The Silence

I whipped through a copse of decades old trees, allowing the air to carry me along through their swaying branches and rustling leaves. The mighty green sentinels roared in my wake; their wooden fingers snapped against my ankles as if to grab hold and punish me for my trespass through their domain, but none of them could get a solid grip on me. They would have an easier time catching the wind.

Several moments passed before I broke free of the treeline and emerged out into the open air. My tummy crashed back into place as I slowed to take in the view. Below me was a sea of undulating vermilion, softly whispering in the breeze, with an endless cerulean expanse suspended above. The two rivals were held apart by a range of massive teal mountains that spread out as far as the eye could see. I felt small, as I always did when I beheld them from this altitude. What was I, what could I ever hope to be, when compared to immense and eternal beings like them?

A rush of heat swept through me at that insolent thought. What was I? I was the wind.

My stomach pressed against my spine as I blasted towards the nearest giant, the canvas of my jacket snapping in the sudden gust the motion created. The bluish tint of intervening sky peeled back from the mountain to reveal the true verdant sheen of the forest carpeting its surface. Within moments, the indiscernible green mass sharpened into individual trees with tender leaves swaying in challenge. I grit my teeth in response and picked up speed. If the earth itself wanted to play a game of chicken with me, I was more than happy to oblige. I would not lose. Not again.

Naturally, wood and stone were oblivious to my determination; the wind must always yield to the earth, after all. I dove once more beneath the surface of the leafy canopy, losing momentum as I crashed through branches and brambles with a chorus of protesting wood and startled birds assaulting my ears. I turned my nose—filled with the scent of maple and damp soil—upward just in time to avoid a collision with the forest floor below. My shoes skimmed the haphazard flesh of the mountain as I dodged and wove through the trunks that burst up and through its skin. The burning, wiggling sensation of falling slid down from my back to my toes; I cried out in exhilaration to ease that unbearably delicious pressure.

Soon, too soon, I reached the summit and broke free once more into the sky once. Sure, a mountain was larger than I could ever be, older too. But a mountain was not free like I was, and their reach only extended so high.

I climbed. Higher and higher I flew over the summit, eyes fixed skyward, thunder rumbling in my ears. The endless expanse yawned above me, growing wider as I left the pitiful earth behind. From my view way up here, the mountains were little more than bubbles or clumps in a swath of green paint on a distant floor. Satisfaction tickled my cheeks. Not so impressive now, were they? I took a deep, triumphant breath. This was where I belonged, truly. The realm of birds and angels. The mystery that vexed humankind for millennia. The embrace that sustained all life on Earth, that kept the seas from boiling to dust and gave fuel to the fires of creation. I was the god of this world; wind made flesh.

The horizon, once hidden by wood and stone, was starting to peek into view; the azure arc betrayed the earth’s true form. The world was no behemoth nor infinite plane. It was just a rock. A tiny, insignificant pebble in one small corner of the endless sky, tumbling around lost for all eternity. How I pitied it. How I pitied those people cursed to never release their grip on its skin and experience true power.

What was the point to living down there? What joy was there to be found? What meaning is there to a life shackled in place? I was free. From bond, law, and gravity, I was free. I could go anywhere in this world, see anything, take anything, do anything my heart desired. Why, if the mood struck me, I could even continue on endlessly to the moon and into infinity, and nothing, nothing, would ever hold me down. Not again.

An icy hand wrapped around my lungs and yanked me to a sudden, violent halt. I gasped in surprise as my poor, tortured stomach was sent hurtling up my windpipe, thwarting my attempt to catch my breath. I reached for my throat instinctively, clawing desperately at the invisible fingers clenched tight around it, battling against whatever specter was so determined to keep life-giving air from entering my aching chest and racing brain.

Why was this happening? Had I run afoul of some old god, or crossed some vengeful spirit? Or worse, had I angered the wind itself, prompting it to suddenly abandon me?

After several tense seconds–hours? I could not tell–my fearful, fading brain finally noticed how high I was and the pieces slowly came together. Not only had the ground far below shrunk away into nothing, but the sky had as well; soft, cloudy blue sky gave way to a deep black starscape around me. The wild roar that had followed me on my ascent had faded away without my notice. I had not been abandoned by the wind, I had simply left its domain.

I fell. It was not elegant or intentional enough to be called a dive, but that hardly mattered. I simply invited the earth to draw me back into its welcome embrace. It accepted my submission as it always did, as smug and sure of its own importance as ever. Rage and embarrassment burned in my veins as the oxygen returned. Once I had fallen far enough down for my breathing to stabilize, I halted my descent sharply, denying the earth its final victory over me for as long as I could. My one last act of defiance.

My feet drifted weightlessly in and out of my view of the earth as my tummy finally came to a rest in its cradle, too relieved at finally being stationary to whine about how empty it surely was by now. I would have to make a point to eat something hearty when I got home; skipping dinner after a flight like this was a bad habit of mine. My gaze drifted to the east, where nestled in the endless forest was a little town. A restaurant there served the best poutine this side of Montreal. The woman who ran the place seemed to have taken a liking to me. Whenever I entered the shabby little hole, she would call out to me from behind the counter, her voice colored by cigarettes and laughter. Whenever I received my food, I could always expect to find an extra helping on my plate. I sighed softly. Maybe I would go there tonight. Maybe I would finally get around to introducing myself to her. Then maybe–

I shook such homely thoughts away. No. What business could I possibly have with someone like that? What would we even be able to talk about? It was not so much a matter of common interest, but rather of common ground. She was just some woman, doomed to languish forever on that cursed earth, while I was the wind. What could I possibly have in common with someone like her?

We both need to breathe. The thought came unbidden to the forefront of my brain, still aching from its brief stint of oxygen deprivation. No matter how much I wanted to deny it, for all of my power and freedom, much like the birds and the trees and, yes, humanity, I too was limited by my need to breathe. I was just as stuck to this unimportant, insignificant little pebble as the mountains below.

Again, wind yielded to earth.

It was cold up here. I distracted myself from thoughts of sizzling poutine, warm words, and the crackling fireplace waiting for me down below by imagining everywhere I could go instead. I was not limited by borders or travel expenses, after all. If I was stuck on this rock, I might as well go to where the weather was nice, or where the most exciting things to do were. Why would I ever choose to stick around here? There was nothing here for me anymore.

The muscles of my gut tensed as I prepared to jet off to the south, towards the endless summer the lower latitudes promised. But then the sun, that traitor, chose to break through a particularly thick cloud to bathe the scene below me in golden light. The amorphous green mass separated into trees once more. A nearby river, its surface rippling black glass, erupted into a dazzling, serpentine flame. However, I noted grudgingly that the most impressive of all were the mountains. The light caressed them, casting enormous shadows that flowed through the valleys like water, as if they were painting in abstract with the world as their canvas. My breath caught in my throat, but this time not for a lack of air. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

Fine. I would stay. I would weather the cold and the insufferable mountains, if only for this view. But it would be by my choice; nothing was making me stay, not some overly friendly waitress or unreasonably clingy earth. I was still free. I was still the wind. I did not need any of this, and I refused to need anybody else. There was nothing I needed that I could not provide for myself.

It was only then that I noticed the silence.

The trees were too far below, so there was no rustling. I was higher than any bird dare fly, so there was no song. The wind moved and whipped around me, but with no mountains to oppose it, there was no roar. And since there was no one here beside me, there was no laughter.

A chill started in my belly that slowly climbed up my spine and settled over my heart. For all the power in the world, for the power of the wind itself, there was nothing I could do to fill that silence. I could race and dive through trees all day, surrounded by all the cacophonous protests of the forest, but that would just be noise, sound for its own sake. No. There was only one thing I needed to hear.

My stomach screamed as I aimed my nose—filled with the scent of ozone and sunlight–toward the little town in the distance and shot off towards it as fast as I could. The wind whistled alongside me, cheering me on, and the rustling leaves welcomed me back home as I drew near. I would go to that restaurant and order that poutine, and when she would arrive at my table bearing an assuredly overladen plate, I would introduce myself to her.

Then maybe, just maybe, my name would finally fill that silence.