Song of Poems [Part 2]

“You look tremendously surprised that she texted you, master,” Helios announces.

“Tremendously? Boy, just say very.” Ishaan grabs his phone eagerly, staring at the message with a pensive focus, rereading it a few times, as if it’ll go away. 

“I don’t see why,” Helios adds. “Of course she texted you, you’re the most tremendously handsome man in existence, dare I say. Scratch that—after me. You’re second.”

Ishaan heaves his gaze away from the phone screen, his stoic exterior non-existence. “You believe she thinks I’m handsome?”

“Is that insecurity I hear?” Helios voice is tinged with dark mischief. “Oh my, my poor master, it’s okay. I may not feel sentiments for myself, but I hear and sense yo—

“If you have nothing necessary to say, shut up,” Ishaan cuts him off.

Helios chortles. “Aye, aye!”

Ishaan rolls his eyes. Hot energy surges in his animation threads, manufactured from far away, in a distant realm of divinity.

In the next moment, an ethereal young woman, who appears to be in her early twenties, manifests into reality.

Short shimmering iridescent green hair gracefully highlights a delicate face possessing mythical charm.

Her curvy, lithe body clads in a flowing pearl silver gown, possessing olive moist skin and rippling translucent blue eyes.

This lovely being is Raziela, a sacred aqua nymph and Ishaan divine companion.

“Take him,” Ishaan commands after offering Raziela a momentary warm smile as a greeting.

The creature nods subtly, her movements fluid as she steps forward and stretches her hand inches before Helios.

The two vanish immediately, their location destination—heavenly realm.

Ishaan proceeds swiftly to the leather couch and sits down. 

Merry Christmas. How are you? He retracts his words, his nerves flaring into a tight knot. How is your day so far? I hop—‘Faith, who uses hope anymore? I hope you had a great day? Stupid.’

You had a great day, right? If not, can I make it better?

Ishaan groans and runs a hand down his face in distress. ‘I have no need for nervousness. I am Ishaan Iniko. She is just a girl. A very burdensome girl apparently, making me struggle over a damn text message.’

He stands abruptly and appears before his desk drawers in an instant.

‘He should have left that fucking book here.’ Ishaan recalls last week when Akira stopped by with a book related to romance; a sort of guide.

The thought that he is looking for such a thing just to send a reply did not cross his mind. He blocks it out, a bit ashamed of his scarcity.

Ishaan clutches a hardwood green book and returns to the couch, furrowing at the title.

Not All Is Lost, You Just Need To Love.

He isn’t sure why Akira left the book or why he even had it, but if it proves useful, he will thank him internally.

However, upon flipping to a page, Ishaan eyes scan the first paragraph for a mere second before he hurls it across the room.

Thud!

The book lands roughly on the metal rug, echoing shortly.

It’s a damn smut book!

‘I should have known.’ Ishaan shakes his head with a weary sigh. ‘You just need to love. Utterly ridiculous. More like, you need to make love. Who reads a guide on sex?’

‘Should I simply call her?’ Ishaan ponders solemnly, his expression thoughtful.

He wants to hear her voice, so after contemplating different possibilities of Kaltain responses, he calls her number.

‘The worst outcome is her not answering. I would then later have to explain why I called her. Or I could lie.’

The very thought of lying brings a cold shudder through Ishaan. His muscles coil to a tense spring. ‘Yeah, hell no. Lies lead to hardship in every relationship, whether it be a friend, girlfriend, father, brother, etc.’

Fixating his gaze above, where the dazzling cosmos shift and morph into threads of starlight, Ishaan places the phone inches before his ear.

She picks up on the fourth ring.

“Hello?” Kaltain's euphonious low voice enters Ishaan's ears with a hint of hesitation.

Relief floods his apprehension features.

“Merry Christmas, sweet darling,” Ishaan quietly clears his throat and speaks with tenderness unknown to himself. “Are you busy?”

“Eh, not really?” Kaltain sounds puzzled, as if at a loss of what to say. “I mean, no.”

“Mind if I steal a few minutes of your time?” Ishaan requests, his hand running along the fur of the teddy bear plushie. He started taking it everywhere with him. ‘Or a few hours…’

“I don’t mind.”

‘This can't be happening.’ Kaltain's mouth is still agape in pure shock; she has to forcibly shut it.

“What are you doing?” Ishaan asks.

“Talking to you apparently.” A dainty sass imbues Kaltain's answer.

Ishaan mouth curls up, amused. “What were you doing before?”

“It’s kinda embarrassing.”

“Do tell.”

“Nothing,” Kaltain responds at the same time Ishaan mumbles her predicted reply. “Nothing.”

Kaltain laughs, taken back, while Ishaan's chest heaves with silent laughter.

In the background Ishaan hears a shuffle and then muffled feet paddling on wood, followed by a click of a door closing.

“Those aren’t your footsteps.” Ishaan can’t control his curiosity. “Speaking of which, why are your steps always so quiet? Whenever I am with you, I sense a weightlessness in your movements.”

“Oh, um, I was trained by my grandma.” Kaltain falls back on her extra cushioned bed, sighing nostalgically. “She was known as one of the first female true Ophanim, infamous for her peaceful fighting. She killed people so silently and quickly that the deceased wouldn’t know they were dead until they crossed over Styx Gates.”

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

“It’s okay,” Kaltain says briskly. “I mean, thank you?”

Suddenly, she chuckles to herself.

Ishaan inclines his head in bewilderment. “What’s funny?”

“Nothing much.” A humorless smile tilts up her mouth. “It’s just that I find it ironic that someone I admired represented something very ill to me.”

Despite asking, Ishaan wasn’t expecting a response and what she says next has him reeling.

“I was thinking of you,” Kaltain admits quietly, moving to sit on the edge of her round bed. “Of what you were doing and like to do. How your winter break was going. If it’s still hot as hell in the west.”

Ishaan's built up tension melts from his body at her words, his heart leaping in a gale of warmth.

“Do you still want to know?” Ishaan places a hand over his heart, unsure of what to make of his own emotions.

“Yes,” Kaltain answers hastily. “If you don’t mind, of course.”

“It’s pretty boring. I’m not confident I can keep you entertained,” Ishaan says, his tone playful.

“Let me be the judge of that.”

“Certainly.”

In a casual, persuasive voice, Ishaan shares his days to Kaltain; from his time in the company of his family where he hung out with distant relatives to dine, morning tea with league members, also sparring with them in space, chatting with his giant friend, and to hours of paperwork.

Kaltain enthusiastically comments here and there.

****

Hours later. 

“I was wondering…” Kaltain nerves flit in anxiety. “If you could teach me swordsmanship?”

Ishaan's heart pounds, a thrill of exhilaration rushing in. “I’ll be a mentor next year,” he replies tersely. “You’ll be able to choose to be under me as a mentee.”

“Oh, okay.” Kaltain sounds disappointed.

Paying extra attention to even her breath, Ishaan's face scrunches in uncertainty. ‘Is she impatient to learn? Or is it something else?’

Ishaan exhales, a mixture of bliss and wonder. “I’m not going anywhere,” he reassures.

Surprise courses through Kaltain, her pulse beating raggedly. “I know, but… most people don’t plan to go, but go anyway.”

Ishaan's chest aches, the troublesome urge to console her ignites; to lighten her mood. He never had to do that for anyone besides himself. Those he did reach a hand to burned anyway.

Ishaan tense mentally, hesitance stirring in his belly. “Wanna hear a poem I was writing?”

“You write poetry?!” Kaltain exclaims in disbelief and fascination.

“In my free time, yes.” Ishaan steady treads over to the desk and pulls open the first drawer.

He picks out a covered book, the hue white, a writhed rose on the back, and flips a hundred pages over.

“This is new information to me,” Kaltain mutters to herself. “I don’t find a flaw in you, Ishaan. It’s infuriating.”

Ishaan's pulse beats a little faster. Shaking his head and straining rationally, he sits in the desk chair. “I wonder if you’ll still think like that when you solve me throughly.”

“No offense, but you sound unsure of yourself. Why?”

“Puzzles wouldn’t be puzzles if they gave you answers.” Without awaiting a response, Ishaan continues, his palms becoming damp with sweat.

“Like flickers of light, the memory of our time fades into a vandalism of love, her absence a beacon of pain, a phantom caress, forged beneath the fabric of age, a sharp and disquiet scream, her sanity lost, gone is the women who assembled my existence, gone is the person who offered her sunlight.”

Ishaan's mellow tone was thick with emotions, wavering slightly.

A pang of tightness begins to form in Kaltain's chest and she wonders why the poem makes her want to cry.

“It’s good,” she says gently. “….it seems special to your soul, if that makes any sense. What’s the poem's name?”

“I haven’t come up with one,” Ishaan shuts the book with care, a fleeting look of misery crossing his face. “I don’t suppose you have an idea, sweet darling?”

“No.” Kaltain hums, draping a soft thin blanket over her shoulders. “I’ll work on my creativity and come back with a few if you still don’t have one.”

“I’ll be waiting,” he tells her, hearing a smile in her voice, one that seems to radiate through time and space.

He imagines her smiling, though he has never seen her smile and is suddenly filled with the desire to witness it.

Ishaan quills the unorthodox desire. At the very least, he heard her laugh, a treasured sound capable of washing away all his hefty stress.

Ishaan never thought it possible to find comfort in another until today. 

It’s agitating to him, knowing that the day this blissfulness will no longer be all light is in the inescapable future.