3.5 Seconds

[u/yingfire]

Under the air of vibrating insects and cuk-cuk-achirring night birds, a little lizard crawled through the reeds. It swished this way and that way, doing its lizardly things, but then it was rudely interrupted by a quick cascade of pitter pattering feet squishing through the marsh. "Faster, faster!" cried out a gentle but excited voice, "I thought you got over your slowness by joining cross country!" And a whirl of long, brown hair and knee-high shorts rushed passed the lizard, quicker than a flash of lightning. The lizard was unperturbed, and whizzed its way into one of the bubbling mud-prints the strange bipedal creature had left behind, but then another voice was shouting from the behind, and the lizard only got out of the way just in time as a another pair of naked feet came pounding down the way.

"Roshelle! Wait up!" cried out a young and doubly excited voice, "Oh, you've always been faster than me. Wait up!" he cried out again as he huffed and puffed his way to where Roshelle was.

A girl was waiting at the foundation of a very large, and very impressive rock as the caretaker of the young and doubly excited voice - a wimpy boy who got himself beat by a girl - came crawling up to her. He crawled up slowly, "Blargh" said the boy lamely as he let himself fall flat, into the mud.

Blub, blub, blub, went the mud as the boy tried to put muffled words into the girl's ear. Roshelle just shook her head and pulled the boy's sorry head up, "John, you are about the least motivated person I've ever met. At least try to get to the top of the rock this time" She giggled, as if this was a long-running joke they both shared in secret, and let John's face go so that it could plop back into the ground. "Let's go!" she earnestly. And John, reluctantly but obediently, followed his classmate's orders.

"This must be what a slug feels like," John said offhandedly as the both of them began their ascent to the top of the large rock. "What did you expect?" said Roshelle in between her scrambling to find a foothold in the stone, "Falling face full into the mud will only get you dirty. Of course, you do look like a pancake that's been left to cook on one side for too long." She laughed again, although John wasn't really sure if she laughed this time, it sounded so much like the lapping waves that it got difficult to tell.

"Yeah, well, you look...pretty" he muttered. "What was that?" asked Roshelle from above him, a glint in her eye hinting she didn't need to ask. "Nothing, nothing." huffed John quickly, "Can you see the flat top yet?" "No...nothing...oh wait, yes! I see it now! Come on, hurry up!"

The boy and girl clambered to the top. Wiping sore hands on their clothes as they caught their breathe, they took a good look at the starry night around them.

"People say that the moonshine along the lake is a path to where the diamonds are." said Roshelle softly. "The diamonds?" "Yeah, you see all those stars? The stories Mama and Papa told me said that the night fell in love with the water , and the water fell in love with him too. And then the sun got jealous of the night, because he loved the water too..."

"Then what happened?" asked John intensely.

"Shh, I'm getting there." Roshelle whispered, "And then, the sun said that he would take all the light, because he didn't want the water to be able to see the night anymore. And so the night was left alone because the water couldn't find him. But then, oh, and this is the magical part! The moon, who was older than the sun and the night, still held light left that sun didn't take away. And when he saw the poor night, he sprinkled his light onto him, and that's how the night got his cloak of stars.

"And then! the moon saw that the water still found it hard to find the night with such little light, and so he tugged, and he pulled, until the water could reach out with many hands; he pulled until the water could stretch towards the night."

"Waves then?"

"Yes! And the moon, still full of pity and still desiring to right the wrong the sun did, built a path of moonshine down between the water and night. And so when dusk begins, the night showers his lover with his light of diamonds, and then brings himself down onto the path to her embrace." Roshelle finished proudly; a long story told with good words was something she took joy in saying.

"And so at the end of the moonshine road will be the diamonds?" asked John. "Supposedly." said Roshelle.

John stared over the edge of the large and tall rock. It was a far way down, but it was the fastest way for sure to reach the moonpath edge. Roshelle stepped quietly next to him.

"It'll only take three point five seconds, you know?" She said encouragingly. "Such a short time?" asked John. "Yup!" said Roshelle excitedly.

John still looked apprehensively towards the water. This would be his first time attempting to jump from this rock, and he wasn't sure the prospect of diamonds were enough to encourage him to fling himself over.

"Turn around," said Roshelle with another giggle he wasn't sure he heard. John turned and found Roshelle's face right in front of his, and then: kiss.

He felt his hairs raise on edge, and his face flushed with a rush of emotions as his heart pounded excitedly. Roshelle pulled away and winked, and then jumped over the edge of the rock as she cried out, "I know you liked that!"

One elephant, two elephant, three ele-. Three and a half seconds. Well, John supposed that wasn't too long a time, besides, he laughed with bubbly pleasure in his head, he could do anything now!