The God of Storms and His Wife

Chapter 21: Nothing Without You

The rest of yesterday is a blank space in my memories. I remember being in the shower with him but I don't remember getting in our bed. I-
White noise plays in the airwaves as if someone is playing with a radio dial and put it on a blank channel. The noise grows louder until I open my eyes. Indigo sheets snuggle closer to me. The shape of a tall male's body pull the sheets up and tucks the ends of it around its form. "Where is the baby of the sea? Where is the last baby of the sea?" Its distorted voice yells at me.

"I don't know! Stay away from me!" I scream and jump off of my bed. The floor disappears beneath me and I freefall through a white expanse. "Honey, you have nothing to be afraid of. It's me. Your husband." The voice sounded like the highest string on a violin being played roughly. "I knew you were crazy but going to these lengths just to find out about a baby from another time and existence is...another level of ludicrous!"

"You were the last one to see that baby. Remember? I've combed the ocean so thoroughly...down to the sea floors of the seven seas. Don't you want us to start anew? How can we do that when there's a loose end still out there who knows how we got together? What if that child tells our new babies my truth? Do you want our children to be afraid of me? Please Ash..." Red sheets fall on top of me and wrap me up.

"Why are you doing this to me?" I fight against their hold to no avail. He chuckles.

"No. Why are you doing this to me, Asher? As you've said... I've been the best husband I can possibly be. I provide and I protect! Yet, you won't give me this tiny detail so we can continue living in blissful harmony." His voice changes like someone is changing a tv channel when different characters are doing a monologue on different stations.

"When did you pass King Enkimdu's soul to me? I bet it was the night I asked about why you were hiding my true identity from me. Then you sent me with Air to Death's house knowing I'd pass out because the king had so much to tell and show me. You wanted him to uncover the memory of that night when your rage and jealousy murdered him! You're mentally fighting me for his soul back so that you can kill my baby...You're horrible!" He chuckles.

I squeeze my eyes shut and focus on the cliff side that King Enkimdu and leapt off of before. My back faces the edge and my light blue sleeping gown dances in the wind. Hmm... No sheets on me. I look up. Storm clouds are sitting in the sky. The wind blows stronger and cooler the darker the clouds get. "Ash, stop getting in the way. Stop protecting them! Stop holding onto a time long gone." The tall sheet form approaches me and my foot slips. I right the mistake. He ceases the moment and runs at me. At the last minute, I dash to the side. I peer over the cliff. I see him with shock and hopelessness painting his face. Then I jump off the edge. I squeeze my eyes shut and envision him beneath me in tall grass. I open my eyes and see dark clouds dancing amongst green blades. "Asher, I said stay on my side no matter what." He says with the dial turning voice.

"You said against our enemies... Not against myself. Think! How can I know how to love you, if I don't love myself first? I can't choose you over me or we can't ever be." I say as tears drip down my cheeks. The grass blades shoot towards my face and drink up my tears. They grow bigger until they are as tall as a sycamore tree. Some wrap around my husband and squeeze him. The little clouds grow until they are back to their ginormous size. Lightning hits the blades but the moisture on the green blades keeps the targeted burns from catching a fire. The clouds cry pelting, heavy rain and I squeeze my eyes shut. The grass pushes my husband down into the muddy dirt. My husband's hand emerges from the mud and pulls him out of my hold.

He slowly walks toward me as he knocks over grass stalks in his way to me. His eyes are red and his hair turns white. He accelerates and in a blink he is standing before me. I step back and he vanishes briefly. Then appears with his hand sinking into my chest. He grips my heart lightly and points the other hand to the dark clouds above. The heavy rain turns acidic and burns all the grass blades low to the ground. I pull us into the mud to escape the burning sensation. I lightly close my eyes and press myself against him. "I won't give up on us, but I'm not going to let you kill my child. I won't let your destructive ways ruin our love. I won't!" I yell. I throw us into constant dreams.

One minute I am a grapevine wrapping around him. The next minute I have him tangled betwixt my tree roots. Every plant life I jump through and every dream that flies past our vision is another level closer to awakening. Soon we will be out of each other's deep thoughts.

"I can hear you." He says and the dream wheel freezes on a scene that King Enkimdu showed me from his childhood long ago. The lonely cherry tree sitting far away from the other trees of the woods. The boy with the tawny hair sits beneath the tree looking down and a burn hole grows at the center of the memory until only deep blackness like the darkness in space is left. I think back to the memory of my husband murdering the king. My eyes dropping teardrops like a waterfall.

In his monsterous form, my husband leaves the murder scene and walks out to the beach. This time he does not fly away on a cloud. This time I follow him into the ocean. He shifts into a giant squid and I shift into a megalodon. I see a smaller shark swim past one of his tentacles and I panic. One of his giant tentacles catches the baby shark and feeds it to his beak. He gulps it down. "No! Not my baby! Not my baby!" I say. I turn to swim back to the shore. My tailfin splits into two and my upper body begins to shift back into my human form. I jump out of the water and run to the nearest palm tree. I close my eyes and imagine the roots bigger and strong enough to dig further into the dirt. Sobbing and crying with trembling hands, I have the strongest hope I have ever had. I have to break the sky open. I have to grow past the sky. I open my eyes.

All the tropical trees around me shoot past the clouds into deep space. A vine wraps around my waist and shoots me into space. I look back and see the clouds coming together to try to get me back. All while they pull away from Earth's surface. The layers of atmosphere loses their strength as it continues to pull away. Dirt and water float into the black expanse. Boom!

I wake up sitting ontop of my unconscious husband. Green vines dance around us in the cracks of the bathroom tiles. The shower head is broken and squirting water everywhere. I force myself to stand even though my legs feel like jelly. Clear sticky goo coats me and I do not know where it came from. I grab my bath towel and slide the clear film off of me. What happened? An ache pulls at my chest. My baby! My eyes begin to water.