Sun King

A Story by JLe

It's love, babe. It's when your heart belongs to someone else and you know you ain't getting it back.

”Can you hear it?” Words whispered softly, barely audible over the whooshing sound of the wind, a wind making the grass rustle and the leaves on the trees dance. Side by side under the brilliant sun we lay, looking at the sky, touching the soft blades of grass. Where we were, I did not know. What day it was, I did not know. Whether it was morning or evening, I did not know. None of it mattered; I was here and it was now, and there was only us.

“Can you hear it?” I realized then what I had known all along. I didn't know who he was. As I looked at his profile, peering into the sky with those hazel eyes as mysterious as the universe, that delicate nose and those full, almost feminine lips, I couldn’t help but wonder; how did we ever get there? I am no one but myself, babe. His slender fingers were picking at invisible guitar strings. With his eyes shut, he played music only he could hear.

“Can you hear it?” It was true that I didn't know him. Yet, I could not define who I was without him. Who was I? Without him, I was nobody. He, on the other hand, was everybody. Without me, he was the same. I once asked him if he knew what it was that made you feel that way - as if you would be nothing without someone. He didn’t answer me then. It’s love, babe. It’s when your heart belongs to someone else and you know you ain’t getting it back.

“Can you hear it?” His heart belonged to someone else, but I never knew to whom. It was not mine, nor would it ever be; he had told me so on many occasions. We were only lovers, if even. Our relationship had no definition. Make love, not war, sunshine. My heart belonged to him. And I knew I wasn’t getting it back.

“Can you hear it?” he asked me. I stayed quiet. He bared his teeth " stained yellow by cigarettes, coffee and pot " in a smile. I could not hear it, what he was talking about. He reached for the sky, waved his fingers and let the wind caress them. “Can you hear it? It’s in the wind, babe; the music. It’s calling your name.”