Her fingers delicately glided across the glossy black neck of the violin. With each subtle movement a new vibrant key sung from the voluptuous instrument. Upon her face she wore an expression so serene it was as though she were looking into a distant and private reverie. Sitting on her balcony and bathed in the coral glow of sunset, she lost herself in the moment -- as she has many times before.
The solo performance was always attended by a single person; the same person. Many times her sat, waiting in earnest to hear her sweet, soulful song. From across the manicured courtyard he excitedly had observed her emerge from her small apartment, violin in hand. Her auburn hair fluttered wildly like a halo of tiny butterflies as her long pink nightgown rippled in the gentle evening breeze.
Watching her, as he always did, he put his pen to paper. Certainly he had encountered more beautiful women in his life, but in his eyes, none could compare to his muse. Ink flowed from his pen, describing in long detail her fair, elfin features. He shook away the inkling to call her exotic, because she was -- in many ways -- painfully familiar to him. Yet, often he felt, from across the emerald expanse that separated their mirrored dwellings, he was beholding a creature from another time; the incarnation of a siren or some lesser goddess.
Nevertheless, he was bewitched by her. She seemed to live a quiet, solitary life like his. Everyday she came and went like clockwork, occasionally returning with only a few small parcels of common necessities. Even less often she would have visitors. Yet, she never seemed melancholy. Just like everything else he witnessed, she would appear on her balcony with her violin as though it was a formal symphony performance.
But unlike she appeared, he was lonely. He didn't need anyone to tell him he was a striking, attractive man; he knew this to be true. He also knew in his heart that kind, gentlemen like himself are easily broken by the carelessness of others. After several heartbreaks he has retreated into a safe, albeit empty, solitude. That loneliness began to ebb when she moved into the apartment facing his. It was also when he first started to feel the compulsion to write again. Certainly he had written love letters and short poems for previous lovers, but never had the urge been so great. They were just lines, half-thoughts, at first. Soon, though, he became bolder. Odes and stories, and soon journals began to fill his once bare shelves. But his secret remained a heavy secret; never had even mentioned his redhaired subject, even to the closest of friends. In the year he had watched her and listened to her exquisite siren song, he grew thinner, knowing that he was pining for her.
