messages.role: user
messages.content: Here’s a scene based on a prompt to put my character in a graveyard in the snow: “Liam’s hair, laden with splinters of ice and snow, stuck out from his low-slung cap. His words framed the brittle air as he spoke, the chill unrelenting, ‘I never meant to return here. I know I—I promised I’d never look back. That I’d keep living with you as some memory on the edge of glory, but the world is round, after all, right? I ended up back here anyway.’” He dug his stiffened hands into his jeans, his boot striking a rock as his own murmur haunted him. ‘Can’t stay long, but I still remember what real sunsets looked like, the way the colors just bled for miles. I hope you haven’t seen this magenta sky. I hope you never know it.’ His acuity, melting into the atmosphere, left him with no other thoughts. ‘You rest well, because I know that while I’m standing here talking to the silence, its better that hen facing it alone—’ He laughed in spite of his raw sense of sorrow and turned away from the plot, dusting his knuckles across the slot of cremated ashes in a lingering fist bump. ‘Again, sometime, brother.’ Falling leaves swirled in his mind as he was transported to an autumn gone. ‘But before I go, there’s something I know you’ve heard me singing in my sleep,’ he said in a low tone. ”I came here to leave it with you, along with something of yours I’ve been carrying around. Keeping you close, but—if I lost it, well, you know I couldn’t live with that.” An entire moment passed before Liam fumbled a thin, metal guitar fret from his pocket, a perfect fit between his index finger and thumb. He then unrolled a small piece of paper with a scrawled transcription and wrapped it around the fret. In a swift gesture, he drove it deep into a crack between two bricks in the wall. “The ninth fret was always the richest, no harmonies sounded as perfect without it.” Liam’s faint smile rested on the glimmer of the fret , visible in the crevice beside Mason’s ashes, along with his notes. “I… still… I. Just. You can’t imagine the things… or the times I’ve wanted to say. Mace could have played you that one while I ruined the lyrics. Still have the rest of your rosewood, too, with all of your fingerprints intact. Damned if I had known you’d find me where you did—or when, and yet I wasn’t there to—but hell, you’d never let me take it all on my own shoulders. And I won’t—for you. It’s never gonna be… all right, but—I’ll try to fill a void or two with your songs. You’ll never know this damn world but, its gonna be changed by what you left in me. You walked into darkest corner of my life and you -”
  
  Without raising his eyes from his fist, his memories hid between his fingers, slipping away as he flexed his palm. “I only hope you can’t see me now, with all this all this hell in my eyes, with the shadows. I still remember the light in yours, don’t you worry. 'Cause I keep my promises, and you’re still my oldest friend. First, and the last. Don’t you forget it. Just… don’t ever forget that.”
  
  As Liam turned away, trudging along the icy path that wound through the cemetery, it could have been hours. Days. Months. Or just a few seconds. And it could have been anywhere. Grief only changed shape as he confronted the infused December sky, its witness the only one in sight.
  
  As Liam slid down onto the curb, only a few miles from where he’d last seen Ethan, he glanced up at the approaching figure. “Hey, Lara, I haven’t seen Eth since… maybe three hours ago.” She dropped to his side, grasping his freezing hand in her own. “Liam, it’s cold out here; you’re like ice… wait, did you visit Mas—” Her eyes, filled with a silent understanding, flitted to his and back to his hand as she placed it in his lap. “We’ve both been looking for you, Ethan and I—but I’ll tell him you’re alright, okay?” Liam, his eyes reddened but dried out from the temperature, nodded. “Yeah, I-it’s… Well, you know how long it’s been,” he said, his gaze finding solace somewhere in Lara’s dark hair, averting her gaze. “Yeah, too long. Ethan was worried you’d freeze, so you’d better get back to civilization soon…” she said, offering a smile and a hand on his jacketed shoulder. “Thanks, you’ve both been feeding me way too long as it is—and I’m not the most stable guest.” She laughed as she let her hand slide from his shoulder. “Ethan could out-eat us all, so don’t worry about that. Just take care out here.” And as she walked away, he rested his head against the flesh of his palm, the solitude granting him a moment of clarity—one that he could never share. A melody in the corner of his mind, one that he could hum, roughly, in the back of his dry throat. “Yeah, Mason, you’re everywhere, and nowhere, buddy. How many years has it been and you’ll always be omnipresent. But at least I can live with that.”
  
  —
  
  Liam glared into the darkness, the dust in his eyes unforgiving. The melody sank in a haunting tune through the night. “Cause there’s a place deep inside of me where my dreams have a hold of me…and soon my soul will start to bleed…” Liam’s voice broke off as he raked a tremor through his hair. “I still miss him,” Liam said, uncertain if Ryan could hear his musings.
  
  “Hey, Ry…how long have we been lying in this hell hole?” He asked, the silence torn by Ryan’s answer, “Too long. And yeah, I heard you saying something about ‘if you play Wonderwall, you’ll look like a total tool’ in your sleep, presumably to someone who could play music.”
  
  Ryan smiled, but it never reached his eyes as he added, “He really was a brother to you, huh? And don’t lie because I’ll know…and then I’ll feel bad about giving ya this.” As Liam dismissed a tear at the corner of his eye, he reached over to where Ryan lay, holding a piece of paper.
  
  “Music? You wrote music. What is this, Ry? You never told me you could—” Liam said, his eyes adjusting to the dark with a vulnerability that settled between them. Ryan, smiling with a broadness that reached his eyes, glanced at the paper with a nod. “Ah, I might have written down that song you insist on humming in your damned sleep. I knew it had some meaning, although I don’t know what…least I could do for you, Li’.”
  
  As his irises shone with another sheen of tears, Liam said quietly, “Mason could have played this—while I ruined the lyrics.” Looking up from his boots, Ryan held a somber smile. “If I’d have known you way back then, I’m damned sure I’d have held you both to that.”
  
  As Liam returned the nod, he folded the paper and tucked it into his duffel bag, magenta particles stirring in the air. “I know…He really was a huge chunk of my adolescence just…gone like…well, anyway, the music, when we get our hands on a guitar…”
  
  Ryan shook his head, angling his jaw in his hand. “Nah, we’re in the middle of nowhere, and it’ll never happen. But you got me, brother.” Liam, smiling faintly, replied, “I know. We’ve seen so much that , well , does it make me an asshoke for being happy that Mason died young, untainted by the trauma. I mean he could’ve lived a different life from us -and maybe I’m wrong to hope he’s in a better -“ As Ryan leaned back against the filth-stained wall , his voice contemplated the environment . “It’s not wrong to want him to have a peace we may never find. It’s human. “ As Liam gazed back, conflict in his eyes he’d said “Y’know , there’s something I had back home. And it’s likely  I’ll never see it again, I was carrying a part of it with me for years , but just knowing I kept it safe…I chose to leave it with him and—”. Words eluded Liam in the darkness, as Ryan’s features , found by the moonlight, left him unable to deflect his gaze . “I feel as though, he wasn’t a friend-he wasn’t a comrade-he was a sibling, blood was all we didn’t share . And even then when he needed a transfusion… I was the first to roll up my damned sleeve. And he was an AB neg , and I wasn’t--“  In a hushed tone Ryan asked , “You think not being compatible was somehow a fault -but Li’ , have you heard-well yourself? He could play better than Van Halen I’m guessing’, and you could’ve ruined more than just his lyrics with those pipes . Don’t make me say it again.”
  
  Liam fell silent, and Ryan flopped backwards onto his makeshift bed. “It’s alright Li’. Just get some sleep, and don’t—” It was almost automatic as Liam replied, “Yeah, yeah, don’t ‘thank you.’ I know, I’m welcome, huh? Yeah, goodnight, Ry.”
  
  As Ryan’s muttering hit the wall, Liam’s mind sifted through the catalog of melodies Mason had played. And, amongst the static, a distinct composition of chords found their way back to him. “And if I fall beneath the cracks, if I find you in the darkness, brother, will you still have the heart to see? When I close my eyes and my memories start to fade, when the filter falls away, will you find the strength to stay?”