe might be infinite but it’s not impossible, for our affinity within stars is unfathomable.
I fondly stared at the small figures of their silhouettes from afar before releasing a light sigh whilst forming another stretch of an alleviated smile.
Our affinity within stars is unfathomable.
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