Therein lay the fault of which I could not bring myself to say. My heart, it thumped like the rhythm of tears I left at bay. There you stood, just moments before the ground overtook the body I so badly longed to see. Swallowed by what was left of your words, the ones my lips pursed to hold back, I picked it up and flung it into the sea. A tiny flint, calloused and hard, with little bits that caught the light, like the high shining building I once met you on, those years ago. And with the wave of my arm, the picture of drowning, you sank beneath the muddied waves, an intoxicating tempest of inky indigo. Arms in the air, the thin line between waving and drowning, I estimated the seconds until impact, within moments my feet found themselves far above my head. My body stretched out, an acrobat lurching through the waves, greenish-blue skin, one might declare me dead. Hands relaxed and fingers elongated, any pebbles once held, now just tiny hearts sinking in a daze. I let my rock fall long before it left my fingers, for you were nothing but phase.