Work Text:
I have bid goodbye to you a hundred times.
I rarely bring myself to recall the exact number anymore – it’s just unnecessary pain. But I do remember each and every one of you .
Every time is subtly different. Your appearance, your gender, the upbringing you received in your home, the language of the words that you speak. Every time you appear before me, you are changed, and every time I love you as much as the last.
The only constant is the red of your eyes, reflecting the fire burning within.
I love every name you are given, and they all whisper your true name to me.
When the time comes for us to part, I turn my eyes to the heavens and observe your star. I travel following its course, and wherever it falls, I make my home.
On the first day, I plant a peach tree. Then, I begin to build my home next to it.
I care for the tree as if my own life depended on it, tending to it every day and watching it prosper.
Sometimes, the sapling withers after mere days, or a couple years. On those occasions, I weep until the sun goes down and it is time to search for that star once more.
When my tree has grown for four years, it starts to bear fruit. By this time, my house is complete and a lush garden has sprouted around the tree. I take joy in watching the blossoms grow into round, soft peaches, their taste sweet and heady on my tongue as I bite into one in the shade of the tree’s plentiful branches.
I wait for twelve more years for the final harvest my tree offers me, before I may see you again. I take the most beautiful peach I can find, seek you out, and offer you the fruit. Sometimes you accept the offering with a smile, while other times you regard me with great suspicion, but never once have you rejected me in your many, many lifetimes.
Perhaps there is something in you, some hidden, secret part, that knows me like I know you, even if you cannot remember.
When your teeth pierce the skin of the peach and its juice wets your tongue, my eyes grow dewy with the joy of our reunion as I call you by your true name. With the second bite, you begin to remember lifetimes beyond your current body, memories that you never knew were yours. With the seventh bite, I am tempted to steal the fruit from you and throw it to the ground, to spare you the sorrow that I already carry.
But you must know everything. The transgression that brought us so much pain, the judgement that robbed you of your eternal life and cursed your star to fall upon this earth again and again.
When your lips join mine, I taste the bitter truth on your tongue among the sweetness of the peach.
Art by blazing
You join me in our home that day. I trail behind you as you walk from room to room, pointing out things that stand out to you.
“This is different,” you say.
“This is the same as before,” you say.
When we lie in our bed – always, always too large for one – I study you in much the same way.
This is different. This is the same.
Sometimes I wonder if I have the right to steal you for myself, lifetime after lifetime. Every time you taste the peach I offer, the person who you used to be dies in front of my eyes. Your dreams, your plans, your unique outlook on life – it all changes when the weight of millennia is laid on your shoulders. Every time, I kill whoever you were before I offered you the fruit of knowledge as surely as if my hand held a knife instead.
And yet, every time our shared time begins to grow scarce, you kiss my face and whisper to me.
“Find me again in the next life.”
I leave everything behind when I begin my journey anew. I have no use for material wealth, and keepsakes are a heavy burden to carry for an eternity. Hands empty and heart full, I leave the house with blessings, hoping that whoever claims it will live a long and happy life.