The Umbrella

The river reflected the city of Northwilde. It fled the mountains and carved dark furrows across the land. It careened through bleak suburbs and crashed into downtown, gathering a scum of polluted refuse and depositing it on slimy banks of discarded fast food wrappers. The squat silhouette of the new bridge jutted out across the water, and the brightest lights in the city had gathered around a twinkling marquee on the shore.

It is an indisputable fact, that heroes and everyday life must never intertwine. However, in every lifetime, unavoidable circumstances conspire to place that fragile world in opposition to the towering ideal of a Venus or Adonis, just as the playwright dashes his doomed cast of players against the rocks of Fate.

The lake was a black mirror, scarred with the shadows of trees, and the moon a bright smudge on its surface. A boy stood on the sand, letting the cool water lap over his bare feet. The air was heavy with the smell of damp earth, and a hush fell upon the world. He looked out, and the dark made the lake an ocean, with the distance to the other shore as unfathomable as its depth.