Lauren--Part One

Splog # 2

One

 

   Lauren was watching a sunset unlike any that she could remember seeing previously. The sky above her was blue with layers of clouds slowly drifting across it. But directly across from where she stood on the side of a small hill, the sun was slowly approaching the horizon. There were bands of clouds in that direction that didn't seem to be moving. But they were undergoing changes of color that were startling. From a rosy pink, a section of sky would start to deepen to a bright orange and then fade to a dusky rose. Then a part of the sky that was blue would slowly bleed through a cloud and a lilac color would begin to emerge which would gradually deepen to a warm purple.

 

    Lauren felt as if the rhythms of color pulsing across the sky were entering her head through her eyes and then slowly seeping down through her body. She had been standing still for a longer time than she had ever thought possible. True, five minutes seemed an eternity to a ten-year-old who never stood still if she could help it. But this was different. The colors were doing something to her. She could feel all the bubbling energy that usually made her such an exuberant person - someone who would run and skip rather than walk - someone who would sing and chant rather than talk - someone whose parents often suggested to her the novelty of standing still, even if only for a moment. Well, wait until she told them she had stood and experienced a sunset for a whole hour. It had been an hour, hadn't it? ...Well, maybe only half an hour....Fifteen minutes?

 

    Thoughts of her parents and their reaction to her astounding self-control faded away as she felt the hues of the sky draining into her. She became aware that the colors were starting to inform everything around her. The gentle breeze that caressed her bare arms and legs; she couldn't see it but it felt yellow - actually yellowish green. And the sound of the evening insects that were commencing their nightly chorus - why, they sounded an orange-brown. Burnt Sienna? (Was that a Crayola color that she had unconsciously noted while filling in the pages of her latest coloring book?) Now she noticed a warm sensation in her mouth. She hadn't eaten since lunch; she was even a little hungry. But she could taste something...It was a color - it had to be! The taste was indescribable - but she knew by instinct that it was purple - no, maybe it was violet. Was there a difference? Of course there was. She could taste it. But maybe it wasn't important which of the shades it was. Even the air around her seemed to be glowing. The colors were overwhelming her senses so that she seemed to be losing any distinction between herself and the outside world.

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[TLK]

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