dec 12

Like a dream, the grey and fog have enshrouded the edges. Softening the trees and making everything appear in grey scale, only this single spot having color and life. We sit together drinking coffee. Watching the flickering lights on the Christmas tree, comfortable with each other. We talk of times past and what may someday be. Just the two of us, as if in a cocoon, insulated from everything and everyone. Knowing it can’t last but wanting to savor every moment. Not wanting to think about the time but it intrudes, whispering. We pretend we can not hear it.
“Do you remember when?” “What will happen when?” We laugh and relax into each other. Your hands warm from the coffee cup touch my skin. The fire is starting to fade and the rain has started to fall. Like the chalk pictures in Mary Poppins, the make believe is beginning to disappear. I cling desperately to every moment. You lean forward as if to leave but I lean into you and kiss you. Just one more minute.
Finally we give into the inevitable.
“When can we do this again?”
“Shhhh, look for me in the fog, you know its only a dream.”
“What if the dream never becomes reality?”
“Then we’ve had the dream.”
“I loved our time together.”
“Me too.” The log falls and we jump startled at the sound. The rain is falling harder.
“Promise you won’t cry when I go.” I smile but the smile doesn’t reach my eyes.
“I can not. I'm sorry.”
I look out the window. The fog has moved closer, the rain slower now, but steady. Our reality shrinking further, when I look back I find myself alone. I look on the coffee table there is only one cup, the christmas tree unlit, the fireplace cold. Could it have it have only been a dream? But I can still feel your fingers on my skin, your lips caressing mine; the reality or my imagination so hard to seperate in the twilight.