Leaves in the Wind

Here on the edge of the mountain, the sun sets among wheat fields that are just a golden line on the horizon. Vibrant pinks and purples and fading blues a painted mess around the sun. The city rising up behind the trees, obscuring the little houses behind it. Glittering like misplaced starlight.

We don't speak, but when I look at you, you're looking at me and I see the sunset in your eyes. I don't know what to say, what to feel, but before I can decide you smile and take my hand. Soft hands, strong hands, pianists hands. An anchor in this world that I don't understand.

You turn away, back to the sunset, and so do I. Watching the last rays of light vanish, swallowed up by the emerging stars. I imagine the sun in each and every one them. Not gone, just disguised as something else. Something beautiful and lost among the dark satin of the night. I ache thinking about it, somewhere in my chest. And even in the beauty left in the wake of the parting sun, I long once more for the day. Brilliant, glorious daylight, where no one is lost.

"It's too late to turn back." You say, voice low. It's strange that I do not startle at the suddenness of it. Perhaps I have grown too used to you. "We'll get lost in the trees."

A breeze stirs the leaves behind us, leaving something uncertain and precarious. Something deeper than the danger of the edge before us. There's something here, something frightful but I do not understand it. I cannot even find it. I do not know if it has been following us, or if I brought it within me and my lost memories but I feel it rising slowly. Responding to the call of my fear and doubt. Whispering tendrils gathering where we cannot see.

I look away, wordless. You don't say anything else, and I wonder if you feel it too. But I don't ask. I simply stand there against the shadows, longing for the light. My only comfort your hand and your breath and the certainty of tomorrows daylight.

A Pretty Picture I Found Shortly After Posting

His eyes flutter open, eyelids purple blue, dried blood cracking and flaking away. Immediately his eyes begin drifting, searching, until they find her face. Layers of confusion and worry falling away like pages turning, finally settling on that blind shining love from the day they were engaged.

"Tayu." He whispers, awestruck.

Discomfort rises. sticking in her chest and the men have gone quiet but she can still feel their presence. Awareness like needles in her back.

"You're late." Is all she can think to say. Her voice strained from the lingering tightness in her throat. She's glad for it. It masks the uncertainty.

He doesn't answer, just reaches to cup her face, fingers trembling minutely on her cheek before he kisses her. Tears spill over, dampening the kiss until it tastes of salt and the copper of blood. Coating their lips after they've separated.

"I missed you." He whispers, lips turning up at their corners, eyes bright and blue and loving, and she sobs, shoulders shaking as she folds. He finds her wrist, doesn't let go. "Shh, shh. It's okay." he soothes. "It's going to be alright."

It's not, she thinks. Because I didn't miss you. But she doesn't say it. She nods her head and covers her mouth and caresses his cheek and she doesn't say it. And she never will.