Tim Melley
Writing
from “Staring into the Sun.”
first published in Threepenny Review
The man pushed quickly through the doors and into the thick outdoor air.
Immediately he thought, Something is wrong.
Everything had taken on a blue metallic shine. It was unnaturally quiet. He felt a sudden panic and headed toward the car, his own hands glowing silver-blue in front him, his legs wobbly and awkward. A single car sped up the expressway ramp in a blur of tail lights, and then, quite suddenly, it became night.
He ran into the middle of the lot, looking back up over the bank. When the corona of the sun came into view, all the life went out of his limbs. He stood frozen, his jaw slack, the parking lot moving beneath him. From the direction of the hills came a faint chorus of screams. Then he was walking backward, feeling behind him for the car with one hand and thinking, I should not look any longer, it is not safe to look any longer.
But he couldn’t help himself. My God, he heard himself say. His voice seemed to come from far away, beyond the crash of waves, beyond the humming of the planets in their neglected career about the sun. His hand had come up over his eyes, but the burning white ring of the sun would not go away. He could not find the car. Shuffling around with a single arm outstretched in front of him, he could not find anything. He thought, Calm down. Why shouldn’t you be dizzy? The earth is spinning like a top, the moon is wheeling around it on an invisible slope of barren space.
But he was unsure where he was and there was nothing to orient anymore, except the indifferent cries of the dazed birds, scrawny heralds of the faltering sun.