Free Eyes of the Soul by Rene Folsom

Chapter One
    A blanket of stars reflected in her amethyst eyes, like sparkling crystals among a rippling body of water at sunset. I’ve never experienced a woman more stunning than the beauty that haunted my dreams.
     
    Amethyst. What an odd color for a woman’s eyes. Odd… yet absolutely breathtaking. I couldn’t get her stare out of my mind. They were the most captivating eyes I had ever seen… or dreamed about. I didn’t actually see them, although my dreams had every feeling of reality.
    Each emotion, image, and sensation of my dreams over the past six years had been nothing short of lifelike. Every morning, I woke up feeling torn with such a mixture of sensations… hope, love, sorrow, loss. But the amethyst eyes of my nightly obsessions kept me in a constant stupor throughout my high school and college years, and continued to entrance me during my days and nights.
    Not only did she haunt my dreams, but also my every waking moment was captivated by the memory of her gaze. She was in everything I did. Everything I created had a piece of her. Whether blatantly obvious or humbly subtle, she was the foundation of all my thoughts, decisions, and creations. Her beauty was my constant. And even though I didn’t know her name, I was determined that one day I would find her. I had to.
    At first I thought I was pathetic. Thriving on the possibility of finding the love of someone I only dreamed about seemed juvenile and weak. Yet, I had grown to realize my determination to seek out the one thing I desperately wanted and needed in my life made me stronger than any man who just settled for normalcy. I was now strong enough to know I didn’t want to be another sheep in the masses of conformity.
    I wanted her. I wanted to know she was real. And keeping that goal active in my mind proved to be more challenging than anything else I ever had to face in this trial we call life.
    At the age of twenty-four, I was hurdling through art school, completing my final and most brutal semester of the prestigious sculpture program at the university. I was a favorite amongst the professors and most of my classmates, yet I had never felt so conflicted. My sketchbooks, all full of beautiful amethyst eyes, were like keys to my essence… as if the purple irises could see right through me. I was certain she could dig deep into my soul.
    Even though I was still studying, I managed to land several locally commissioned jobs throughout the years and began making a name for myself. For the past several months, I’ve been working on a commissioned job for the nature museum. It took all the strength I had to deviate away from the color purple. It’s as if nothing seemed complete without it. The color had unintentionally become my signature throughout the years.
    So, with my plans in hand and the sculptures ready to glaze, I began to brainstorm over how I could somehow incorporate amethysts into my pieces without making it blatantly obvious and still adhering to the specifications of the museum director. I needed to use amethyst to mark my work somehow, but it had to be subtle.
    Closing my eyes to think, I saw her staring at me, expectantly. As if she was waiting for me to come up with a plan to somehow incorporate her into my work.
    Totally whipped. Whipped by a woman I didn’t even know. Forget that. I knew her. I may not have known her name, but I was not ashamed to say that I knew the woman who had consumed my every thought for the past six years.
    I had an idea. Even though this idea was likely going to drain every cent I would make on the job, it would also bring me the unique reputation I was working hard to build and desperately needed as a new artist.
    And not just for my reputation, but to represent the color that hazed my vision. Amethyst.
    The entire sculpture was made up of dozens of frogs, some large, some small, which would then be arranged in various groupings across the wall adjacent to the museum entrance. It would start off with a