(no subject)
The winter wind outside is blowing softly, just barely noticeable. Most walk along unaware it’s there, but I close my eyes and it kisses my cheek, dancing across my nose and down my face. Suddenly it’s gone, with nothing but a gentle chill left to remember it. I take a step and it lifts the hair on my neck slightly, like a voice whispering, “Please remember me.”
I sit in a chair that once was soft, but today it feels like a rock. I am looking across a room that seems so small lately. No matter where I look I see your shadow on the wall or the carpet squished down where it would be under your feet. I can find a crease in the couch where your head once pressed against the plush material. As I close my eyes I see your smile as you watched me out of frame, trying not to give away that you noticed me approaching. You tightened your back as I leaned in to tickle your ribs. You giggle, wrap your arms around me and squeeze until the world goes away.
I open my eyes and the room is empty again, so I whisper, “I will remember you.”
Did you know?
I used to wonder so many silly things, but now I only think of details that I missed back then. Like how you put your whole body behind every kiss you gave me, and when you looked into my eyes, it was so deep it was like you were seeing through a magic window to another world. The way your heart raced each time you touched me, to the taste of your lips.
My heart stops for a moment of silence, to remember you.
I dropped the phone when she told me. My head went black and the room spun so fast I couldn’t tell blue from pink. My face shrunk. I couldn’t breathe. I wanted to scream, but no sound would come. Only silence remains. Black, cold silence fills the air around me until my throat finally opens for a simple word.
I listened to her tell me what happened. Her voice choked and cracked as she strained to maintain. My soul shook, my skin vibrated and the air around me pounded upon my flesh. I closed my eyes, your face clear as day but darkened by the pain overwhelming me.
Did you know? All this time you made excuses for why things had to be a certain way, and why they couldn’t change, you knew. You knew that you would go to sleep and never wake up. That your heart would stop and your warmth would fade away.
I deserved to know, too.
I should have told you, I could have shown you and I would have loved you, where every single breath was like taking in a piece of the world. Every day lived like there was no tomorrow.
I could have done that. I would have done that. I should have done that, even without knowing.
We should have lived like we were dying. So many things I could have said had I known that I would never get another chance. So many things I would have asked. One last kiss; one last touch. Your presence was so strong, but so easy to overlook. Like that winter wind that whispers to me as it passes, your heartbeat tapped out to my own.
“Please remember me.”
And I do…
and I always will.