I know he tried. He's always honest in that regard, never failing to give more than anyone has a right to ask. His eyes are as deep as time itself and almost as old. Looking into them, I can see the faintest glimmering of hope trying to cover an ocean of sadness and loss. Does anyone really know just how much he has lost over the years? Centuries? Millennia? He always brushes it off, modest to a fault.
I first saw those eyes at the main corner. It was a day of no particular significance to me at the time, but I can only imagine what might have prompted him to drop by. I didn't know then, didn't appreciate the gravity of his passing. I imagine few ever do, and he seems to prefer it that way. The only reason I can even recall it at all was a tingle I felt build in my neck and run all the way to my tail as he walked past.
Virtually anyone can be interpreted as a fool. Just a look in the right place, a moment's hesitation to respond, a second's loss of coordination, assembled and edited in the mind into a cinema of blunders. Oh, to be certain, some are easier than others, but it's not very difficult to pick out any random person and demonstrate blithering idiocy with a few well-timed incidents. After that small seed is planted, an avalanche builds and grows in the minds of those around, then in their hearts. Vines and tendrils that seem so funny and cute, yet flow with a bitter sap of venom even in the most kind-hearted of souls. Anything thereafter builds upon the image, never subtracting. Confirmation bias is a cruel thing. The tingle, of course, was no exception, and I suppressed it of habit.
Perhaps that was why he left me. I failed the test even in the first instant. Poised upon the precipice of the fantastic, I could only consider the impressions of others and so I ignored it. In a sea of countless trillions or more, why would I be the special one? For every winner, there must be many losers, and I've long ago made my peace with that. I don't know what I'd have seen if I turned. I never had the courage to ask. Perhaps nothing, but then... I can only wonder. I only had the first glimmering in that instant that I looked into his eyes, the instincts that reach across the ages marshaling every bit of subconscious to push through into waking thought a simple message, a warning too basic for words.
Once would be enough for anyone. To simply know that greatness had passed beside. The wash of second-hand splendor radiates from the truly magnificent, whether it warms or freezes the hearts of those it touches. Most people understand the importance, if only dimly, of being able to point out where they were when something important happened. For some, those recollections are mere curiosities, viewed dispassionately as a commentary of the passing of time. Others take a kind of shared solace or rapture in the collective experiences, as if they could claim a piece of the glory for having been there. In a way, that's true, I suppose. But for someone whose greatest aspiration is merely to be seen rather than noticed... I collect those moments. I treasure the memories, savoring playing them over and over in my mind. My collection isn't very large, but I am secretly proud of the moments stored there, safely locked away in my head. No one can take them from me. And though he never even saw me at all, the stature of his grandeur was such that it was one of the greatest moments of my life, even though I did not know it at the time.
Once would be enough for anyone. Once should have been enough. But fate wasn't through with me. The second time I met him was more direct. He looked at me.
He. Looked. At. Me.
Not as a close friend would look with concern, nor a lover with passion. Not as a disinterested observer nor even a calculating samaritan. He looked at me, eyes deeper than eternity, and saw me. All my life, I've been noticed. A mistake is always noticed. It cements the illusion of stupidity others need to remain comfortable in their superiority. Some people spend their whole lives trying to be noticed, only to find the cruel truth: being noticed is a purely selfish thing. It is like the fish willingly grabbing the hook with delusions of a ride to the clouds. The reality doesn't set in until the damage is long done. No, he didn't notice me. He /saw/ me.
Seeing is a gift I don't possess. Even if my vision were perfect, I don't think I would be able to see others. I know they don't see me. I often wonder what it would be like, to push past the colors and shapes, past all the outer trappings and social flotsam, and truly see another person. Not for what I imagine or want them to be, but for exactly and precisely who and what they are. To take in their existence and understand their worth in an instant, capturing their essence forever. In that perfect moment of clarity, they would be immortal.
That is the moment I cherish above all others, the memory I set upon the pedestal in the gallery of my mind. It is the centerpiece in the museum of my life, the instant I was seen. I know beyond all doubt that as those pools of eternity swept over me, for just a split second I was the most important thing in the universe, just in existing. Of all creation, he was there, looking at me.
And he saw I was worth saving.
We ran like hell. I didn't need to be told twice. Explanations flowed from him as water from a river. Some of them I understood, other parts were lost in the terror of the moment or the sheer infectious giddiness that poured into me. I hadn't realized as fully what had happened then, but it was beginning to dawn on me like the creeping rays of light from the rising sun, spilling onto the landscape. I didn't ask if I should fly. I knew that abandoning him would be an unforgivable sin.
He spoke of angels and demons, and tried to impress upon me the importance of keeping them in sight. As if I didn't know! He told me it would be alright if only we could reach his home. I never doubted it. The blue door, paint glimmering in the morning sun, stayed open for only the briefest of instants. I locked my gaze upon it, tried to see it.
Seeing is a gift I don't possess, but damn if I didn't catch a glimpse of what it would be like. That door had been places. It's strange to think of a door moving about more than just the swing of the hinge. A door is usually one of the most confined existences imaginable, practically a metaphor for repetition and use. And yet, I knew that this particular door was so much more. Shield, portal, hope, salvation, harbinger, destruction, dismay... If it were possible, I think I could have stood transfixed in time, forever running those ten hoofbeats, basking in the enormity of the door. Sometimes I think that time is something I can sense, in more than simply something we deduce must occur between events. It was like the time I was in the high-flyer contest. I soared higher and higher, and then as I could go no further, I turned and looked down. The world yawned before me, and for the first time I knew what depth was. People can be raptured by the deeps, and in that door I saw an incomprehensible depth of time. It was probably there at the beginning, and I wouldn't be surprised if it's there at the end too.
I'm still not sure how I noticed the creature slip past. It shouldn't have been possible. He tells me I'm the only person to ever have seen one, that I must have imagined it, that it would have violated physics. He didn't understand. For all his gifts, he couldn't understand that I didn't see it. What must it be like to see and not know? Is it so fundamental to his nature that he has no words, no conception of what he possesses? Is it a defense mechanism that allows him to keep some shred of self from being washed away in the maelstrom of others?
It wasn't easy to remove the creature. It physically left easily enough, but even noticing it is enough to court disaster. How can knowledge be dangerous? Is it truly that we fear understanding locked away in the mind? Or is it the manifestation of the knowledge that really chills the blood? The terror of knowing that those intangible ideas could somehow emerge though the hooves of another and take form in the world?
It's here that my memory gets fuzzy. I know there was a reason I couldn't keep the memories. He explained it all to me, all very rational and sensible in that way people affect when they know they must inflict pain but don't relish it. There are words for it, but I don't understand them. I don't know if that's something he did, or if the concepts are just beyond me. It's like a hole in the space of my mind, a terrifying void that I can only sense by the missing of a step when I cross where it should not be. I've tried to map it, but it defies any understanding. I cannot know what was taken, even in the abstract, even in the meta. Had he not explained it, perhaps I would never have even realized it was there.
The next clear memory I have was the last time I met him. I don't know how long I had been safely tucked into bed, how long he had been gone. I sincerely doubt that it was as long for me as it was for him, even if I had been conscious. He saw me once more. I knew he would, he cannot choose not to see people. It's what makes him who he is. If he ever stopped seeing, I know in my heart the world would end.
He didn't bother explaining why I couldn't come. He didn't have to. The door alone was enough to show me that I didn't belong there, any more than a butterfly belongs on the dash of a car. I think he actually enjoys such contrasts, but I could tell there was more he couldn't bear to say. I had a dim sense that the hole was there even then, and I know it was the real reason. Some things simply weren't meant to be. But there was a sparkle of merriment as he smiled at my awakening that told me I was his triumph. That smile is the third masterwork of my collection. In that moment, I was a glint, a small reflection of his victory, and I know he saw it. I can only gauge the danger I ever faced from his expression, but even that is enough to fill me with retrospective dread. It's worse when you don't know the ending of the story, even if you know, logically, it had to work out. I just count my blessings for my precious moments.
Now and in some nebulous 'then', I know he travels amongst the unfathomable endlessness. And I know someone will be journeying with him, as was meant to be. Sometimes, in the darkest part of the nights, when I cannot lie even to myself, I'll admit that I wish I could have been that someone. But serenity is something that must be cultivated, and wishing without recourse is a pathway to a bitterness I never want. Besides, how can I feel shortchanged when I have such vivid memories of the perfect moments he leaves in his wake?
I know I was worth it to him. I know he tried. I saw it in his eyes, and that's all that matters.