It was a shockingly beautiful sunset for an average thursday afternoon

It weaved its way through trees to string up streams in shadows

A nearby kite casting the silhouette of a star saying hi

A shirtless man slowing down his pace to brisk jog, enjoying his scenery

A couple

A young woman kicking sand while she walked, as to not let it get in the eyes of the clumsy man next to her

A young man kicking rocks while he walked, shooing them away before the clumsy woman tripped on one

He always had a puffiness to his eyes, eyes that spoke with silence and kept tears to show he cared, eyebags to show he’s resilliant, hair tangled in some places but overall healthy and strung like acoustics.

She always had scrapes and bruises, and each one whispers and shouts of adventures and stories, scars healed like rings on trees with history and magic lining its existence, making paper you scribe with.

To see what she cannot, and to walk where he does not dare to.

Two mockingjays sat on a perch, knowing they are now able to fly and are almost expected to

It is no longer a rebellion, or to go against the grain.

For amongst the other birdies in the perch, these two have always sung the loudest, about things the others do not understand.

They’ve been up long enough to get the worm, and now that part of life seems second nature.

So it should be expected these two leave the perch to become greater things.

She a gymnast, a remarkably talented young woman traveling along the country to eventually find her way into Olympic trials, with an astounding ability to navigate uneven bars as if she was made to do it.

Him, an academic, a mathematical genius who excels at applying theorum to established principles, founding a free-to-use chess site that uses ai to give players personal insights, that he then uses as research for his ideas about personality through logistics.

Waiting any longer, for both of them, would be insane

A sin

to anyone who isn’t a mockingjay.

The man has a number of colleges for free scholarships, and so does the woman.

But the mockingjay sing from what they hear.

And when she first hopped on the uneven bars, the man was there to walk her through every step in her execution

And when he first told her of his ideas, she was the woman who held him to it, pushed him on even through odds.

These two mockingjays sing so beautifully

For they sing from each other

For each other

Because of each other.

And now, in two weeks the woman will fly first, and there will be no more singing on the perch

She first dared him to step outside his comfort zone

And he dared her to solidify her confidence

So she dared herself to always be the rock he needed,

And he the same for her

They were troublemakers at times, him downloading malware into the phone of a girl picking on her when they were younger, and her sneaking into the office to get his electronics back through the paneling in the roof.

She would watch him playing videos games and call him a dork, and he would make fun of her when she fell

There were checks and balances

A push and pull

Pressure that formed

Diamonds, so beautiful now in the sunset, giving rainbows they now know have ends.

They’ve always dared each other to leave the porch

When it felt so far

But now, how sweet a sin it would be

To sing a song where the two mockingjay

Tell each other

DARE each other

To stay.