The lights go out

The neon lights of the city cast the night's sky into starless haze. Like the endless surface of an untouched sand-bath, its artificial calm hides the wonder of eternity from the denizens of the city's walls.

She steps from her own sand-bath, her gorgeous bulk rippling with leathery power, tusks shining in the false blue glow of the city as she reaches for the white gauze-like top that she ties at the back of her neck and lets the hooks that attach to her skirts hang free. Each step carefully takes her to another part of her closet, and she selects the night's outfit for comfort after the long day doing what she does best. Sakiayaka thinks of her husband as she dresses, her own apartment dark apart from the light of the city, and she compares her days without him to being in this city. Full of fake light and forced brightness.

The gardener aches for the days he was here, and their journeys deep enough into the plains and scrub that the glow of the city could fade away and the stars could ignite before them both. Each night she turns off her lights when he is gone, wishing they could look as a society to nature, like they claim to do, and breathe deep enough in the comfort of the dark that they could bring back the stars, so she could remember him while he was away. He's a big shot architect, gone down to Natare to help them rebuild their academy to bring it into the new age.

Her man, her mate is a bright little bird, strutting and preening and trying to make the most of himself, almost as if he has to prove to everyone that he deserves what he has, what he has with her. She takes a drag of a heavy eucalyptus cigar as she leans over her balcony and thinks of him, the dark of her apartment at her back and the too bright glow of the city blinding and before her. He suits down there, with the loud people and the fake smiles - every project they've ever worked together has had him as the face, their mutual voice so she can get down to the work of it all, but lately he's felt compelled to be more and more acceptable, bright and shining when all they need to be is cool and dark and together.

She blows the air out of her lungs, past her tusks, rings of smoke drifting into and catching the light, and tears prick her eyes. Sakiayaka was not made for all the loud and the light he brought her to, this big city far from her family, where he told her they would start theirs - soon. The gardener still loves her architect, still trusts him, but this place is too light, too bright for her to thrive and without him the light holds no meaning but to take away the stars and to scare the forest animals away with their bioluminescent glow. Saki swishes her hips, letting her many heavy skirts sway back and forth, playing between light and dark, her bare bulked arms brushing through the fabric in absent melancholy.

Saki sent him a missive days ago - 'come home' travelling with traders down to the academy city, beckoning him back to the city of song. It will be a couple of days for his missive to return, longer still for him to react and find his way back if he listens to her. The slow pace of the distance between them contrasts with her life before him, where every person she'd ever needed was right there, or was somewhere they were heading to. And now she grows gardens in a city made of and for performance. Every night the city stays awake until it cannot party anymore and then still the glow of its excessive joy continues all the way to dawn.

She blows one more ring of smoke, letting out a sigh once it to disappears, rubbing at the 'stain' under her eyes before turning back for the dark of her apartment and the door. At least for tonight she will have to put on the mask of personability and preen and pluck like her beloved would, though hopefully she will be in bed before the dawn - to dream of the stars above.