The fire is cracking and popping and I am sitting in the window seat, drowsily watching the fat flakes of snow falling past outside, and thinking of you. I rub at one of the panes, frosted with my breath, and peer into the swirling whiteness. Did I imagine it, or are there two figures out there, dancing; kissing?
I remember the first time I saw you. It was snowing then, too. It was a Christmas Ball and I was bored, as I often was. I had opened the garden doors, taken a step onto the patio and there you were. You froze me with a glance. I had never seen such beautiful eyes in such a beautiful face. You smiled at me, snowflakes caught in your eyelashes.
It was a long time before I took in the rest of you. Your soft, black hair, tied with a velvet ribbon. Your slender body, enclosed all in black. Your long legs in the high leather boots. Your luscious lips and shy smile. When I did, my knees began to tremble.
You didn't say a word to me; just took my hand and led me out onto the grass where we danced among the snowflakes, to the music spilling from the house.
That was the first of many times we danced, but the only time we danced in the snow. When the dance ended we kissed and I lost my heart.
The fire hisses and sighs as I remember the day I lost you. A servant came riding with news that you had been thrown by your horse and were desperately ill. I felt my heart break and I knew that we would never again dance as we had danced before.
So many days flashed through my head as I rode as I had never ridden before or since. So many days of dancing and smiling and kissing. You, smiling down from the back of that great black beast you rode, bending for a kiss. You, dancing in the rain, naked as the day you were born, with that glorious hair flinging out in all directions, dusted with diamond drops. You, lying on the rug in front of the fire, the flickering flames bronzing your skin and making your brown eyes burn amber.
Even now, flames make me think of your eyes; the volcano of passion that hides behind their mildness.
I remember trying to hold on to the memories, the days, the moments slipping through my mind like grains of sand in a timer; a life slipping through my fingers with nothing I could do to stop it... nothing but...
Oh it is still painful, that memory, that moment when I saw you, your face as white as the pillows on which they had lain you. I'm sure, even now, that if you had not been waiting for me you would have been dead before I got there. But you held on; you held on just for me.
When you heard my voice you opened your eyes and smiled at me. It was the most beautiful smile I had ever seen, but it broke my heart because I knew it would be your last. I saw death in your eyes, felt his presence, a cold breath on the back of my neck.
There was no hope in your eyes, but neither was there despair. You were as you had always been, content to accept what was given. Life or death. It was out of your hands and were happy to leave it out of mine. You knew that I wasn't ready; that there had been no time. Perhaps you were ready to surrender yourself to the arms of death, but I wasn't. No matter what I had decided; no matter what we had talked about in the soft glow of the dying fire, I was not ready to say goodbye.
Closing my eyes I shiver. I think there is someone out there, in the snow. Didn't I just hear a laugh? Didn't I just hear a sigh? Didn't I just see the glow as they kissed?
