Sweet Moment in Reckoners 3

“You,” I said, tipping her chin up to look her in the eye, “are a sunrise.”
She cocked her head. “A…sunrise?”
“Yup.”
“Not a potato?”
“Not right now.”
“Not a hippo?”
“No, and…wait, when did I call you a hippo?”
“Last week. You were drowsy.”
Sparks. Didn’t remember that one. “No,” I said firmly, “you’re a sunrise. I spent ten years without sunrises, but I always remembered what they looked like. Back before we lost our home, and Dad still had a job, a friend would let us come up to the observation deck of a skyscraper in the morning. It had a dramatic view of the city and lake. We’d watch the sun come up.”
I smiled. It was a good memory, me and my father eating bagels and enjoying the morning cold. He’d always make the same joke. Yesterday, son, I wanted to watch the sunrise. But I just wasn’t up for it….
Some days, the only time he’d been able to make for me had been in the morning, but he’d always done it. He’d gotten up an hour earlier than he needed to get to work, and he’d done it after working well into the night. All for me.

“So, am I going to get to hear this glorious metaphor?” Megan said. “I’m twinkling with anticipation.”
“Well, see,” I said, “I would watch the sun rise, and wish I could capture the moment. I never could. Pictures didn’t work—the sunrises never looked as spectacular on film. And eventually I realized, a sunrise isn’t a moment. It’s an event. You can’t capture a sunrise because it changes constantly—between eyeblinks the sun moves, the clouds swirl. It’s continually something new.
“We’re not moments, Megan, you and me. We’re events. You say you might not be the same person you were a year ago? Well, who is? I’m sure not. We change, like swirling clouds and a rising sun. The cells in me have died, and new ones were born. My mind has changed, and I don’t feel the thrill of killing Epics I once did. I’m not the same David. Yet I am.”
I met her eyes and shrugged. “I’m glad you’re not the same Megan. I don’t want you to be the same. My Megan is a sunrise, always changing, but beautiful the entire time.”
She teared up. “That…” She breathed in. “Wow. Aren’t you supposed to be bad at this?”
“Well, you know what they say,” I told her, grinning. “Even a clock that runs fast is still right twice a day.”
“Actually…You know what, never mind. Thank you.”
She kissed me. Mmmmm.