The Graveyard of Airships
After you left I started playing a lot of video games. I’m sure that comes as no surprise. You always told me I played too much. You told me to go outside and look at the stars. You told me you were leaving because I was “always somewhere else.” Well, I like to think I keep my gaming under control. It’s possible, however, that after you left I briefly developed a problem. I played one game in particular, Final Fantasy Tactics. Some people swear by it. Some say it’s the greatest game of all time. I don’t know about that. All I know is, for a while, it swallowed up my life. I didn’t want to shower or eat regular meals or go to work. All I wanted was to play Final Fantasy Tactics. I got really good. The final battle takes place in the graveyard of airships. I’ve been thinking about that place more and more lately. I think everybody has their own, personal graveyard of airships, buried somewhere deep down in their soul. I think the love you and I shared was the most beautiful airship I’ve ever flown, with sleek golden wings and a balloon of rainbow canvas pumped full of superheated gases. It hurts me now to think about how we fell out of the sky. It hurts to imagine us as one more pile of wreckage littering this place. I always hoped our airship would be the lucky one that just kept rising forever. The one to catch a strong wind blowing over the mountains. The one to carry us safely to lands unknown.
Alex Miller is a writer and graphic designer who lives in Pittsburgh. His fiction has appeared in Fifth Wednesday Journal, Maudlin House and Rabbit Catastrophe Review. His short story collection, How to Write an Emotionally Resonant Werewolf Novel, is slated for publication in July 2019 by Unsolicited Press.