Hūr and the Dancer

Hūr scrambled up the hill, not realizing that it was getting harder to traverse. Not realizing that his knees were bleeding. Not realizing that they were healing faster than they should, not even realizing that there was no pain. The animals looked at him curiously, not having seen one of his kind before. There had been one, but he was a rumor, they had not seen him in a lifetime. Trees spoke about him, but sometimes the trees spoke of memories from their fathers and their fathers fathers, memories that they had carried with them as the wind blew them from one place to another, until they landed on these shores. This was the first real man that many of them had seen. They did not know to fear him, but maybe it was also because they saw the goodness in his eyes. 

The area he was traipsing looked like heaven. Lush green everywhere. Air smelled fresh and cool: rejuvenating. It tasted of oranges, his favorite fruit. That was the fruit his mother would feed him when he rubbed her feet, saying “my little Hūr, my pyaara heaven-sent companion.” The sky was as blue as his right eye, the trees as brown as his left. They shone and sparkled like both. The grass was soft under his bare feet. A few days ago, he had felt the urge to take off his shoes, and after carrying them for a while, he had left them by the big stone pillar, cracked, and ancient-looking.

The animals kept on grazing and looking at him, their curiosity piqued by this strange two legged man. Nightfall came. He set up camp. Setting up camp was taking off his shirt, folding it, putting it under his head. He slept under the stars. Sleep came to him easily. He had not had nightmares in weeks. Since he had been on the run.

A patter woke him up, he almost jerked up, sitting. The stars were shining up above. Everything was quiet, and peaceful. He felt, for the first time, the insignificance of man in the larger scheme of the universe, whatever that may be. The twinkling lights that he could snuff out from his sight with the tip of his pinky were actually many millions of times larger than him. Coming too close to them, he would burn. And yet here all of them were, thinking they were masters of the universe. He sighed. It was quiet, too quiet. He looked around, no animals were around him. He caught movement in the shrubbery, shadows dancing around. He followed, light on his feet. The grass was so soft, he went on his tippy-toes. No sounds could be heard from him. The wind, too was silent, no, there it was. Rushing away from him, rushing towards the shadows. He stopped for a second, to question the intelligence of his decisions, then thought about the police that were after him, the peace in this place. He could only go deeper, right? He tip-toed onwards.

It got much darker before the light came. He almost turned back twice. But the peace and tranquility in the forest gave him strength. He kept moving onwards, a few times, he almost made sounds, as his feet stepped onto sharp rocks. He bit his tongue, and moved on. There was a girl. Dancing. Light coming from her.