Member-only story

What Happens When the World Stops Talking to You

Ryan Frawley
5 min readApr 23, 2022

A quick tour of the Wasteland

Photo by Simon Hurry on Unsplash

“It’s good for the soul,” she said.

As a wave sighed in the way they do, the crystalline brightness of the water’s edge transforming by subtle gradations through aqua to turquoise to ultramarine.

Somewhere, he’d read something or written something about ionized air, the spinning water droplets that carry an invisible charge like the spark that started life in some primordial pool of amino acids and muck.

More woo-woo, probably. Some people believe that water remembers everything it has touched. No wonder the ocean is salty.

“Yeah,” he said. And meant it.

But going to the sea is not the same as going to sea. Ishmael’s sovereign charm against knocking off the hats of strangers. You can mean something without feeling it.

In his chest, his heart lumbered undisturbed. Untouched. Unmoved. The stone the pilgrims circle around, but never fully reach. The monster sleeping in the heart of the labyrinth.

“I knew it! Born in a goddam hotel room, and dying in a hotel room.” — Eugene O’Neill

Anything is prophecy if you’re vague enough

--

--

Ryan Frawley
Ryan Frawley

Written by Ryan Frawley

Novelist. Essayist. Former entomologist. Now a full-time writer exploring travel, art, philosophy, psychology, and science. www.ryanfrawley.com

No responses yet