Still dreaming?

A shout stirs me from sinking stupor.

A shout. But from who? Would it be you? Can it be you?

Is it really from you?

There, I hear it again. It is a shout, a shout undeniably from you. But I don't know if you are shouting for me. I cannot hear what you are shouting for. I'm hoping it is for me, for me to survive and for me to be by your side. It has to be. Am I wrong?

I have to be correct. Don't I?

Beaten and broken, lost and forsaken, I scavenge what remains of me, if any. I hold tremulously and tenderly the little, flimsy hope that she is calling out to me.

No one, but me.

Just a dream?

I am paddling in a boat. Alone. I am trying to paddle to the shore where I see you standing.

You. You are standing at the shore. You're looking at me. No. Even that I cannot be sure. You may be looking at me, or you may be looking at the distant horizons.

I am trying to paddle to the shore. The shore that you are standing on. The tides push me back, punishing me, preventing me from bridging the distance.

I push back even harder, paddling even stronger. Dare I venture to say with a power Hercules would be awestruck by. Every muscle in my body bellows with rage, single-mindedly inching the gap smaller.

I draw closer to the shore but you still seem to not have noticed me. I scream to gain your attention but I am met with nothing.

With each scream met with indifference, the waves seem to get powered up. Every muscle fiber trembles but I do not give up. I do not dare to give up. I do not want to give up.

Slowly,I get overpowered. I am swallowed whole by a last tidal wave. But all this time you do not notice me. Or, perhaps, you have chosen to ignore me.

I lose my boat and my paddle. I am beaten and broken. Every muscle is torn,ripped into pieces.

My heart crumbles and I break down. But all this time you still are preoccupied by something else.

I sink.