Ep. 75- Of Shape and Beauty

ext. seawood forest night cont.

The fast fading Alice in the arms of the frantic fallen star, Alchiba. She sets Alice down and picks up the clay pitcher, which she deftly tips toward Alice’s mouth. A clear, shimmering liquid which twinkles like the doting stars of night trickles from the pitcher unto Alice’s barely parted lips. The careful stream quickly cascades to a small tidal wave as Chiba’s unsteady hands tip the pitcher too forward before she quickly pulls it back.

ALCHIBA
Sorry, sorry, that was way too much, please don’t drown-

Alice springs to her feet, her arms spread to the sky. She lets out a howl fit for a wolf, her eyes erupting with purpling arcane energy.

ALCHIBA
Way…too…much.

There’s a beauty in this moment, however, which Alchiba cannot look away from- the Alice, wire thin and frail, cheeks flushed with the dueling natures of exhaustion and inebriation, her work shirt and slacks faithfully clinging to her despite the strange day’s abuses, eyes a wicked purple black, bathed in the yellow-blue light of the moon’s cradling rays which light each individual red-pecked freckle beneath her eyes like a blacklight…too many details, for so long viewed from afar now assault the poor star with such a close quarters realness that she can only watch, like a fearfully shy fan in the midst of celebrity.

To this point, little has been said about the looks or bodies of our characters, let alone Alice. I suppose, to this point, it was avoided- or rather, not considered terribly relevant to the story, although you might glean a few details here and there. The Pale Horse, for instance, has hair of silver and a long, drawn face and jaw which comes to a point- quite equine, really, in the most noble sense. The Queen of Swords is a woman of athletic elegance whose airs give not a sense of royalty, but of a weary campaigner. Her pepper brown hair pairs well with the well defined creases and angles of her own face and body, a true woman of stone. Of the Knight of Cups, there can be little doubt- his rickety, tin can armor gives way to a face that can best be described as a a cuckoo clock given breath, earthy, comfortable, and exaggerated. His body is hardly a picture of health, quite the opposite- and yet one senses a deep welled vigor that lends confidence that the shaky, aged exterior of his mortal shell is strangely unassailable, like the old farm truck that continues to run despite the farmer’s best attempts.

Alice is, for lack of a better phrasing- one who appears weak- both in body and spirit. Hers is a body that does not lend you confidence in either its longevity or its reliability. At a distance, one might describe her as youthful, or even, to use the dated and foolish terming- waiflike. But when one closes the distance, it becomes readily apparent that the body is afflicted with the countless woes of one who lives habitually- caffeine, alcohol, nicotine, thc, various pharmaceuticals all frequent the same dance halls within her organs, and the ravages of the clean up efforts can be seen on close examination- a gray hair here, the beginning of a crow’s foot there, sunken eye pockets that persist a bit longer each day, a strange pock or scar or stretch mark. In shape- she is thin- too thin, a thin that bucks the subjective “tastefulness” of so-called conventional beauty and instead appears with an unnatural sharpness in her elbows and her shoulder blades. Her hair has to this point been described as damp straw, and the description remains apt. Her face, too, has born some description- the small freckles and stubborn burst capillaries leaving behind small ranges of red pecks across her upper cheeks being the chief memorable feature, although her hazy, gray-blue eyes, the whites ever a tinge of pink, much to Alice’s consternation also bear note.

Of course, it is the soul that completes the portrait. There is a reason the devils and angels of the next world are said to prod at the souls of the long passed- there is an exacting, a refining they hope to achieve- ta glimpse of the rare extraordinary spark which gives us the ear of the gods.

But to this point, the only attribute of Alice’s soul that would surprise these same otherworldly stewards would be how deeply buried and obscured Alice’s own spark is. In spirit, Alice is an excavation project- and while many have tried their hand at investing in her, perhaps keenly sensing the vast reward to be uncovered, like a buried pirate treasure of old- just as many have promptly given up in search of less taxing projects, leaving poor Alice with no shortage of gear and displaced soil (not to mention an ever growing pile of tortured metaphors), but little else to show for the years of shuffled effort. As such, the first inspiration of the soul when one meets Alice is likely that of fascination- then pity- but then, inevitably, exhaustion.

And despite these harsh assessments, it remains true that Alice’s nature is not such that should be held against her, for the worst sins Alice was guilty of at any given time were carelessness and selfishness- which is to say, she suffers from the side effects of living a mortal life, and her habits followed suit.

Like the weightlifter who fails to let the muscles properly mend between workouts, Alice is the life liver who fails to let her body mend properly from the act of living. She imagines that any inspection of her that comes closer than six feet reveals her otherwise aloof, youthful appearance for what it is- an optical illusion that screams “don’t tell them how I live” to any who get too close. As a rule, Alice refuses any and all photographs.

Now, all this is not to say Alice is not beautiful, because even a house which burns from the inside can find a certain splendor before the last key timbers give way. And in this moment, as Alchiba bears witness to the first exposed embers of Alice’s smoldering soul, she can see little else but beauty in the creature she’s just saved- and will save time and time again, until her Pitcher of Fate runs its course and her time on this earth- and in this universe- expires.

And readers, whether Alice knows it or not- even now, in the fleeting moments of this adventure’s birth- there is a great deal about Alice worthy of being called beautiful. And unlike many others who would try and fail, Alchiba is the one person who will never give up on her dearest Alice. Because Alchiba, from the very start and up until the very end, will always and forever believe Alice is the most beautiful person she will ever meet.

…even as, in this moondripped moment, alone with her Alice, Alchiba knows- as she has always known- that this is also the woman she will never be able to share a forever with, because this is the woman she is destined to die for.