Granite Posture

His joints ached. So much, that he actually couldn't tell. They had ached for so long, he now just assumed they did. He had forgotten what it felt like to move. To breath. To live. It had been so long. He tried at first to keep track, counting the rising suns and setting moons, but after the first couple hundred, his mind began to get fuzzy. Not because he was having difficulty counting or remember the days, but because he was lost within his mind everyday, all day.

He hadn't been that old when he was punished. Many would even consider him innocent.

It was long ago, before the streets were paved black. Before the people below him rode around in metal beasts and spoke to little boxes that were pressed against their ears. Men were still dreaming. Hoping to fly with the birds, swim deep below the waves with the fish, discover a new land at the edge of the world. He was still just a kid.

It was a slightly overcast day, much like most of the days in Paris, and he was wandering around the market, watching the bakers break their freshly cooked breads, the artists painting in broad strokes, and the shop owners' heckling onlookers. Thats when he bumped into her - a shriveled old husk of a woman. Her hair was long a wispy, hanging in front of her face - hiding the few gnarled teeth that still stuck in her gums. Her hands were twisted knots of knuckles, eyes almost to the point of blind. He hadn't noticed immediately, but she had dropped a jar of liquid that had shattered upon the cobble stone.

She looked down at the spilled contents and came right back to him, glaring into his eyes, through him, into his soul. She began murmuring something, low and inaudible. Some sort of chant. When she reach the end, she repeated it, but a little louder. Again and again, she continued through the verses. He was unaware of what she was saying - it was some language he had never encountered - but he had heard of a gypsy language only they knew. As she got louder, she began to shake, her eyes growing darker and darker with every repetition.

Quick as lightning, she reached out for him, her gnarled hand barely missing his face. At that moment he ran. As quickly as he could. He felt as if the woman was inside of him, possessing him. He felt stiff. He needed to get away.

It was only a couple blocks before he felt himself starting to tense up. His muscles became tight and his vision began to pulse in and out. Looking down, his skin was turning a sickly grey - his complexion turning rough and porous. He wasn't sure what to do. By the time he tried to move again, he was stuck where he was. He tried to speak, but his mouth was fused shut. He couldn't even move his head to look around.

Waiting seemed like the hardest part. Just waiting for someone to pass. But he soon realized it wasn't the waiting that was the worst, but watching everyone walk by without noticing him. A select few would walk right up to him, stare at him, stroke his new skin. He would scream on the inside - try to shake back and forth, but no one noticed. Helpless.

It wasn't until a week later that an architect happened to wonder down the street and stopped, eyeing him up and down.

Within weeks, he was hoisted above the city of Paris and placed on the Cathedral of Notre Dame - to stare down at those below him for eternity. To watch people come and go. The loved ones in his life would occasionally pass by, looking up, marveling at the architecture. Unaware that he was up there, a prisoner of time.

He had watched the world evolve. It didn't make sense to him anymore. The noises, the things people wore, or their habits.

As much as he wanted the old gypsy to somehow forgive him, releasing him of his curse, he was glad she was long dead. For if he had the chance to return to the world of the living, he wasn't sure if he'd want it.

He would just be a relic of the past.