Sea. Silence. Solitude. Yet, there was something missing in this serenity that he had longed for.
He had watched the vastness, deeply with empty soulless eyes. It was both liberating and enthralling for some reason. He had traveled his gaze as far as those gloomy gray clouds spanned, up to that straight line at the horizon. Multiple thoughts were gushing to his mind beneath that calm façade to seek refuge and a reply. In any event, he wanted to deny both.
He thought, "Isn't it ironical that a moment will arrive when both will collide and clouds will shed all that they held for so long, purging to achieve that lightness? Lightness that will bring freedom, freedom from this chase." Peace was often fragile and transient and simmered underneath, he had come to understand.
A quick wave had approached under his feet making a clean slate of sand urging him to scribble something on it. He resisted, effort-fully. Brackish wind had bothered him as couple of more waves milled around him and slapped his feet leaving remains of sparkling sand crystals on his toes. He had disliked the clingy nature of wet sand. And dry sand had slipped way too quickly every so often.
Previous betrayal had not fatigued him. Ideally, he should have been battered by now. Strangely, he was not. Part of him was damaged. And life's unpleasant truths were all too clear and corrosive. He wasn't as uniquely strong as he often projected himself to be. He was neither excited nor morose about it. Just the fact he knew more clearly, now. Appearance of peace on the surface seemed uncanny.
Musty heaviness in air had come along with this quietude. He hadn't quite enjoyed this bargain, this moist feeling that had settled heavily on skin of his face and hands. Few strands of hair had decided to stick to his temple. He had raised his finger to brush them aside without breaking his gaze from the horizon, as if all the answers were to be found there. And as if finding difficult answers in life were all that easy.