Tempestuous Affair

Anan, the cloud, flitted across the translucent dome with nimble steps. The sunbeam, proud of her daughter, stroked her hair, braiding it with the choicest of gold threads from her basket.

The debutante stopped at the edge of the amber welkin, her eyes twinkling. “It’s time,” her brother, Hadad, the wind breathed, sweeping her off.

She let the clarinets of songbirds, the staccato of sprinting squirrels, the orchestra of the moss soak her spirit as she waltzed. Hadad squealed as the beat picked up; bouncing up, he began a whirling dance. Anan flung her head back and laughed as they twirled across the width of the sky.

Pearly dewdrops unclasped from her hem and hurtled towards the congregation like ambrosia trickling from the heavens.

Sumer, the rough patch of land—a low-born in the gathering of the blue-bloods, became enchanted with Anan at first glance. The stripling’s intense stare sent her heart aflutter. The dance forgotten, she stood transfixed, lost in a feverish desire.

It irked Hadad.

The magpies scrammed; the butterflies bailed out, and the grasshoppers lammed as Hadad stormed towards Sumer. Sumer’s comrades—the trees clustered around him; however, their groans pierced the firmament as Hadad cracked their boughs and stripped their emerald cloaks. The Primroses, honeysuckles, lavenders quivered under Hadad’s wrath—their wafting aroma marking their last skirmish.

Hadad kicked dust in Sumer’s face, ramming his weight into Sumer’s belly in a brash display of strength.

Anan’s face turned ashen. Tears tumbled down her sullen eyes, gushing down her chin. Before they could dissolve into nothingness, Sumer stretched his rugose hand and gathered the deluge in the puddle of his palm.

The lovers inched closer, bound by unsaid emotion.

“Stay away! She is way above your station,” Hadad thundered before whisking Anan away.

Something inside Sumer cracked; his core shuddered under such savagery.

As the years multiplied, his love for her burgeoned, crackling and bubbling; he feared he would explode. Drawing himself to tremendous heights, Sumer trudged far and wide, his eyes keen to spot her.

“Never saw her again; she sailed to far-off lands,” Hadad wailed, casting a sidelong glance on the heap Sumer had amassed. Hadad hurtled past on subsequent encounters—his head downcast, his eyes averted.

Sumer sat in stony silence for eons. Bleak. Bereft. Then one day, a shadow fell upon him.

“You seem different,” Anan whispered, letting her gaze linger on Sumer’s tanned, towering physique and chiseled sinews. The years had sculpted her beau into a majestic, mighty mountain. Life hadn’t been rosy for her—her locks now had a smoky tint, her robes wilted and worn, her gait listless.

Too overwhelmed for words, Sumer opened his arms, erasing all her self-doubt. Anan dropped into his bosom. Stored tears—a torrent of rain poured unchecked from her eyes, seeping through Sumer’s skin, filling the crevices of his soul.

A blanket of mist closed over as the two impassioned forms melted into one.

***
People do not change; they are merely revealed.
***

Glossary-
People do not change; they are merely revealed- by Anne Enright, Irish women’s fiction writer
Author’s note-
The story came about when I noticed a sea of clouds embracing the mountain’s peak soon before a torrential rainfall on a road trip. Their interlude made me wonder about mountain formation, storms, and wind as the force of nature.
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