In the moon’s desaturated hues, the fall breeze frustratedly blows at the blinds causing them to tremble, and they lay there, their bodies intertwined, her head resting on his arm resting on the worn pillow. Her knee pressing against his inner thigh, as his leg gently presses and half pulls her closer to him. The comforter below them strewn and bunched up at its different ends. The thin blanket they’ve tossed upon themselves, barely covering anything, a kind of afterthought at the late hour. The moon’s light refracts off the pale walls filling the moments with an ethereal atmosphere. In the night’s near silence, there is nothing else; the moon light, the suspirations of the breeze, and their intertwined bodies, a slight glistening to their shapes, when the blinds dance and spill the moonlight. Nothing else is needed, in the moment, in that moment, as their breathing reaches the same cadence, then loses it, and hurriedly seeks it again.
His eyes attempt to peer through the dark to make out the small formations on the ceiling. He breathes in deeply, breathes her in.
“Do you remember,” he queries, “when we were young?”
She repositions herself, searching for his eyes, searching. She leans closer toward him. He can feel her weight shift further onto him. His arm reaches out as his hand traces her outline, gently running down the length of her back and finding a space just below her waist.
She laughs, softly.
“We were never young,” she pauses and the distance to childhood echoes in the shadows, “not together.”
He turns to her, finding that glimmer which is always present in our eyes, even in the fading and faded light.
“But I knew you before then,” he says. “Do you remember?”
She breathes in. She breathes that quick deep susurration of surprise, of being caught off guard. She clenches her eyes tightly. She folds onto him and pulls him close, and his arms wrap themselves around her.
The sun’s soft light finds her space on the bed empty, his body still resting on a portion of the mattress, as if he were not alone. He rouses and reaches toward that space, filled in only by his memory. Leaning in, he inhales, searching for her scent. Like a dream this is familiar and it vanishes the same way, with the light streaks of morning erasing the possibility of whatever was or may have been.