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Catching Sunsets
I cup the sun between my palms…
The glow is warm and mine, the culmination of a hundred mornings where I tried to catch sunlight in my bare hands. Some hunger after the moon by nightfall, but I have always been in love with the way the sun makes my milk-white skin darken by the day. For my sisters, there are only burns; for me, the sun favors me like no other human ever has.
I’d heard the tales of the Great Wolf who would capture the sun in his jaws and devour it whole. While we sat in the coldest traps of the Winterking’s doing, Gramma would have us huddle close and whisper of the coming summer. Behind my lids, I always imagined a moment when I would stand fearless and bold underneath a cloudless sky. It was easier to imagine back then, when death was something that happened to other families in the tundra.
But with the sun comes the melting. Our ice sculptures collapse in on themselves, but I welcome the heat with the freedom it brings. My sisters grow wary when it comes to removing clothing and basking under summer’s touch. I have no such qualms. I run in a body strewn with cloth that only just protects my decency.
I cup the sun between my palms as it banks across the horizon. For a moment, my fingertips are fire. But by the next, my hands are back to normal. Human, safe, penetrable.
When my sisters call, I do not answer. I don’t play their childish games of hearthwives fawning over husbands. I would rather dance all night with the Winterking till my feet bled. Maybe his ice-cold kiss would drain the love of the sun from my limbs.
Still, I hold the light. I feel it. And I am invincible.
