A Hint Of Reality

A Story by Ben Taylor

A metaphor.

I glance up through the bare and leafless branches, searching for nothing more than a glimpse of melancholy blue sky behind this blanket of cloud--but instead I see something more. A flicker, a glint, of gold coruscates from one branch to another many feet above my upturned gaze. My feet cease their wandering as I stop, intrigued.

I place my hand, palm open, on the trunk of the naked birch, wondering. After many long minutes, nothing occurs. After glancing around, I hoist myself up onto a lower branch and continue the climb until I have reached, roughly, the area in the claw-like canopy in which the anomaly appeared. A shiver of expectation crawls along my spine, but still, the air around me remains unaffected and frigid.

I sit in these upper boughs, papery and shedding, for over an hour, feeling stymied. My inquisition has reached an impasse--and after a time, I will no doubt question the validity of my memory. There is, I suppose, nothing to keep me from forgetting the event and simply continuing on my current course towards nothing.

It felt like something real, though. It's a shame I will never experience it again. If it had been something of actual consequence I'm sure it would have been more assertive in its appearance, more willing to appear to me again to confirm its own reality.

Right?