The Last Song

The Last Song

The leaves made soft, rustling sounds.  I walked slowly through the yard, stopping at every tree to touch the bark, stopping at every stone to sit on it and gaze off into the cloudy sky for a while.
It had been an awful year.  I was the only one left, I was the sole inheritor, I was the ends that fulfilled the twisted, twisted means.
I walked down the stone steps to the dock which was still in the water.  I would have to remove it before the winter set in; snow and ice would destroy its aged supports.
I moved onto the deck, stepped onto the dock and headed out to the end.  I stared over the glassy water, unbroken by movement.  Memories of canoe rides, of motorboats, of waterskiing and tubing flowed back to me.  I could almost hear the happy laughter flowing over the surface of the water.  My thoughts were broken by the mournful cry of a loon.
I stared at the island, the lonely island that inhabited my beloved lake.  There were a few cottages out there as well, but they were long abandoned.  Everyone who had lived there was gone.  Everyone was gone.
My shoes and socks slipped off easily and I rolled my jeans up to my knees.  I stepped into the icy cold water, looked at my reflection.  It was marred by the golden leaves that floated on the water's surface, leaves that had fallen in the last week or so.  Autumn was moving quickly this year.
I moved deeper into the water, ever deeper.  Eventually the water was waist-deep, but I didn't shiver.  The coldness was a part of me, the frigid water was my blood.  The cold breeze was my soul, floating and dancing among the trees which were emptying themselves of their green burden.
It was the last time I would see these trees, the last time I would see this sky.  I took it all in and smiled to myself, though there was nothing really to smile about.  I could see the loon off in the distance, floating serenely on the surface of the water.  I wondered why it hadn’t flown off for warmer weather, and decided that it was probably like me.  I had stayed because this was what I knew, even though everyone else had left. 
A distant rumble cut through the still air, the sounds of a tank discharging its deadly cargo.  The war had caught up with me.  It would invade my paradise whether I wanted it to or not.  I leaned back in the water and let myself float away, staring at the clouds and wondering about things.  Wondering about people, absent people, disappearing people.  And I floated away from it all, floated towards the loon as it sat in the water singing its mournful song.