City in the Sky

Chapter before the holy days ,oh the irony

******

"At the first God made the heaven and the earth.

And the earth was waste and without form; and it was dark on the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God was moving on the face of the waters."

******

Light is luminous and loneliness is lonely. Darkness is gloomy and loneliness is lonely.

These two sentences were the only pieces of knowledge I was able to learn and deduce during my almost infinite loneliness.

But why is that or how can it be changed?

I thought, busying myself with unnecessary effort just to get away from the constant monotony.

They were not the wisest questions, I know, but they were questions I had to ask at some point...

Of course, I asked them toward my father because who else could I turn to for help.

Because if I hadn't asked them I wouldn't have given myself a break about them and only continued to bother with them even if it came to doing more important things...

As someone smarter than me might expect, my father did not react softly to my existential thoughts and questions and after a while began to ignore me.

But that's okay, I was alone before as well as I am alone now, nothing has changed.

Even the light which at first seemed so special and fundamentally different from the darkness has not really been any different except that it only caused me pain.

The brightness hurt and the darkness soothed and calmed, the light warmed and the darkness cooled my skin, and beyond that...nothing, the emptiness inside me still the same...still hasn't gone away...

...

Unfortunately, due to my earlier stupidity and inquisitiveness, my only source of infinite knowledge about the world stopped working for an indefinite period of time, because, after all, you should not ask twice about the same thing and continue to annoy your father, right?

It is not good to ask especially when someone does not answer you, right?

Well if my father's first dismissive comment to the effect of "It would be better if you figure it out yourself" counts as his answer, right?

Although now these existential questions no longer bother me so much. What I find more interesting is how this man I should now call father managed to answer them so quickly, and on top of that, he answered with his back turned to me, right?.

Could it be that he already knew what I was going to say or someone else had asked him similar questions or maybe he thinks so quickly, right?.

More importantly, how can I at least come close to his level of intellect and answer just as quickly?

Well, exactly how?

Also, how did he manage to say something to me when he wasn't moving his lips after all according to what he managed to tell me or what I managed to 'snatch' from him during a break from work was just one sentence about it.

"Every creature has one pair of lips," He told me then in a slightly irritated voice.

So he should not have a mouth on his back, but maybe o is an exception, who knows?

Exactly who knows?

Someone should know that, right?

...

..

.

Watching my father at work was never a boring event.

How long it's been since I woke up I don't know but like never is never.

When I was once again stuck in solitude for the third time, boredom for the first time in my life began to bother me, well maybe not the first, because before that I didn't even know what that feeling was.

So in order to overcome it with something, I decided to talk to my father once again, this time in the hope that maybe I will learn something new and finally his resentment for my mistakes will disappear.

Of course, as every time I got lost again, but who would be able to find the right direction in the endless depths of light, certainly not me.

After many moments of lost wandering, I finally found my destination, that is, I saw my father's back and knew I was in the right place, but when I began to pay attention to the rest of the 'landscape' a magnificent sight appeared before my eyes.

Light and darkness danced a magnificent dance, merging after that dividing and then merging again and so on over and over again and it was all done in the hands of my self-proclaimed father.

With every movement of his hands, the two opposing forces interacted with ease, without any friction, any hesitation, or divergence.

It was as if light and darkness were one and the same entity at the beginning. A truly magnificent display.

[Dance]

Hence, the two opposing colors that complemented each other, danced with each other for the father as if for a conductor giving a command till at the end of the performance the darkness completely evaporated.

"What?" I thought shocked by this phenomenon.

"What has happened?"

I was about to walk closer to the aged man and find the answer to my questions, however, I desisted from doing so when I noticed from a distance that there was a sizable smile on his face as if he was satisfied with the result.

I could not be so cruel and insensitive as to interrupt his joyful moment although since in a good mood, my father would be more likely to answer my doubts.

Meanwhile, when I was so hesitant and wondering what to do or to stand and wait or maybe to approach, I heard strange words coming from his mouth which began to echo throughout the light "darkness from now on will be called night, and light will be called day." and then a silence fell which neither of us broke for several moments

...

..

.

Of course, my father still did not say anything to me he just looked at me, smiled slightly, and then went back to his work.

"I guess I'm not lucky this time either," I thought with a slight smile on my lips.

Though I did not take it personally, my father obviously knows better and is infallible, so it would be better for me if I did not know the answer to the question I wanted to ask him, surely that is the point.

Yes, it will be better for me, it must be so...

"..."

Not getting an answer did not make me return to a state of permanent boredom again, no... exactly the opposite, because when my eyes saw the demonstration of my father's power I decided that from now on I have no intention of leaving him even for a step.

I wanted to be like him, perfect, infallible, flawless, pure perfection.

Although I almost got lost once again because the old man when he finished his latest work with light and darkness decided to change places and I in my infinite stupidity wanted to get thoughtful almost at the 'perfect' moment for this.

Silly and foolish me, as usual.

Fortunately for me, I woke up just in time, since my father was still in range, admittedly on the edge of sight, but still in sight.

That's why I ran towards him as fast as I could to catch up with him.

It was not an easy task, because I, with my body half the size of my father's, not only had to catch up with him, but every step he took counted as two of mine... yet I succeeded, and as soon as I was almost on his back I picked up the perfect pace so that my father would not be able to slip away once again.

I watched, observed, and analyzed his every step, every behavior, and every movement of his muscles and breath. I knew everything he was doing, everything he had done and I tried to anticipate everything he was about to do, I tried to shadow him trying to imitate his every action...unfortunately with poor results because I wasn't smart enough for that.

But I will improve in the future

My analysis and attempts to imitate the man was terminated when the father stopped, although I did not know why, after all, to me, this space looked like any other like a mirror image.

The father looked around and then nodded as if satisfied with his find but immediately after this action he turned towards me as if knowing from the beginning that I was following him.

"Oh, my beloved son I see that you have already grown a little bit more some more and you will be my size...hehe". Laughed the man in my direction.

"Yes...really...I didn't notice any difference."

"Yes, just a few inches but there is a noticeable change, you already look like a decent 10-year-old." Said the older man and then went back to his work again.

"This..." I wanted to say something but stopped when my father once again stopped paying attention to me.

After all, a father must be listened to and one of the first orders he gave me was that I should not speak when not asked.

So I stopped the question, hid it in a corner of my memory, and waited impatiently for the next thrilling conversation between us, even if it would only last a few short moments.

I am patient.

...

When my father stood still and ended our discussion I had a moment to look around.

However, something was different we were at the junction of light and darkness, which was weird to me because I remember well how the darkness disappeared at some point, but as we can see, not everywhere.

It became more orderly and methodical and on top of that much smaller.

Without bothering anymore I began to reflect on what I had seen and what I now recognized knowing that for the time being nothing was going to happen, of course, I had no intention of taking my father out of contemplation. The thinking was the only thing I had left.

Is the light a round disk surrounded on all sides by darkness I asked myself.

No, it is more shaped like a dome of infinite length.

Or maybe it has some other shape...

Maybe...

Further pondering was interrupted by my father's loud voice.

"Observe and you may gain the knowledge you so much desire," the older man said and then went back to work again without giving me the slightest chance to say anything.

So, like a polite and obedient son, I remained silent and watched my father's spectacular feats in silence.

As always.

...

..

.

First, man created the clouds entirely on the side of the light in such a way that in the future we will walk on them and not directly on the disk made of light itself.

Although I don't know why he did this, could it be that some other creatures are supposed to be in this place and they won't be able to walk on the light like the two of us?

Weird...

Then when the clouds occupied all my vision up to the horizon my father began to create something completely different.

Large white stone blocks of probable marble began to appear completely out of thin air, but not as I might have expected singly but in groups.

I guess I still underestimated the power of my father.

Wall after wall emerged, brick after brick until finally what I saw to the right and left were long marble blocks up to the limits of my vision...

Were they created for some specific purpose?

Father when he had finished all the separation of the inside of the city from the outside moved to the only empty space that was centrally located in front of us.

In its place a huge 'silver' gate began to form, ending in a semicircular arch on which were some paintings and drawings.

The whole 'building' was huge and almost impossible to measure for the present me, the top of the wall, as well as the tip of the gate, were barely visible. However, before I had time to look at it longer, my father once again snapped me out of my contemplation.

"Doesn't it look magnificent?" The man asked me cheerfully.

"Yes," I managed to say something quickly and instinctively, but once again he did not even wait for me to say anything further, but calmly walked through the marble gate into the newly formed 'silver' city.

So as usual I followed him and went without thinking for a moment about the possibility of doing otherwise. As usual...like a polite and obedient child as I was.