aquarium

the water is literal lol also how do you write someone who’s been gone for too long

you’ve always enjoyed the water. there’s something about being under the surface, weightless in watery coolness.

everything looks so… different, from here. wavy neon light strips and scattered fluorescent dots dance over your skin, darting from limb to limb, wavy patterns on your forearms and thighs. you admire their flashing, fleeting existence as the world goes by and by.

all the noise, the chaos that you remember… all of it just… disappears. they can only reach you through thick glass and heavy water, mere blurs in your ears.

but the world… you can still see it, crystal clear. you can see it go round, spinning and spinning and spinning… everyone laid bare in their own skins, doing their own things, like a snippet of a silent film or little clay models in a stop motion movie. you could reach out to them, almost. you could almost feel them, almost feel their warmth.

almost. almost…

…nothing ever reaches you here.

silence.

you reach your hand out, sluggish through the icy water. it lands softly, muffled, on the glass.

oh… hm?

were your hands always this… wrinkled? you hadn’t been in here for long…

oh… was your skin… always this… green? it looked… sickly, tinged a pale mint in the lights…

hm… how were you… how were you even breathing, anyway?

you gaze up, at the shiny, clear bubbles rising up to the top, fighting desperately with their form wobbling and moulding against the chilly water. they looked so pretty, shining every colour of the rainbow… a rainbow… a rain-bow?…

silence.

you float for a while, and then sigh, bubbling the water some more.

you’ve… you’ve isolated yourself… for too long.

you gaze into your faint reflection on the thick glass, pointed fingers tracing what once was.

you’ve lost the… colour… in your eyes. your eyelids barely function, cloudy white irises accustomed to the sting of the icy water. they… pierce you, with their blank stare.

your fingers looked too… sharp, skin having shrunken around your bones. they looked… long. too long.

your skin looked… shiny. an uneven crystalline sheen over you, glittering under the light. and at some angles, the light flares right into your eyes-

ack!

you turn your pained eyes away from yourself.

light… hurts.

you… don’t remember that happening…

a few more bubbles rise to the top as you sit.

you once saw dark rooms… sad eyes… hm, a distant figure reaching out… and then… icy cold…?

you don’t… recognize much, anymore.

a picture you held… gold eyes, black hair, a smile… was that you? … or, wait, no… black eyes, tanned skin… um. green eyes… blue…?

…

you don’t recognize yourself anymore.

the thought comes out as a slight warbling tune, twisted by the water.

people don’t recognize you either — you’re suddenly faced with their marvelling and staring and pointing and flashing their bright, too bright, lights…

with a hiss, you disappear back into the depths.