Departure

Twilight. The sun still stood defiantly in it's dinner time position, hanging over the tree line of the great hills but, for one reason or another it seemed to emit an ever dampening amount of light. The trees; they were everywhere. They surrounded the highway making the asphalt appear almost alien as the cars zipped along in swarms. It was only a quarter past five o'clock and yet the late afternoon sky seemed hours older. No green could be seen from the all encompassing trees, no blinding yellow from the tiring sun, and certainly no visible difference in the sky as one would expect as the sun started to intrude upon it. It was all simply gray.
         Vacuum. The atmosphere in his car was stifling and beads of sweat were quickly forming on his head. While the air conditioner was on full power and undoubtedly pouring  a refreshing breeze into the cabin it wasn't felt but, rather came to be wasted on his aching heart, his all to absent mind. It was all simply numb.
         Silence. The radio was blaring; the display showed that the volume was up as far as it could go. The windows shook and the seats thumped unnaturally. The exploding sounds should have hit his ears with the force of a thousand hammers and yet the telltale tickle of bursting eardrums never came. It was all simply quiet.
         His mind began to fall back to an hour before. The world at that time seemed to be as it should be. The sun was vibrant and blinding. The trees were teeming with vitality and glowing with the green of their leaves. The sky was alive and  breathtaking as the sun sank into it setting it ablaze; fire beaming with oranges, greens, and blues. Of course, at that time he wasn't strapped into the driver's seat. At that time he was with the one person who stopped all of this natural beauty from meaning anything because she is it's better in every way. She who had smiled and the world had stopped had dwarfed the sun and all those who lived beneath it. Well, to that end he couldn't really say. He knew however, that she had stopped him cold.
         He snapped out of his dangerous fantasy and came to realize he was still on the same course he had been on when he'd let his mind wander. Only now, he thought, the sky truly was without sunlight  and an eerie white light was being cast on the world below. Even so, everything lacked color. The moon had bloomed beautifully but, the sky seemed to turn away from it in fear of being swallowed. A fear of beauty and perfection which he could empathize with.
         Hope. He noticed in the rear view mirror that what was there too had little color and yet far off in the distance something glowed. He again back to sink back into his fatal fantasy and something swelled within him. He turned the car around and hit the gas hard. Back toward the growing shades he charged, back towards her, and back towards the sun. It would all be simple.